QLS Classic: Anika Noni Rose

Published Mar 4, 2024, 5:01 AM

Celebrate Women's History Month at Questlove Supreme with 2021 conversation and a guest can literally do it all and does in the world of theater, TV and film. Think about it, Anika Noni Rose is an award winning actress who has played an array of characters who live in totally different worlds. From a Disney princess to crooked cop with enough edge to rival 50 Cent, she does it and we believe it. Whether she is singing her sentiments or speaking with a South African accent we feel her presence. But what is her story, where does such talent come from? Find out these answers and more!

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Questlove Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. Hi.

This is Sugar Steve from Questlove Supreme. This March, we're celebrating women's history at QLs, something that we've done for years. Back in March of twenty twenty one, we spoke to Anika Noni Rose about her acting, singing and voice work. She discussed growing up in Connecticut, working on Dream Girls, and landing a life changing audition for Disney's The Princess and the Frog. This is a powerful and sincere conversation that is worthy of hearing, and I hope you enjoy it.

Oh, I didn't know you say it was up Hi Ceo in the Corn's it.

That's funny. I thought I was visible for about six minutes, and I was like, oh, I'm just a blank square.

So we're just talking about the salt and pepper Lifetime, The salt Lifetime.

Deep Salt Pepper, Deep Salt Pepper.

Did you watch it yet? Protect Come on, brother, I was on time for that thing. Man's thirty seconds. Thirty seconds?

Okay, the salt and pepper story, it was, I mean, it was cool for Lifetime. I thought they cast salt real good pepper. I wasn't really too convinced on Pepper. I really was not convinced with Tretch. I really liked the way they cast Herbie love Bug and the twin although it hasn't really been documented that Herbie love Bug has a twin brother does have a he has a brother. I don't know if it's his twin brother, but Herbie, Herbie does have a brother. It looked like it was the lookalike was in his uh it was in the he was in the shoot video. I want to say his brother is was in the shoot video. I can't remember which scene, but anyway, Yeah, I mean it was a little too long. I felt like it probably could have been like two hours. I mean, you know, if it was Jackson, it was hours long.

It was three hours.

And mind you, let's contrast that with the Jackson's story being four hours.

So that was multiple movie nights.

Okay, yeah, the jack Nat was five yes, yes, yeah.

So did you learn anything about salt and pepper at all? Not that you didn't know, but just anything I didn't know that, uh, pepper was not pepper. Salt had to eating disorder.

They kind of they kind of hinted it that, you know what I'm saying that was the new information, but yeah, that was it, and you know it was I watched that ship on a Sunday afternoon of my couched Nigga.

Hey man, welcome to the show.

Welcome to the show. So yeah, this is Quest Love Supreme and uh I'm yours quest though. That was that was our cold open take a little hot take on the Salt and Pepper Lifetime movie.

Am as this episode airs in women's history mo yeah yeah yeah.

Anyway, so we have a sugar Steve with us. I have a hell we have unpaid bill and we have Laya with us as well. Our Esteem guest today, Great, thanks for asking, but oh okay, how you doing, Steve? Great? Okay, nice weather. I like I like this sweater. It's it's a champion hoodie. It's not a sweater. Okay, Well they can't see you on the on on. I mean it's a very expensive sweater, Steve. Can I please introduce the guest anyway? Our steam guest today is an amazing, versatile, award winning actress who stage credits range from Carl Jones to Raising His Sun to Eli's Coming Carolina Change, which she won a Tony Award and her TV credits so many Ladies, Number One Detective Agency. She played Wendy Carr, one of my favorite TV shows. I missed The Good Wife so much, Like that's one of my favorite shows ever, and I wish we're still here, even though you know, the the not the reboot, but a good fight is sort of okay, you know, but anyway. We also can't forget her role as a jukebox character on everyone's favorite guilty Pleasure Power, not to mention Little Fires Everywhere. She also did The Quad and had a cool bucket list check as a voice on The Simpsons. Uh, not to mention her movie credits are just his own point. This past Christmas, she started in Netflix's amazing jingle Jangle The Christmas Journey, which hopefully will last for years and decades and decades and decades.

Christmas story.

Yeah, definitely, my all, my niece's nephews enjoyed it. Not to mention, there's dream Girls for colored girls only. And also yes, she starred as Princess Tiana as the first Black Princess and the historical Princess and the Frog for Disney. Incidentally, she is the youngest inductee dever be honored as a Disney legend. I want to know what a Disney legend is and do I qualify for my four seconds? Now I'm playing Anyway, Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to our show. Oh my fellow Academy a member. It's it's like a secret society that only people know. Anyway, Welcome to Coest Love Supreme, Anika Noni Rose, thank you, thank you for coming.

Thank you.

I wanted to ask, how how have you made out in the past year. You know this, this this year has been difficult on a lot of people, and it's been an adjustment for artists in all mediums like and for singers, for you know, actors, and for pretty much anyone in the arts is it's been an adjustment. So how have you been adjusting to the past year or so?

I the past year was rough. It was it was a rough year, you know, And then you sort of feel funny even saying that, because it's been rough for everybody, like heavy, for everybody in lieu of work. I've been really lucky because I'm a voiceover artist. So even when I can't do something where you see me on a set, I can still do voiceover work. So that's a blessing, you know, to be able to do that. And I've started doing some film work as well, which was weird and still feels weird to be on a set because I still sort of feel like, don't be that close to me. So professionally, I would have to say that I've been I've been pretty lucky in that respect, you know. Personally, it's taken some adjusting too. It's been wild. It's been a frightening year. It's been a year full of really intense anger. If there is an emotion on the emotional scale, I don't think that we've been saved from it this year. I think we've done that whole circle. So, you know, I'm grateful to be healthy, especially as an asthmatic. I'm very grateful to be healthy. I'm grateful that my family wasn't touched as often as some people have been by COVID and that type of loss. But I've lost friends and I've lost family, and it's been a really shit year. To be perfectly honest.

No, we welcome that honesty, you know.

You know, I'm grateful for the possibility of change and we'll see, you know, how just how much people are able to do. But you know, January twentieth, when everybody finally got inside and the doors were locked and the cameras were gone, I felt like I could breathe a little bit. I just wanted everybody to go inside. I was like, this is great, can you now go inside? Everyone, everybody. I want Mama inside, I want to step children inside. I want everybody inside. So I was really I felt like it felt like at the end of the move of a movie, like a movie shoot when I've been wearing a corset and I have to take that course and get to take that courset off for the last day. It felt like I have been wearing a corset for four years and I finally got to take that thing off and get a deep breath in. I felt like I could just breathe a little bit.

That is a very great metaphor. We've all been wearing spanks for the last four years.

West trainers.

Waist trains and on Bill and the face like, I was like, do we have to translate this for you?

Like no, no, no, I'm hyptop type clothing.

You know, I admire you for, you know, the transparency and the honest honesty about it because you know, this has been a hard adjustment this past year, and for a lot of us, this forced us to deal with ourselves and to deal with the people in our lives, like to really get to know them. I mean, if you're quarantining alone or with the partner, your children or your family members and that sort of thing. So this was an adjustment for you know, a lot of us, and you know, a lot of us didn't didn't make it, you know, through the past year wiser or you know, I know a lot of people that are in this field that have given into to panic and fear and that sort of thing. And sort of what three divorces going on right now? Like three's going through divorces? Yeah wow, yeah, you know, I hope for you that you know, it was at least a lesson. But for the voiceover work, was it more of a pivot for you? Or was it what you were always doing or was it something new that you weren't exactly prepared to make, you know, something as serious as far as your career is concerned.

