Keira Knightey isn't ashamed to admit that plenty of people think she's a bad actress.
"Every time I do an interview with the English press, one of their questions is, 'How do you feel knowing that everyone thinks you're a sh** actress?'" she tells the March issue of Elle (on newsstands Feb. 16).
Not that the critics have affected her paycheck.
In 2008, the 24-year-old star was named the second-highest-earning actress by Forbes. She earned $32 million — only to be surpassed by Cameron Diaz, who made $50 million — for her roles in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End and Atonement as well as ads for Chanel perfume.
(She was also the only British star to make either of Forbes' lists of the 10 best-paid actresses or the 10 highest earning actors.)
"You have to be selective about the people whose advice and opinions you take," Knightley, who shot to prominence in 2003's Bend it Like Beckham, says.
Still, she values honesty and says she prefers to surround herself by people who tell her the unvarnished truth. Namely, her parents.
"I know they would never tell me I was sh** because they were trying to hurt me," she says. "It would always come from a very sincere place."
