America Ferrera is Seventeen magazine’s October 2008 cover girl. Here are some of the highlights of the interview.

On being friends with Sisterhood costars Blake Lively, Amber Tamblyn, and Alexis Bledel: “One of the most wonderful experiences I’ve had with girl relationships was working with them on Sisterhood. I’d worked with other girls before and it was pretty catty. But this time, I thought, I don’t want to feel judged or defensive. So before we started shooting, I was like, I’m just going to show up to work and be professional – not their best friend. But a couple of weeks into shooting, Amber and I started talking. She’s a hippie and I thought we had nothing in common – and now she’s one of my closest friends!”

On Gossip Girl being a bad influence: “Close, genuine female relationships are not what generally gets depicted in movies and TV shows. Like, if you’re watching The Hills or 90210, all the backstabbing shapes the way we act – you go to school, and you think your job is to find a sworn enemy and be jealous of each other. I mean, I love Blake [Lively]; she’s a wonderful friend of mine, but shows like Gossip Girl kind of condition us to be mean.”

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