It's something that I've always been doing and that I really enjoy doing, and then it became something that I was also really really grateful to be able to do you know, outside of just saying, oh yeah, I get to do voiceover. I'm a voiceover artist. That's fun and I'm glad to do that. It became something to be really grateful for during this past year.

Can I has what experience does that entail? I took one hand. I did one time of trying to do voiceover work, and you know, I kind of I'll say I was unprepared. It was like an American Express card and I realized that like the inflections that you have to have and you know, read things sustinctly, so I well like.

What I do a little bit too. I would.

Not like.

What what does good voice over work entail? As far as having to I assume that if you get called back, that means you're good enough to to work again.

So you know, it's different. It's different for depending on what type of voiceover you're doing. Like if you're doing a commercial and they call you to be your voice because your voice is because you know you are questlove. They just want to hear your voice. So there's some things that you don't have to worry about. You don't have to create a character, but you still have to read whatever it is that they've given you in a way that gets the whatever emotional tone that they want, how does it push their product the best way. So in that respect, you know you have to be ready for that. If you're doing a character, they're looking for actors most of the time, unless, of course, you're being called in to be yourself. They're still looking for you to be an actor, but you still get to be yourself, which takes a little bit of that onus off of you. But I would say if they're looking for a character, if you're talking about a cartoon or an animated feature, or even a voice over for a feature film, there's acting involved because you need to know how to put forth the emotion the information that they need to have. And I think that what trips people up is that they think, oh, oh well, let's just I'm just going there and talk. It's gonna be fine. And it's a lot more than that. And it's also tiresome because if you are doing a whole feature or something like that, they may want you to lay that whole thing down in one day and by the time you're done, you're like, thanks, that was that was really nice.

And it's also very competitive too, because unlike in some ways, even more so than acting, because we're acting, you can kind of age out of.

A role, so to speak.

But in voice acting, I mean, hell, Nancy Cartwright been playing Bart Simpson for thirty years, you.

Know what I'm saying.

So once you get in those roles, you kind of stay there, and if you're there, you.

Can stay there. But it is extraordinarily competitive. It is becoming more different by the day and more competitive by the day because it's becoming more compartmentalized by the day as well. So it's very interesting watching the shift. But to be able to be on The Simpsons was so much fun and I got to be so silly, and anytime I get to be silly, I am very happy. And you know, Princess Gianna was a huge, huge honor. But I love doing voiceover for me. I love being able to create a character. I love when somebody listens to something and they don't realize it's me, or they figure it out real late. That that gives me a kick, Like I feel real honored when that happens, and that's exciting to me.

And that's the difference. That's what Creed Summer taught us.

Y'all remember like that is why Anika is in the cree tribe of things where you can't tell them, where you can do all kinds of different characters and whatnot. But then there's just the voice over a voice over artists, which is sometimes like you said, just direct what you're.

Talking about a commercial where they're like, hey, we want to know who this person is because they want to sell their project product on that person's voice. And look, trust if Nike or Apple or any of those people want to be like Ana, it would be great to I'll be there before they finish the sentence. I'll be right there, right there, direct deposit form in hand.

Yes, I wish I knew that ahead of time, because I think I came there prepared to do like my dom Pardo uh impression. Then when I when I asked my manager, like, so what they think, They're like, they're going to roll with da da da da, I was like, where I mess up? And they were like, they just wanted you to sound like you were mere. And I was like, oh, you know, I was talking like this the whole time and no, no, no, no, So now now now I know that, Okay, Yeah, but there would.

Be another chance for you because your quest love and they see you on TV all the time and you are distinctive and now you know, well common can.

Sell a I I think you can say okay, okay, okay, all right, because because you have uh kind of both feet in all of these uh areas of acting? Is it one? Is it? Is it highly unusual to not just concentrate on one particular medium like strictly television or the Broadway stage or movies like are you just one of those supernatural people that will just take whatever comes your way? Or you know? Or is it highly unusual for a person in the acting feeld to sort of stretch out to all three different arenas. I'm sure there's more than three, but I know TV, right.

And I think that when you can do that, you're lucky to be able to do that. So I think that, you know, and let me not say that it's just luck, because somebody is going to be like, oh, excuse me, ma'am. You know, there's a lot of training involved, there's a lot of work involved to be the actor or performer that I am. And I've been lucky for the time that I've been here, that I was here at the perfect time to be able to be in the running to be Princess Tiana, because five years beforehand or two years beforehand, two years afterwards could it wouldn't have been me, you know. But also there is an adjustment of your craft depending on what you're doing. You're not doing the same thing on stage necessarily that you're going to be doing on film that you're going to be doing on television. And it's not something that I can be clear about, but there are tiny adjustments. And there are some people for whom they're amazing on film and they get on stage and you're like what. And there are some people who are on stage and you're like, I've never seen anything like it, and they get on film you're like oh, and you know, so there are there's a translation that happens. And if you are somebody who is able to translate to different mediums, well, it is again a blessing. It's the work that you've done, but it's also you know, you're lucky to be able to do that, because there are people for whom they are magnificent actors in either realm, but they get on screen and your face looks funny and you don't know why your face looks funny because your face looks great in person, but the screen will change your face, Like you get up there and you're like, wait a minute, why does my eye look so high on that side? Those things happen on screen, So the reasons that people don't make it on screen aren't always about their talent per se. There's always something that can make it not work for you. So I'm glad to be able to do all three things. And it was a plan for me to be able to do all three things because I like to do all three things and I'm somebody who I get tired of doing the same thing over and over, Like it's important to me to be able to stretch out and try something different and be in a different space because I get ant see and I want to be able to challenge myself. And basically, anytime you see me doing something different, it's because I was like, yeah, I want to try that.

Let me see if I can do that well, and I jump in which one edges out more like what do you prefer? Do you prefer the stage? TV or movies?

I what was the last or or movie or movie?

But then again there's also voiceover so I mean it's like.

For I love stage, and you know why, you know that feeling being on stage, live in front of people, and the challenge that it is to yourself every time you're on a stage, how much better it makes you having to do that, wanting.

To do it.

I love stage and I love film, and that's a different type of challenge, and it's also finite, which is sort of level. But on stage you have more control over what you're doing, over the performance that you're giving. And I really feel like stage is the place where I sharpen my pencil, where I hone my skill, so that when I step out to do something else, I know that I have grown a new limb from the time that I spent live on stage.

Oh, I was gonna ask, have you ever given any consideration that thought about like singing, like making the nikoonni Rolls album?

Like is that a is that a dream of fashion of yours?

I love to sing.

I have.

An album that I've been wanting to do for several years and I just don't quite know how to do it. And then I have a different musical project that I'm actually in the works of planning now. So yes, I love singing and I don't know. And I think probably even when I started, when I started as a performer, I wanted to be I wanted to be like a Grammy winner. I said, by the time I was twenty one, I want to grabby That's what I wanted to do. That's what I didn't know that I wanted to be an actor, and that feeling came later. And then I've just been really really focused on this part of my career and I think that it is it is a loss to me inside of me to not sing as much as I used to, even and definitely that is in my plans. I just have to some things I need to figure out. That's a help I need.

I need some help which a genre of passion.

That's probably part of the problem. I just love to say. So I need to focus, you know. And I have a focus on something I did. I did a concert series a few, oh god, several years ago now very bad at time, and it was a tribute to my grandmother. And I would like to turn that into an album. And I always wanted to do some sort of like poppy thing, some sort of pop R and B. I love rock. I would love to put out a rock song, so like I'm not, I don't feel like, oh well, I would only do you know what I mean?

Because you have a song out now right that's really popular from the Jingle Jangle down here.

