Amanda Seyfried's stage fright is stopping her from performing on Broadway.

The 40-year-old actress used to dream of starring on Broadway, but Amanda admits that she'd be too anxious to sing in front of a live audience.

Speaking about the challenge of singing in The Testament of Ann Lee, the new historical musical drama film, Amanda told Vanity Fair: "I'm always striving to just be a little better. But this movie has made me step back a bit and appreciate what I already have.

"My voice coach is like, 'Where have you been' because I've known her for so long, and I'm like, 'I'm okay now.' I think my plan was to do a musical on Broadway, and then I made the decision to never put myself through that - because to be honest, my stage fright is like, life's too short.

Amanda has actually found it liberating to accept that she'll never sing on Broadway.

She said: "When I decided that I wasn't gonna do that for the foreseeable future, I just took a step back from voice lessons. I remember that day on set, actually. I was in Budapest, and I remember thinking I'd had two nightmares back to back about doing this musical on Broadway. I was just talking to my agent in a little break in my corseted dress and thinking, 'I can't put myself through that.'

"It's a devastating thing to uncover about myself, but it doesn't mean I'm weak. It just means that I know myself well enough to know that this will break me - and that was really liberating."

Amanda made her feature film debut in the teen comedy Mean Girls back in 2004.

The movie - which also starred the likes of Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams and Tina Fey - proved to be a huge hit with cinemagoers, and Amanda is still regularly reminded of the project.

Asked if she's re-watched Mean Girls, Amanda told Variety: "No. It's on often enough, though.

"I love it. I really love seeing my face on people's T-shirts. I'm a little resentful because Paramount still owes me some money for the likeness. Every store sells Mean Girls T-shirts with our faces. Don't I [get something from that]? Even the girl at TSA tells me it's her favourite movie."