7 Fascinating Insights About Billie Eilish From Her Elle Cover Story

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Billie Eilish is Elle’s latest covert star, appearing in the pages of the publications May issue to promote her new concert tour film Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D), which she co-directed with James Cameron. In the accompanying interview with Suzy Exposito, Eilish talks about her evolving relationship with her brother, her body, and her career (among other things). Here are some of our favorite tidbits (and a whole bunch of great pics!).

On her brother Finneas and their rumored falling out since deciding not to tour together for the first time:

“I heard somebody say, ‘Did you guys hear Finneas and Billie had a falling-out?’ Finneas and I have never and will never have a falling-out, ever in our lives. We’ll get in the biggest fucking fight you’ve ever heard of in your life… and five minutes later, we’re back, laughing and making music. It’s sibling shit. There’s nothing else in the world like sibling relationships.”

She later muses, “If I never saw Finneas at all, I might literally never make a song again….” She trails off, seemingly considering the flip side of that closeness. “But how do we move on and have separate lives?”

On being the artist at the top of her own Spotify Wrapped list every year:

“My friends make fun of me [but] I’m sorry, I make the music I want to listen to.”

On her favorite James Cameron movie, Titanic:

“I hate to be so on the nose, but it’s a beautiful movie. There was like, me before I watched that movie, and me after I watched the movie. My friends and I watched it when we were 12, and it was the first day that I decided I would start swearing.”

On why she started wearing baggy clothes:

“I’m not the first person who’s worn baggy clothes,” she says of her wardrobe, citing inspirations like Harlem fashion influencer Bloody Osiris and hip-hop icons Tyler, the Creator and Missy Elliott. But she also craved the freedom of movement afforded by these clothes, and the resulting gender euphoria of it all. “I had a really, really toxic relationship with my body,” Eilish says. “I had a lot of eating issues. I remember putting on, like, a big shirt and the relief that I felt. At the same time, it was my love for hip-hop culture and wanting to be a man. This is the misogyny that we all have within us…which is that I didn’t want to be seen as feminine, and therefore weak. It’s not right. I’ve found a good way of not feeling like that.”

On maintaining her love of performing:

“I advocated for not being gone for longer than four weeks at a time without a break,” she says. “Performing is my actual favorite thing in the world to do. So when I feel like I don’t like it? That’s when I want to recalibrate so I can enjoy it again.”

On making her acting debut in Sarah Polley’s upcoming film adaptation of Sylvia Plath’s 1963 novel The Bell Jar:

“Writing and directing a film is so much work. I don’t know if that’ll ever be a thing that I do, but the acting side [is what] I’m really interested in,” she says. “We’ll see where that takes us.”

On what filming her concert with Cameron means to her:

“Capturing a show that I can watch when I’m old and feel like I’m there again…it gives me chills,” she says. “And I’m so grateful that it’s going to live forever.”