Yes, and John Legend wrote this song. It's called Make It Work, and it is such a brilliant piece of writing. And he is so interesting because his soul, I think, is one hundred and two years old and right he puts all of that into his music. So what Make It Work gave me was R and B and got bull and a henta pop and a tap of rock all up in one thing. And it gave me intense musical joy to be able to sing it. I love it so deeply. And it was so smart with regard to the movie because it was talking about many different things. It was talking about making the relationship work between me and my dad, but it was also talking about him making his creation work and making his life work again. And what John managed to do in the music is he has a work song in there, like an actual work song from time in the Fields. You can feel it in the bass and the movement of that song, and it talks to you in a way that I don't know if people realize they're being spoken to. It comes from the inside. And you know, music moves you in wavelengths because your body moves on wavelengths. So when people are like, oh, I hate a musical, but then they go to a musical and they're like, god, I kind of even amazing. They've got caught because of what the music has done to your body and the wavelengths that your body moves on. And when music is really good, it seeps into your body that way. And I think that that's part of what he created with that song having written it, and it was my great joy to be able to come in and partner with him and take it to the next place of that vocally. It was an amazing experience for me, and I loved it.

I wanted to know what before you said that, you know, the stage is what caused you more of all the avenues that you can do your craft. I wanted to know that, even it's weird that that's your choice, even though like a thing. Think a lot of times stage actors get not dismissed, but I mean there's really no glamour or glory in it so much. You know, like the baccolades that a movie actor or a television actor would get this hardly, you know, extended to the Broadway world, and at that there's so much pressure because you kind of have to deliver out the park every night, Like there's no such thing as a bad night or one false newe you know, especially with musicals, Like how hard is it to preserve your like and basically to hit it out the park every night when you're on stage, Like how much pressure is that?

Musicals are particularly exhausting, but it's also life giving, Like you leave the stage, you finish your show. For me, it takes hours for me to become tired. I am so high when I leave the stage, you know, like my energy is moving. And I get home, I make something to eat, and I talk on the phone or read something. I'm up for hours. It takes me hours to fall asleep because of the energy coursing through my body. But it's exhausting, and it takes an extraordinary amount of discipline, which I don't I don't know that people who haven't done it realize that, which is why it sometimes conquers people who haven't done it and are like, yeah, let's do that, and then they're like, oh my god, it's show number four. I'm about to die because it's a murderer like that if you don't know how to pace yourself for it. So depending on what you're doing, Like for me, if I'm doing a musical, I want nine hours of sleep period. I don't want to talk to people about it. I don't don't call me in no single digit am. No, I'm not trying to get up to do nothing with you. No, we're not going one out at night because I have to make sure that somebody one hundred and fifty dollars or however much they spent is worthwhile when they come to that stage. And it's that's my job. And I take too much pride in what I do to ruin it by being out at a bar or out doing whatever. And look, some people can do that. I can't. I'm speaking about it.

The show is done, and no, I.

May go out to get something to eat, but what you will not see me do is talk.

Done.

I'll be at a restaurant eating, But if I'm talking to somebody, I'm talking in their ear, like I'm in their ear right here, real quiet, because you're going to I'm gonna lose my voice trying to speak over the din of a restaurant. You stress your voice so badly that the next day your voice is tired, not from the show you did, from the talking you did after. So I am really I go home most of the time, and I drink an extraordinary amount of water. I probably drink about two leaders of water a day, no less, to make sure everything is moving. I eat it super properly and well, because I can't afford to be sick at all.

You're vegan, no dairy.

I am not vegan. I would like to be that person, but that's where my discipline doesn't quite get that far. I need a piece of meat, you know, and not every day, but I need some meat or I'm cranky and tired. But I do you know, I cut back on I don't eat a whole lot of fried stuff. I don't eat a whole lot of spicy stuff. I don't eat a whole lot of heavy, heavy stuff. Why because those are the things that get on your body and say, ooh you've had fun, you ate really well, how about some reflux for tomorrow. So those are all things that I'm thinking about when I'm performing and somebody is going to be like, Oh, you don't have to do all that. I never had to do all it. I do this, I do that. That's great for them, and I wish I was that person. But for me, it involves a whole lot of discipline, and I'm not bitter about it because it's the thing that I love to do, so it always feels worth it.

That's weird to hear because the time that I was involved with the cast of Faila, they would go super hard, like every.

Night, like that's like a thing and a star thing. I think like you get to a certain age, you can't party that hard when you're like, you know, a lot of the ensemble kids don't feel like they need to save the voice as much as the word stopped you right there.

Bill Present said something that I'm a now I can understand why you wouldn't have to you about to be muted.

Canceled.

I have never This has always been the way that I approached my job. It's my job and I and you know, FELA was an amazing show with amazing artists in it. Also a dance heavy show. I don't think it was as vocally heavy as it was dance heavy, and it's a different type of singing because it's also choral singing. So everybody singing except for uh, what was his name, Sasha Sar who was Chef's Kiss magnificent. So it's choral singing, so you have a whole lot of voices that can fill that thing out. And if and again let me make this clear, no shade whatsoever. But if one choral person is singing at level six or seven on a Tuesday night, the audience isn't going to know that one choral person is singing at six or seven unless that person has a solo. So when you're in a show that you can do choral work, I think you have a little more space. You can lean on that day what you said.

The person.

That is next to you in a different way. But if Sar would go out drinking every single night, Sar, I'm gonna have a different show the next day, you know what I mean? And he was, oh god, they were magnificent in that show.

Wait, speaking of Bill good, well, now he's canceled build instead of yeah, wait a minute, because Ninka, I was looking on your your credits and I saw Hamilton there. Explain this to me when when was your run with this? Because I didn't do a run.

I helped workshop Hamilton.

Ah, So I did the original table like the the last not the last workshop, but the second to last workshop to Hamilton.

We did a workshop up at Vassar at New York Station Film, which was amazing, and then I did A Raisin in the Sun and I couldn't really do anything while I was doing A Raisin in the Sun because it was a three hour tour and I was it was just a really busy and heavy show and dramatic, and I didn't have a lot of space to do other things while that was happening. They were still doing work another workshop for it after that, and they got the lovely Renee Goldsbery and she ended up being blessed with the role. But that's how those things happened, you know what I mean. Like sometimes sometimes.

Bill, I was I was not at that. I thought you were going to bring up being on the Sesame Street float, which is what you and Anica have in common other than many other things.

No, but I mean she when I read that she was in the initial Hamilton thing, I was like, wait a minute, Bill, that's that's your whole world I did.

I didn't know that I wasn't. I wasn't there during that, but I know that Anica was the first Angelica many many moons ago.

Wow. Oh okay, yeah, okay. I was just confused because when I read that, I was like, wait a minute, I could.

Have sworn it was to make a record a mirror, and she was not there when we made that record, and that's the thing.

I was like, wait, was I in ruined?

It was so crazy? Is that Renee and I actually did the good fun together? And she is so amazing and beautiful and fantastic. And to watch her, you know, step up there and get that Tony and give that beautiful speech afterwards. I was so happy for her because she is such a good person as well as being you know, stupendously talented and not too painful on the eye. She's she's a lovely human being. So, you know, sometimes you lose out on a role as somebody, and with no rationality at all, you're sitting at home mad at the person. It has nothing to do with that person and you, but you have a little mad you home, sending them to no mad cussing under your breath. But she is somebody for whom you really can't begrudge anything. She's so good at what she does. She's such a lo person. She is, She's really a blessing. So I was really really happy for her. Does that mean I was not sad that I didn't get to do it now, But it does mean I had a great time when I did do it, and I was happy that the person who ended up getting to do it was somebody really beautifully fitted to what it was.

