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Friday, May 31, 2013

Kerry Washington Talks Death Threats, Substituting & Twitter Blocking In The Hollywood Reporter

Actress Kerry Washington has nabbed a cover spot on "The Hollywood Reporter." That's right she's representing for the new wave of “Drama Queens” and looking lovely while doing so.  She joins the ladies of Breaking Bad, House of Cards, Mad Men, Nashville, and Top of the Lake on the cover dedicated to the fiercest women on television.
After the shoot, Kerry joined the other ladies (Kate Mara, Anna Gunn, Connie Britton, Elisabeth Moss, and Monica Potter) for a roundtable discussion where she dished on being a substitute teacher in New York, getting death threats on Twitter for her political views, and being rejected for movie roles.
See details of the interview below:
On Her Worst Job
It wasn’t one of my worst jobs, but I used to be a substitute teacher for New York City schools. It was great and hard, and I even did it after I started working in films. But I had to stop after I did Save the Last Dance because the students were like, “Chenille is substituting!”
On Her Worst Audition
It’s a little bit different for me because I’ll audition for something and they’ll just decide that they’re not going “ethnic” with a character, which I hear a lot.
If not “black,” then yeah. People have artistic license … that’s what casting is: fitting the right look to the right character. Whereas you could maybe lose some weight, there’s not really anything I can do, nor would I want to, about being black.
On the Craziest Thing She’s Done to Get a Role
I’ve written a lot of letters to directors.
On Negative Backlash Because of Her Real Life Political Involvement
I come from a family where people really participate in the democratic process. I don’t think that being an actor should prevent me from continuing to do the things I do. A lot of people fought for me to have the right as a woman to be able to participate, and as a person of color, and so I don’t want my acting to get in the way of that. I do it as an American. And blowback? Absolutely. After I spoke at the Democratic National Convention — our show has a very active life on Twitter and Facebook — I couldn’t go near any of it because there were threats to my life, sexism and racism. It was shocking that me speaking at a convention incited all this anger. Thank God for block on Twitter!
I would never block somebody for disagreeing with me. But the threats to my life … that’s not so good.
On Social Media
Yeah. I mean, you read the good stuff. … But I don’t tweet about my personal life. I don’t tweet things that are about me. I work with a woman who is a digital social media consultant because I was terrified to go on Twitter. She helped me to figure out how to engage — as an actor — to promote the work without promoting myself. It’s scary. It’s this whole other universe.

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