Selena Gomez was given a lesson in cigarette smoking so she could play a bad girl in racy new movie Spring Breakers.

The 19-year-old former Disney star sheds her squeaky-clean image to play a wild college student in the film, but admits she needed a few tips on how to embrace her dark side.

She tells Interview magazine, "I was getting kind of repetitive in terms of the roles I was picking, and I really wanted to do something that was completely different. It was a mark thing for me - like, 'This is what I want to be doing.' I want to be taking myself seriously as an actress...

"This was definitely a stretch. I mean, I'd never smoked a cigarette before in my entire life. It was really funny - they had to show me how to do it."