Oh nice, I mean you wanted Tony previously for Carolina Cheams. What was that like to I believe that that world is very not unpenetrable, but just very hard to get a seat at the table, just based on my limited experience of being in that world, So I mean, what did it feel like to get the acknowledgment?

At least it was one of the most amazing moments of my career because it was the last thing that I expected. I just had no idea that that was what was going on to come from that role. And even when at the time people were like, oh, we're coming to see your show, I was like, well, it's not really my show. I come in at this point in time, but come to see the show, because the show is amazing and everybody was phenomenal in it. I was stunned when I got nominated and then when I won, I I if you ever get to see that video, Like my head dropped, Like they said my name, they said my first name. I didn't even hear my middle name. My head went down. And then I was just focused on not tripping.

As I got to the stage, Everyone's like, don't fall, don't fall.

There's a lot of wires. Don't tell you that on the heel.

And you haven't eaten for six hours freezing because yeah, and you're not trying to drink nothing because your dress is fitted and you're not trying to have come up put a pinch, so all those things. But I did have a lunar bar in my purse. Oh I always have a snack. I'm the one a snack because otherwise I'm cranky.

So you established that you're angry, Like.

But my friend, my friends like, NA, we're just going to carry some snacks for you because you don't really know how to act after a certain impoortant time. And I was like, no, but I can't even deny that. So I had snacks but you know, what was amazing to me was that it was a collection of my peers who said, you, you did something that stands out that is worthy of recognition. And I looked out into Radio City Music Hall and the people in the balcony. I could see them barely, but I could see them like they stood, and I could hear. At some point my hearing came back, like I got to the stage and then I could hear this wave of applause and I could see the Oh, the woman who wrote the music, Jantia Sorri, was climbing over somebody else to grab them. While it was happening, my brother was in the audience, my grandmother was there, and both of my parents, and I think I was so very moved and full, and I think that you know those times when you just have no idea, like I didn't even know when nominations came out, and I try not to know because I feel like it's stress. Live. I don't need that stress. You know, it's so rare that we're in a position where we were nominated for something and then go ahead and get it. That's something else, So I don't need to be thinking about Oh, April second is blah blah. That's stress you don't need, so I just go on about my life. But I had zero idea that that was going to happen. And it was phenomenal. It was phenomenal, that feeling, and it led to me being in Dreamgirls because Bill Condon saw Carolina change and then he came back and saw me in Pearly and that's how I got to audition for Dreamgirls.

Like it was an audition.

The audition it was. It was interesting because I was such a knucklehead and I was so new. They had asked me to audition, and I said, well, you know, I'm actually supposed to perform at the Library of Congress and I told him that I would and I can't pull out of that because you know, it's a performance that I said I would do, and so let me know when you have a second round of auditions. That could have gone so wrong. So they did. They did let me know, and they were like, but now we're in Los Angeles, and I said, well, I'm guess I'm gonna fly myself to Los Angeles. And that's not something that I do regularly. I really generally feel like if somebody really, really wants you in something, a company they'll send for you. Yeah, but if you really really really want something and you have to decide what that thing is, then then bring yourself and go get it. And my point of view was I'm coming to get this. So I flew myself out. I did an audition. It was a great audition. It was months before I heard from them, like it must have been three months I think it was. And then they wanted me to come to a callback and they flew me out for the callback and there was a limo that met me at the airport.

And I was like, what, I didn't notice really happy by this time? Where were they in the casting process? Like had some people been casting and some hadn't, or like where were they by the time you got I wish that I.

Could tell you, But you know what I was concerned about myself, Eddie Murphy, you know already in there. I think they were already there from the beginning, but we weren't auditioning with them, and they were still trying to figure out who the girls were going to be together.

You know.

And there are so many reasons why I may not have gotten that job. I'm short, I am five two and a half Beyonce, I think it's five six. Jennifer is five and nine. You might not have seen me on screen, so it was you know, it was me and five and literally five and a half inch heels through that entire movie, so that we could all be on screen together. And those are some of the things that people don't know happened. When you're casting something. You got the Lollipop Guild me to say so anyway, so I went, they flew me out, and I auditioned again, and I sang ain't no Party live and with no music, and and then it was like another three months and.

And I was like, well, you know, you start three months waiting, like how are you supporting yoursel are you still working as an actress like making money and stuff?

You know what, I've been very lucky that I've never done anything else with this. I've never waited at a table. I've only done this.

Straight from school.

And I'm.

Grateful for that because I've seen people at restaurants, you know, people come in getting real entitled about their medium, well Hamburgers. So I'm grateful for that. And I have a lot of respect for the people who can deal with the public feeling special about their Hairburger. So I've never had to do anything else, but I have been broke, and at that time, I really wasn't having much money flow coming in because I didn't have a stage job in that moment, and I remember, but I still had to get my hair done because your hair is your face, so you have an audition, your hair need to be right. So I was getting my hair done. I was under a hair dryer and my phone rang and my agent was trying to talk to me, and I was like, what.

I can't hear, I can't. You gotta be calling you.

So I got out from under the dryer and called this person back and they told me that I had gotten the role. And I was sitting in the hair hairdresser, tears running down my face because I wanted it so badly and I felt like it was for me like I felt it in that moment. Sometimes you're wrong, though, and I was so thrilled that this was the next thing that I was going to do because I knew that music and I knew that show really well. And then Anthony Manguela, who did the Number one Ladies Detective Agency, saw me and Dreamgirls called Bill Condon to ask what kind of person I was, and that's how I got the audition for Number one Ladies. So everything is sort of connected.

I see, I want to know. I know that you worked with the great Debbie Allen. She's one of our bucket list hopefuls for this show. What was it like working under her direction for Kat on a high ten roof? First it was this all black version of it, which is unusual. Like, what was it like? And also with James L. Jones was in that book, right, Yes he was.

That was my big daddy, and Felicia was, Yeah it was. It was great working with her because you're working with somebody who knows the stage like the back of her hand. You're working with someone who has no pretense. You're working with someone who will occasionally pull your hair to make a point. And I love her. I love her deeply. And the fact that she came to me with that role was I mean, it's something I never thought I would do, not because I didn't think I was able to do it. I just never thought that I would be considered for that role. I mean, you're talking about a sacred cow Tennessee Williams, who would have ever thought a black Maggie would grace a stage.

And that's the role Elizabeth Taylor played correct.

Yes, And I loved that play and I loved those words, and I loved that woman, Maggie. She's an amazing and tortured soul. And Debbie said, you know, would you like to do this? And I said absolutely. And I will really be grateful to her forever for giving me that opportunity to stretch myself like that and to be an adult, like a full blonde woman on stage, which until that point I had not really done. I was playing kids most of the time and really young people, and this was somebody who all the youth had been sort of sucked out of her. She was and she was a woman, and she traveled the world in womanhood before she was even a woman. So this was something that it was perfect in my life space because I had known disappointment at that point in time, and I had known pain, hurt, and Debbie knew, she knew that peace, and she knew that stage, and she just she just set me free in that space. I and I'm really, really to this day very grateful for her. And she's somebody you can laugh with, but also who has done her homework and you know that you can have an in depth and fruitful conversation about the art of it with her.

So okay, one question I had for you, Anita, I was specifically concerning your time at FAM.

You it's not too many, we won't.

Get too many HBCU grads, you know, to show I'm as I graduated North Calina Central, and yeah, FAM, he was actually one of my schools. I was, you know, I got like a seventy two, but I wasn't going all the way to down Florida. But yeah, oh yeah, that's right. Yeah, like you too, So yeah, just tell us about that time, you know, going to FAM, and just what that experience was like for you and how you think that influenced your artistry.

