Actress Zoe Saldana revealed that she regrets ever starring as Nina Simone in writer/director Cynthia Mort’s controversial 2016 biopic, “Nina.” The actress discussed her role — which required a prosthetic nose, fake teeth, and makeup to darken her skin — in a recent Instagram live conversation hosted by B-ese with “Pose” co-creator Steven Canals.
“I should have never played Nina,” Saldana said (via Entertainment Weekly). “I should have done everything in my power, with the leverage that I had 10 years ago — which was a different [amount of] leverage, but it was leverage nonetheless. I should’ve tried everything in my power to cast a Black woman to play an exceptionally perfect Black woman.”
When she was cast in 2012, after replacing Mary J. Blige, Saldana already had mixed feelings about taking on the High Priestess of Soul. But distance from the film and its notoriously bungled production, she said, has led to necessary reflection.
“I should have never played Nina,” Saldana said (via Entertainment Weekly). “I should have done everything in my power, with the leverage that I had 10 years ago — which was a different [amount of] leverage, but it was leverage nonetheless. I should’ve tried everything in my power to cast a Black woman to play an exceptionally perfect Black woman.”
When she was cast in 2012, after replacing Mary J. Blige, Saldana already had mixed feelings about taking on the High Priestess of Soul. But distance from the film and its notoriously bungled production, she said, has led to necessary reflection.
- 8/5/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
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