Acting is very competitive. There are few good scripts out there and the ones that are good are very competitive. You look at your options and often times they're not too appealing.
I'd love to say that every move I make is completely calculated and I'm sitting on a pile of scripts, sifting through them for the perfect role, but the fact is that there are a lot of talented people out there and there's a lot of competition in our business.
It's very hard to become an actor in film and television, you have to have such perseverance and you have to really believe that if you have any sort of talent at all, you will find work one day.
I look at being an actress as being like a mummy: You're bandaged up and preserved as soon as you start making other people money.
I am not sure for how long I'll stick to this industry. Acting is just a part of my nomadic life.
I booked my first series when I was 13. Acting kind of took control because I was just going from part to part at that point.
I was never not in a show from ages 11 until 18. It was a great creative atmosphere but also a professional kind of atmosphere. When I finally went into the professional world, I felt ready. I was prepared for work.
Throughout my career I've played a lot of parts that might've been played by a man. They're human roles rather than specifically men or women. I've never been as hooked into that as a lot of women are, you know, like, 'There aren't enough roles for women.' There aren't necessarily a lot of good roles for anybody.
As actors, we have to say yes to everything for a really long time. You say 'Yes' to anything you can get.
There've been moments where I just was tired of being in L.A. It was very difficult. I mean, you're constantly rejected. And that's OK, it's just really frustrating for me, because I try to read scripts and projects that have really great, deeper, meaningful qualities to them.
Everyone has a different path. I knew no one in the acting industry growing up. I never did a play until college. I was not outspoken when I was younger and I hated being the center of attention. But I had a dream of being an actor. I went to NYU and studied theatre. I learned a craft. And began my career straight out of college.
The fashion industry is completely different from the acting industry, but definitely the same as well, because there's cattiness and competition just like in the modeling world.
You can never fight for a part or can't beg them to do another audition. You can try, but that rarely works.
I've seen young actresses have major falls from their career, and that's just not what I want.
Once I was in L.A., I realized anyone could act. Why not give it a shot? I started going to a ton of acting classes, and I found I had a real passion for it, probably the biggest passion I've ever had in my whole life.
When you're working as an actor, you don't think that when you get out of school, it's going to be so hard to get a job. Just to get a job. Any job. Whatsoever. You don't think that people are going to see you in a certain way.
When I was a young actor, I just didn’t understand how to function in this business as an artist. It is a business, it’s called the film business for a reason, there’s money involved ... But on the flip side, now I do not let the business side of it rule either. It’s a balance.
Ideally I'd like to be working steadily as an actor: movies, a TV series, that sort of thing. I've been through a few different TV development cycles, and they didn't work out. When the time and project are right, it'll come together. Like I tell a lot of guys, it's not a race; there's no finish line.
At times, I feel sorry for kids who have succumbed in some kind of way to being a child actor.
Well as I said in France I didn't get auditions, and it's very difficult to get an agent in France because they conduct the business in a strange way.
To have the freedom to be able to make choices is something I guess every actor aspires to. Most actors don't have those kind of choices. If the part comes along, they take it.
When I was younger, I felt very much like, 'Oh, I have to be a certain way, I have to look a certain way.' You really, really don't. That's the way women are treated differently than men. I mean, I've had actors argue with me about this.
To be honest with you, there's nothing that bores me more than sitting around with a bunch of actors talking shop. I love actors and I've got friends that are actors. They're interesting people. But for some reason, usually when it comes round to talking shop, there's a part of me that doesn't like it.
If you want to protect yourself as an actor, always work with good people
There is a class system in acting just like in anything else. Black females fall in a category below black male actors.
