And how old were you when you did that first film?
When I, when I did Vera’s film, Higher Ground, I was 15.
Okay. So do you think if you wouldn’t have been acting through most of your teen years and didn’t have that creative outlet that those darker parts would have came out in other ways?
I mean not entirely ‘cause my characters have done a lot of stuff. They’ve slit their own throat, they’ve killed…
You know, it’s interesting cause I was a very shy teenager, wasn’t great at communicating, wasn’t good at talking about feelings. Acting really helped me learn how to express myself and I always had a level of maturity to me. So I had awareness about things, but it didn’t make it easier to talk about how I was feeling and how to express that. So I don’t know where I’d be. I’d probably be really–I don’t know. I genuinely don’t know. If I didn’t have acting to be able to learn who I was and discover parts of my personality. Cause that’s how I figured out who I was. I was a young adult in my twenties and through acting as you push yourself (when you get a new role) to draw out this part of you to be able to play the character, and all of a sudden I’ve got a full-fledged personality now. I don’t know. I don’t know who I would be, probably wouldn’t be as comfortable with myself.
Yeah. I think that’s a blessing that you were able to have acted because that’s such a hard period for anybody.
Yeah. Just learning, figuring out who you are, acting definitely helped. Playing different characters because with every character you play, there has to be, has to be rooted in something true. And that’s usually you,some part of your life and whether that’s, you know, a majority of your personality or just a small bit. So I was able to take that and run with it. And Gosh, sometimes I think about it and I am generally fearful of who I could have been if I wasn’t granted this incredible opportunity and worked my butt off to be here eight years later.