Well, I wanted to go to an HBCU. I didn't know which one I was going to, but I knew I wanted to go, and I had already been accepted at a couple of other schools that were, you know, traditional schools. But I had family who went to Howard, I had family who went to Hampton, I had family who went to FAM, and so I was familiar with these schools and I don't know. I wanted to go someplace that was small enough to build a program and have individualized attention if you needed it. That was important to me because say, Howard Grade School, fantastic school, huge, so.

That much smaller.

It's the department is much smaller.

Oh, the department.

The department is much And I was coming from Connecticut, and that's another reason why I wanted to have a an HBCU experience, because that wasn't my growing up experience. Like in my particular neighborhood, I was one of two black folks and I don't know if the other person knew that.

They were wanting to.

Connect Bloomfield.

Oh, beautiful town, gorgeous town and a great growing up and I'm happy to have had it. But it was important to me to have that experience. And I, you know, and I grew up in a family who made it.

You know.

I was very clear about who I was and where I came from and what my history was. I didn't know if I would ever I don't think I would ever have the opportunity again after this time to be surrounded by my own culture. So that was important to me to have that experience, and it was I think it was a good experience. It was a good place to be on stage. I studied theater, so I didn't study acting necessarily specifically. I studied theater so that meant I was acting. If I wasn't acting, I was doing costuming or directing or fighting. Yeah, I was doing everything. And I think that that was a gift to me as an actor, because it made it very clear that there are a lot of other things happening around you that make the thing work. It ain't you. You know, you, you are the reason the one thing that you're doing is happening. But you can't just do that, you know what I mean. And so I think it made me very appreciative of everything that happened all around me.

And and.

The band was exquisite U and I knew the band before I had gotten to the school, and I had seen them live before I got into the school, and they were you know, it was just such an amazing culture to be a part of and to be proud to be a part of. And there are a lot of HBCUs with some good bands, but then there's fam you.

Did this? Did you did this? Prepare you for your time on the quad? On BT.

Because you know what was amazing about my time on the Quad is that I was playing a woman who was from Connecticut who was thrown into the HBCU experienced And did they.

Know your did they know your history when writing this character or it was just a coincidence.

Rob Hardy did. Rob Hardy did, but a little bit of coincidence. And it was really interesting and great for me to be able to bring that aspect of myself to what I was doing. And I had spent a lot of time in academia because because of family, and my grandmother was a teacher, and so all of those things sort of came to ahead. But the HBCU thing, most assuredly, I think you have to live it to know it, and you can read about it and you can watch some video, but you sort of have to live it to know it. And I was grateful to be able to bring that part of myself to that space. And we had a couple of writers on staff who were HBCU people, and Rob Hardy, who also went to family, was one of the creators. So it was luck that all of that came together in one space. And she was a pretty fun character to play.

Can I ask a random role question because it was two roles I just wanted to ask you about, and one of them is very random, but it's still one of my favorite episodes of this brandis Law and Order.

Yes, Law and Order SVU. I wanted to ask you about that.

And I wanted to ask you about what that now that I know, I mean, I knew you were from Connecticut, but what that meant as an East Coast actor? What that means to East Coast actors in a way? And was that something that you felt like you had to do? It was on a bucket list of sorts in a way, because it's I feel like everybody has run through Lawn Order.

It was not, And it was a badge of honor to be the only New York actor that I knew who had never been on Lawn Order. I was like, apparently they don't want me, and I'm the only New York actor they don't want, So I'm going to turn that into an honor instead of being like, y'all do I can't even be dead in the park like people die every.

Week, right you?

Okay? I didn't even get that.

So it took years before that happened. And and it was a great and interesting role. And the guy who wrote it, Oh, it's Matthew's last name. I can't think of his last name, but I'm gonna figure it out right now because that's rude. He he was so good and I'm looking him up right now. That's why I'm trying to multitach my mind. He saw you on David Matthews. David Matthews wrote that episode. Warren Light is a really good dude, and they love theater people. But David wrote something so interesting with this character, this woman, this Marriam Dang, who was based on a real person who had had that situation happened to her. And I cannot remember the real woman's in the beginning, Okay, I researched her, I pulled her up. I listened to her accent over and over again to find this woman and it was an interesting accent. It was different for me to do, but it was fun. It was fun to do, and it was just it was something different for me to do. And then I now, I can't say I'm the only one who they didn't want.

My second world question was just about going to be about jukebox and the way that character was brought to you, and if it was brought to you, if you auditioned, and why it took.

It took me four episodes to realize it was her.

Oh my god, you were just That's when I was like, oh, she's you.

Just all things are kind of flying by you mirror.

Like, like, no things, No, you're still in the doghouse. Yo, I'm gonna come back.

I'm gonna come back. Wait till we get to the Princess of the Frog. I got Betty questions, but literally literally and all kinds of ship.

There's a point where you know where I guess you were going to Kiltaric or whatever. And when I watched the credits to the end, I was like, no, that's not her, let's get out of it. And then I realized that was you and I had to rewatch that episode again. Yeah, I totally did not make that you until you really lost yourself there.

For me, that is See, that's my favorite compliment. I love that. I loved jukebox. I loved jukebox.

Courtney put you to do it, or like how I met her. She's one of the nicest people ever.

Also from Connecticut. Courtney and I have mutual friends, and we met at a game night and Courtney also wrote on The Good Wife? What so she knew me from The Good Wife? I didn't know her at that point. And then we met at this game night and had a great time. And when we met, we were like, we like each other. We should go to lunch. And so we went to lunch and she was like, you know, Anka, if there was a is there a role that you'd want to play that you feel like no one would ever give you? And I was like, huh, well yeah. She was like, well what is that? I was like, I would like to be a complete badass, preferably on a motorcycle, which I don't drive. I don't ride motorcycles. But I'm thinking this is something new when I would have given me and you know, just completely like wild and the outside of anything somebody would think of me for. And this was years before before power had even happened. And she was like, oh, that would be really cool. I'd love to see you this way and I was like yeah. And so cut to a couple of years later, I'd get a call saying, would you be interested in She's a cop, She's a rogue cop. She's a lesbian, she's sort of murderous. I said, yes, yes, I would, I would be absolutely. I mean, you ain't got to tell me nothing else. Thank you. I loved her. I loved her because she was ruthless and interesting and different, and it's something I would never be in life, you know what I mean, Like I would never want to do the things that she did in life. But that's one of those times where you can do all the horrible things on screen and have fun with it. And I got to mush fifty cent in the head, like we guessed the mushif.

More than mush fifty cent in the head yo.

And the accent I heard a DZ accent.

I appreciate it, thank you, thank you.

Yeah, it was.

It was really really fun for me. And it was so well written. The episodes were so well written. And that was that, honestly, was another moment where they were just like, so, how you want to do it? And I was like, oh, really, let's go. I just got to go. And I have been in New Yorker for so long, you know, I'd lived in New York for a really long time, and I've always been I grew up on the East Coast, so you know, Thank god, I haven't had to really spend time with those people, but I've definitely seen those people, and you recognize them when you see them, when you look into their eye and you see like they are not worried about doing away with you. It would not bother them. You've seen those people. So I loved her. I loved her, and thank you.

Okay, So if you can, can you completely walk me now? I feel safe asking this question because people already know on the show that my animation watching activity is very, very low, with the exception of occasional few, so I don't feel bad when people ridicule me for not you never saw the Lion King. Yes, I've been through all that, So can you walk me through the process now? And again, I know this is a very historical pivotal, not even for you, but just for history. Love it, keep going, keep We didn't see Princess at the front, But what I'm asking is to please walk me through the process of how that role came to you.

And it's the best ship ever. I have daughters and it's just great.

