I'm not trying to be famous, I'm not trying to be the next whatever. I'm just trying to be someone that contributes positivity with my talent.
It was cool to play an African princess who's the smartest in the whole world. That never happens. So I hope all the young girls can feel smart, too.
I'm centered in who I am, and I'm really grateful. I'm not perfect.
So many young black women love science, technology, engineering, and maths. But that's not the widely held image of the kind of person who likes those things.
I fell in love with Jesus, and I'm still in love. Amen!
I don't need to be validated by anybody else; I don't need to be accepted or approved of for my happiness.
The 'Black Panther' world taught me about the importance of exfoliating.
When I was a kid, people bullied me about my weight and being skinny. Throughout my teenage years, I had to just depend on the fact that, look, this is who God created me to be, so I'm going to depend on what's already there.
If I can be of inspiration to anyone to go after their goals and their dreams, then I feel like I'll be satisfied with that.
I'm not perfect. As a Christian, you're not perfect, you know, but you're walking every day and trying to stay connected.
My aim is just to remain as humble and as godly as I can be.
As soon as I was obedient to just taking a chance on God, all of these things that you're seeing - 'Black Panther' or 'Humans' or 'The Commuter' or Steven Spielberg - it came right after I took that break.
I just want to do something meaningful in the world. I want to contribute positively. That means the roles I get to play as well.
No, I'm not super-smart and tech-savvy.
Makeup is cool. I mean, you can turn up and feel really good and treat yourself, but it shouldn't be something you hang on to to validate your beauty or something you have to do to make you feel beautiful.
I would love to be producing movies, acting in more movies, and doing projects that are Oscar-worthy... have kids, be married, all that, being a normal human being as well, balancing it all out.
I didn't see a lot of role models or women who looked like me on screen when I was growing up. For me, one thing that changed all of that was seeing Keke Palmer in 'Akeelah and The Bee.' That film made me realize that I wasn't an alien.
In my country where I was born, Guyana, we push more for education. It's more being a lawyer, doctor, teacher, or scientist.
I have to also get into producing if I want to see these stories being made... Let's venture out and do projects with people of different ethnicities: not just black but also Asian actors and Asian superhero films. Just an equality across the board.
When I came to England, everybody was indoors all the time, and nobody said hello to each other. That was weird.