I was in l A doing Carolina Change after we closed the New York Rule, the New York Run We did a soft tour just LA and San Francisco, and that was all I did, because by then I had done over three hundred shows. And while I was in La, the Disney people came to see it at the mark Taper and they were like, we'd love to have a meeting with you, and I was like yes, because I had always wanted to be a Disney voice, not necessarily a Princess. I really didn't care what I was going to be. I just wanted to be a voice. And so I had this meeting and I told them that I would love to be anything, and I could be a fleet even and I had a sound for the fleet or the ticket, and they probably thought I was insane, and from that meeting I was a couple of years later, three years later, two years later, they called me for to audition for The Princess and the Frog and I read that the piece that they gave you, because they don't give you the whole thing, and I was like, oh, I know this girl. I am this girl. I am from a small town where nobody did the thing that I wanted to do. I spent my growing up and trying to do what I do being told you know that it wasn't perhaps possible. I knew who this girl was and I was a hard worker. So it took three auditions over I don't know, must have been a year that those auditions happened. One was the first one was the day after the Dream Girl's premiere in LA So you will see no pictures of me at the Dreamgirls premiere party in La because I went back to my hotel room and I worked on that audition and I think I sang everything in my book when I went in there, because I was like, I'm going to get this wrong. And the second one was some time later, and I also crazy. I was working on a show in Australia and I got a call back for the Princess and the Frog, and I was in Oh God, I was in New York. I was flying out to Australia. I think the next two days I was flying out and my audition was going to be I had to go to Australia, unpack a bag, shoot for one day, get on another plane, go back to LA And the day after that was my second audition. That sounds crazy because it was. However, I didn't care because I wanted that role and I was like, if I have to turn around and get dressed on this plane and gargle my way to Bourbank, I'm coming to get this role. So we did that, and then time went past, and I think I will It was two thousand and six, so I was we were doing the Oscars telecast for dream Girls, and Randy Newman was there because he of course had something that was nominated. And I'm looking at him because he had been in the room audition.

I'm like, hi, toy story sixteen.

And I'm just hoping he's gonna say something positive to me, and he was like hey. And some more months went by before I got the word, and that one I got the word walking down the street in New York, headed to the bank with a sad piece of check in my hand. I don't know what. I just know it wasn't it wasn't exciting, but I was happy to be putting it in the bank. And I got the call walking down Broadway that I had gotten that role, and they were like, you should where are you. I was like, oh, oh, broa, where and they were like, you should come to our offices so we can celebrate. And I bopped myself to the Disney offices and had an intense, tearful, fabulous celebration and you know, three years of making later it came out.

Wow. So it took three years from that point wow for it to come out?

And was that really what you were asking me? And I gave you an hire?

Okay, we lived for this is the rabbit Hole Central. We we lived for those things.

Wait can you talk about can you talk about Princess and the Frog? Like the music so like straight out of New Orleans and like just the whole process of like getting into that vibe. Also Randy Newman known for like the medium shuffle sort of getting himself out of that and writing things that are very you know, New orleansy as it were, And like, how did what was it? What was your approach to that and how did you feel about like being that character?

I loved being that character.

Because the singing, like the acting and the voice stuff is great in that show, but the singing and like you know, you're always trying and Disney stuff to be the next great Disney songs because these songs are are so high. This is coming from a guy who works a saysme street. Disney songs are so high on the you know, on the thing of great songs, Like, did you feel a sense of purpose? I feel a sense of that you had to to be up. I mean, you're always up to a certain level. I'm not going to say that, but like, did you feel a sense of having to push it over the top?

Like what was what was that? I don't want to get canceled again.

No, my finger is hovering, but I didn't. I have to tap themw button. I'm glad.

No.

I felt a sense of responsibility towards the character. I felt a strong sense of responsibility towards her because I wanted her to be as honest and as real as possible. And I felt like it was something that I was old as a little black girl in this country who grew up on Disney. I felt like it was something that my parents' generation were old, having never seen that. And I felt like it was something that was old to the generation coming up behind me, that this person be real, that she be relatable, that she be honest. And there were things that we talked about as we went through it. You know, musically, I wanted to hear the youth in her voice, particularly as we started the movie and the wonder in her voice, and I wanted her to be true to the sound of that era. So the movie starts with a tiny song the evening star shine and right, so make a wish and hold on time. There's magic in the air to night and anything can that was flat thing can happen. So I wanted that beginning to definitely be as magical and whimsical as possible. And as we went through almost there, you got her spirit in there, and you got her soul in there. That last note that I was able to just I was given the space to just hold and go with it. And then at the end, when she sings down in New Orleans, which Doctor John had sung towards the beginning of the movie, I felt like it was important to hear the maturity of who she had become and the journey that she had gone through. So it's still her, but you know, we all sing differently for different occasions, different feelings, different moments. I really put some a little bit of her gut in that song because I felt like she was freed of some things. She was freed of the responsibility that she had put on herself. She was a she was more open to just having some fun. She had found love, which she didn't expect, and she had achieved her dream. And I feel like that is an opening up that happens that takes you from being a girl to a young woman. And I wanted that to be heard in her voice. So when you get to that down in New Orleans, sorry, down in New Orleans, in the Southland, there's a city way down on the river. I wanted to use some more of the bottom part of the voice and some more and to let some more dirt for lack of a better word, come into to her voice for that song. And that was important to me, and we had a conversation about it because I didn't want her to be to spend a whole movie singing in this place. I didn't want not from New Orleans, you know what I mean. And I felt like it was important to the truth of who this young woman is and would be to have that space today.

Were you allowed to sort of drive what your character was or did you have to have like a conversation with the Disney people, because I, you know, I would think that at least when you're dealing with the Hollywood superpower like that, they're always thinking about middle America and we don't want to scare them off, and you know that sort of thing.

So yeah, no, I wasn't worried about Middle America. You know, she's from New Orleans, so I was worried about New Orleans. And she is me, so I was worried about representing you know, who we are. And they wanted it to be as true to form as possible. They really did, and so I was given the space to say, you know, I don't think this would be this doesn't really make sense to me for this reason or the other. And I was heard when I said those things. Now, mind you, I didn't write the story, so it's not like the necessarily the story was going to change. But if I said that something culturally didn't sit well, or if I said that, I know, we had a big talk about the scene in the I think I'm free to say this, the scene in the swamp where when Princess Tianna was a frog still and Navin was a frog and they were being hunted, and there was when we first did that scene, my concern was, I said, what we don't want in this scene is for it to feel like a slave hunt, because you know, black folks are always going to think about and feel that feeling when you've got these real what's the good word, like hick white dudes with two teeth and a net and some dogs running after us. Very important to have the tone of that scene correct. And we talked about it, and I talked about it and they were like, oh, you're absolutely right. So it made a difference in how that scene moved and the words that were used and how the chase happened. And I'm and I'm glad that I was working with a group of people who were open to hear that. And you would think, well, of course they would, because they want to make some money, but you'd be surprised the amount of times that people don't listen to you.

As you were saying it to you, I was thinking to myself, they listening, and I was wondering if that anybody in that room that looked like you though that was helping to write that story. But I'm guessing that that's why you had to provide that expertise, because.

Well, I mean, I think we had one black writer, maybe two, but they weren't always there with us. And I think when you're dealing with large entities that you do the best you can to make sure that you're heard, but sometimes it's hard to be heard. And look, I don't know what conversations happened before I said that, so let me make that very clear. I don't know what conversations happened. But sometimes it's hard to be heard from the inside of the room. Sometimes something has to come through from the outside of the room for people to understand, Oh, this isn't just so and so who I work with every day. This really is something that you know will be a universal thought issue, you know, problem feeling. But I don't know what they talked about beforehand, but I know that for me that that was something that we really needed to talk about. And I'm glad that they heard me. And they were really wonderful during the process, like really wonderful Peter del Vaco, Ron Clements and John Musker, who are amazing and they also did a Little Mermaid, so it was an amazing production team. And I did feel listened to when I spoke, I'm and I'm glad for that. And I think it's only smart of people who are creating something in a culture that isn't theirs to listen to the person who in the room, for whom it is now, am I from New Orleans? No, but as a black woman who grew up in this country and knows her history and has family in the South. There are things that I'm going to bring to that that they never would have listened to there. First of all, not even women, so we can start there. You know, it was a group of men, but they were good dudes. And there were other things that we talked about, like I asked for Tiana to be left handed, and they were totally into that. Yeah. Right, And that's something that you just don't I am, and it's something you just don't see, you don't get to see. It was important to me that she not have a cookie cutter body. I was like, you know, this is a black girl, so let's make sure that you know, we don't want it to look like porn, which sometimes cartoons can do to people. But she need to have a booty because let's be true to form. Let's make a real person, not just paint something that's there. And to be clear, this wasn't a fight. They asked me the things that I that I thought of that I felt were important, and those were you know some of the things that I talked about, but not all of them. But those are the things that you will see immediately, and that our hair not be straight. Those are things that you'll see immediately. And it was and I have now taken you all the way to Wonderland because I think I'd forgotten what the question was that I got.

A quest love Supreme, where every tangent is a good tangent.

Again.

No, this this brings a whole new level of respect that you know was already there, but added more to it. No, thank thank you for sharing that You're in Tyler Perry's uh for Colored Girls with damn near half of Hollywood.

What was that?

What was that whole experience like in doing that that movie?

You know, it was interesting because most of those people we I didn't see till the end, and I I didn't I didn't see them. However, it was it was actually a really good experience. And I'll have to say that as far as how you're treated on a set, Tyler had there were flowers in my trailer every morning when I went into work, fresh fresh flowers that had never happened before.

And so that makes a difference.

You know, all it says, is we care.

Okay, and at the very least you're doing so much heavy work that it kind of doesn't end up lifting a ways.

Okay, well, at least I'm starting my day off with these flowers, because.

Yeah, start up with something nice because you're going into the ships that one. But that was a really lovely thing. And we shot in New York and we shot in Atlanta and it was pretty fast. But yeah, so I didn't really get to Tandy and I became very close on that set. For some reason, we ended up being what year was that we ended up being connected of two thousand and nine and Carrie and I became friendly, but we didn't really get to find, you know, meld and work together because it really as much of an ensemble as it was. It was also you know, if you know the original piece, which I'm sure you do, it was monologues, right. It was singular stories that cut together and touch each other in the corners. So but what I am grateful like that monologue is such an amazing and phenomenal monologue that I got to do in the hospital, and I remember Tyler was like, oh, so we're gonna do this shot and then that shot and the other shot, and I started to do it. We did a rehearsal, and then I went back to and we didn't want to use a lot of time because it was so emotional and I was coming off with something else and going straight into that, and I was supposed to go back to makeup, and I said, no, I don't want any makeup. I want you to leave my face as it is. I think it's important to see her face. I don't want her to look nice or better or falsely worse. I want you to see her face as it is. And he did not fight me on that. And then one thing that he did, which I really appreciate it was he was like, you know what, we were going to do different angles, but you just do your monologue. And so instead of doing different angles and cutting and doing this and that and the other, I did a take and he got closer and closer and closer and closer with the camera so that it didn't have to be cut up and I didn't have to find create that same emotional space because I've waited now for fifteen minutes for a camera angle to change or for a lens to change, which God bless them those people are doing their jobs and they're trying to make you look as good as possible when the edit is done. But sometimes there is something to be said for allowing the emotional space to live and just showing it in its naked space. And I think that that's something that's something that happened in that moment that I think Tyler totally made. Well. Look, that sounds crazy, but it felt like the right choice to me at the time, and as an artist, it definitely was the right choice for me to be able to do the best that I could do in that space, you know what.

You mentioned that, and then it also hit me that well because I worked on it as well. You were no no, no, no, not colored girls. I've worked on Roots, you were on Kiss. I totally forgot I was.

Episode four. I think I was, you know, which was quite an honor to bring that, to bring that story to the young people, people who haven't seen the original, who didn't know about the original, And at first I was like, why are y'all doing this again?

What already?

And not because it was about slavery, because listen, I think it's important that people know about slavery. Here's one thing There's a reason that the Jewish population teaches the Holocaust all of the time, and they teach it all of the time because it is important for young people to know what happened so that it does not happen again. We must move through the pain of the thing so that we know how to keep it from coming back, so that we are clear on our history, and so for people who did not live the history know what their lineage did and can teach themselves and their children to do different things and make different choices. We must tell the story of slavery. We must, and maybe we want to tell it from a different angle. Okay, I think that it's important to talk about It's important to talk about the revolutions that happened on plantations. It's important to tell this, to not just tell the story of bondage, but to tell the story of the breaking freeze, to tell the story of the moors, to tell the story of the Sorry the oh. I can't remember shaking my.

Head so hard because me and Fonte had this debate all the time. I'm like, it's important.

The mores is not the word that I wanted to say, but the ah, what do they call the people in Jamaica, and then Haiti who went off into the hills. And I can't think of the name of the word. It starts with the M. I can't think of it right now. But see, that's why you have to keep telling. But there are other angles to enslavement and to slavery. But also what we need to do, like with Jingle Jangle, is have stories in that time period where you see people who are not dealing with bondage, because bondage was not what we sprang from. Bondage is not the only thing that happened to us. So I am somebody who yeah, sometimes I'm like, oh God, I don't know the slave story, but only because it's coming from the same angle. We have to look at other angles. But we cannot afford to not tell this story. And if we thought we could afford to not tell this story, January sixth should have taught us.

Exactly.

That's where I am.

Making a gun.

Because I make this point constantly and people always argue with me about it, and I'm like, I don't understand twelve years a slave with not the same slave movie as Roots twelve you of the slave was really cause I'm kind of different like, I've never seen the story of a free man that guy kidnapp, Like, stop acting like that's the same.

It just was. So I'm just runs maroons. Want to give me.

Sorry?

Are you do you feel that you're now at the place where you can well that you can create productions and and and things that you want to do without having without not having to go through the Hollywood shuffle. It's like, are you past the place where it's like, no, this particular company calls and we want you to fly in the ref this role in that I'm learning now through this show that there's two different types of processes, Like you get called in and you have to read and read and read and wait for a call back. And then there's people that are like, I won't do that.

There are times when I won't do that. There are times when I won't do that because sometimes people want to put you through hoops just to put you through hoops, and there's too much tape for people to watch to be putting folks through hoops for no reason of very different roles, you know what I mean. It's not like I've been doing the same role for twenty years and you're like, but today we'd like you to be a magician, and we've never seen you pull a rabbit out of the hat. You know, there's a lot of tape for people to look at. So there are some things where I'm just like, no, no, I'm not going to do that. There are other things that I would be willing to and I do go in for. I mean, i'd like to say that's over, but I don't know that it's ever over, to be perfectly honest. There are things that I get on offers for, and then there are things that are like, we'd love for you to We love you, You're amazing. We think, oh my god, you are our favorite in this and we've got this amazing role. We'd love for you to read what happened of Love? What happened to that?

So we love for you to read. It's sort of the deal breaker that, like.

Man, it depends on the on the role, on the project, on how I feel about it. It depends. There are a whole lot of variables that that go into that.

So is there a genre that you haven't stepped into yet, like the horror genre or I don't I don't know if they call the Marvel world, like science fiction or not. I don't know, Like I don't know what the It's.

Just I'm supposed to do a horror movie. I was scheduled to get on a plane two weeks after Quarantine it and I'm supposed to be in Romania. But no, it was a really it was interesting and different and potentially a lot of fun. And now I think it's dead. I would love to I miss comedy. I miss comedy, and I think maybe people have forgotten that I can do that, so I sort of miss that now. Sort of I really do miss do income comedic things. I would love to do a cute, little romantic comedy or just a regular comedy. I love sci fi and I'm glad you mentioned that. And I've got the rights to a couple of book series that I am trying to make happen, And then I don't have the right to a couple of series that I'm friends with the authors, and I'm like, I'm we are talking about moving forward with me as part of their package without moving the rights, but to have me as a producer and an actor on it, because I sort of I love sci fi. I love us in the world of sci fi. I love anything that goes beyond the boundary that people have tried to give us. And so I'm into those things because I'm not into being told who I am allowed to be. So that is always exciting to me when I can find something that is outside of the space that we have sort of been relegated to, because I always say, and people are like, when I see a sci fi movie and people are, you know, seventy five, one hundred years into the future, and you've got one black person, you a lie, you a lie. There is no way that black people, and I mean throughout the diaspora have been through the things that they have been through and are here in twenty twenty one, and you think we're not about to be here in thirty twenty one.

If you here, we here, we started this time.

We're here. So that is always a story that I'm interested in telling and putting us in a space where we have been told that we do not belong or will not exist.

I'm always interested in that awesome, awesome, real quick. My last question is about Jingle Jingle, Like, what was the experience for you and doing that film, And well, I know it's important for at least my nieces and nephews like they you know, they lost their minds over it and seeing it. Yeah, but how did that project come to you?

David Talbert offered me that role, and it was so funny because I think he was trying to get in touch with me for like the better part of a year. We just kept missing each other and I would have missed out on something so great.

No happy, but it success for him too, by the way, Yes.

It's really great for him. And so we had a Zoom meeting because I don't know where I was. I think I was. I was in New Orleans shooting some and so we met on Zoom and we talked and then it was had to go up the flagpole and then oh and while we were talking about it, I had read a version of the script, which was an fairly early version of the script at that point, and I was like, this is cute and this is cool and yeah, this is interesting. And then he was like, and you know, it's a musical and I was like, oh, yeah, I had heard it was a musical. That's cool. Well who's doing the music and he said Philip Lawrence, phil and John Legend And I was like and sold because everything came together in that package. You've got this Chris story with us centralized and normal but also magical, and now you've got these amazing musicians connected to it. I love Phil Lawrence. I think he is magnificent, and I also love Bruno Mars, whom you know that he writes for a lot, but he as a singer musician is also beyond Phil himself. And I've already told you how much I love John Legend and his work and how he is able to translate story to song and a song for a story. So all of those things sort of just worked together, and it was a really wonderful thing to be a part of another project that centralizes Black children and our wonder, our ability to feel wonder the joy of Christmas in a way that wasn't showing lack. You know, there was family dysfunction, but that's important to show too because we all have it. But the story wasn't about what these people couldn't have, couldn't get, couldn't whatever, aside from love, and they rectified that. The story took place in the Victorian Age with these amazing costumes by Michael Wilkinson, who's Australia. Randomly and phenomenal, and he mixed all these African fabrics in with these Victorian costumes and these amazing colors. And then the hair with Sharon Martin, who I'd worked with on Half of the Yellow Sun, and all the hair was natural and it wasn't like there wasn't a commentary on it, because this is what people's hair was supposed to look like, does look like, looks like. So the amount of positive reinforcement within this film without beating people over the head with it is just fantastic. And then you know, again, to be able to sing the songs that I was able to sing was delicious. And I'll say this because we were talking about make it work and it's not a way that people have heard me sing before, and that for me was quite the gift because I love to access that part of my voice. And I think usually when people are thinking of me, they're thinking of me as a soprano, because that's you know, I am a soprano. However, I'm also that you know, I'm also that gritty. I don't know, you know, I'm not Fantasia, so I'm not I haven't gone there yet. I think when I do that that's the farewell concert, that'll be the last note. But I also live in the deeper register of my voice and I and I really enjoy being there. So there was an aspect of my voice that I don't think I had gotten to express before, and that to me was really joyous to be able to do so the whole thing. And I got to work with my Felicia Machad, who I just love, love love. I got to see Madeline come into being, which is always something that's amazing when you see a little kid come into to being. Kieran Dyer, who played Edison, who was a scream, was also magnificent, and the lovely and very gentle Forrest Whitaker, so there's there was nothing to not lack about it.

Really wow, thank you.

You know.

Our episodes can go on forever, but you know we gottap up. We have to wrap up. We really thank you.

I thank you because I have embarrassed myself in front of you at least twice. I have shamed myself at least the first time you were DJing at Hammy party.

I do this yeah.

Yeah, in l A.

Okay, I can't.

Remember what hotel it was, but anyway, and you were going off the Year's Eve, No, No, the Emmys. The Emmys was a couple of years old. And Kirk was playing the hell out of this guitar. I mean when I say he was playing the hell out of this guitar. So he was playing it, and he lifted it over this girl's head, and I think she was talking, and I don't think he appreciated that at the time. So he lifted it over her head and she was talking to her, and and the and the guitar came over her head. And he's playing the guitar in front of this girl as if she was playing it and got all of her attention and all of our attention. And my mouth is open and my eyes are wide, and I'm like, I can what's happening right here, right now? This is amazing. And so I started you all were going on a break.

I think it was her Amazon. I remember this.

It was like you root for the hotel being crazy.

Yeah.

I was a little fanned out right. I was amped by the music, and I was feeling very fanny, and I was walking and talking and not paying attention, but like running my mouth about how fantastic everything was. And I don't remember who stopped me, But I was I was being talked to. I wasn't talking at somebody's back or anything. I wasn't being a crazy person. But I was talking and running my mouth and I had to be stopped. And I was like, what what's happening? And it didn't occur to me that you all were going into your.

Dressing Oh really?

And I was just walking and talking and like heading into this dressing room with y'all and I was moretrified, and I was like, these people are going to think I'm insane and they are never going to speak to me again. And it has lived with me for years. So thank you for erasing that, Like you know, men are blacking it from your memory to be of all the roots.

We definitely welcome you into our dressing room.

I'm just.

Thank you. Thank you so much for doing this for us, and thank you for you know, we appreciate your your talent and and sharing your story with us, and you know we're proud of you. Thank you for coming on the show.

Thank you so very much. It was really lovely speaking with all of you and getting to know you and you know, outside of what you see of the person, but really getting to see you. The person has been a gift, all of you, and and Bill, I forgive you.

All right, I'm still canceled, but thank you or viaf like you and Sugar Stephen, and we have the same birthday.

Nice job.

Wow that's my wife's birthday. You got you and my wife same birthday. And she's left handed as well.

Yeah wow nice wow. Anyway, anything else, Steve, Nope, just the birthday thing. Thanks, okay, okay, anyway where we have a birthday burger group down there and and fontigolo and uncanceled, uh Bill uh this quest left signing off for QLs. We'll see you on the next go round. Thank you, yo, what's up? This is Fante.

Make sure you keep up with us on Instagram at QLs and let us know what you think and who should be next to sit down with him.

Don't forget to subscribe to our podcast, all right. Peace West Left Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Questlove Supreme

Questlove Supreme is a fun, irreverent and educational weekly podcast that digs deep into the storie 
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