Last season of HBO‘s True Blood took a toll on Tara Thornton (Rutina Wesley), as she was turned into a vampire despite her hatred for them. Can’t really blame the poor girl she has had a rough go of things where vampires are concerned, but the best thing to come from that change for fans was the developing relationship between Tara and her maker Pam (Kristin Bauer van Straten). From Rutina’s point of view, one of the best things to come from this change in Tara was the ability to show a different side to her acting ability. You can catch the gorgeous True Blood star on the cover of this month’s Rolling Out Magazine, and inside she talks about sex appeal, stereotypes and racism.
In the Sookie Stackhouse books the role of Tara Thornton is actually significantly smaller than in True Blood and Rutina Wesley has been on the show since day one. When we first met Tara she was portrayed as a bitter, unhappy woman and her clothing wasn’t particularly flattering. In fact the show purposely downplayed Rutina’s beauty and she tells Rolling Out one of the comments she hears most from women is that she’s much prettier in person. She seems to take it all in stride but she talks about the early days on the show saying that all she did was talk about work non-stop. The Julliard trained actress has been married to fellow actor Jacob Fishel since 2006 and she says that learning to adjust to her new-found fame was a challenge for her marriage:
“When you come home, you have to come home and leave ‘her’ at work. And I’ve also learned it has to be 50/50. Usually, I would talk for an hour and he would be like ‘You wanna ask me how I’m doing?’ [laughs]. We’ve been able to survive Hollywood because we love each other and he’s also an actor, so he gets it.”
One thing that does bother Wesley however is the criticism that she’s portraying a stereotype of an “angry black woman” in the role but she says she tries very hard to bring layers to her portrayal of Tara. While she let’s the writers do their jobs and just tries to bring as much vulnerability to Tara as she can, she worries that she’s not doing her job properly if people cannot see that Tara is wounded. She reveals that she dealt with stereotyping when she attended college in Evansville, Indiana saying:
“I had one teacher who was going there and he was really rooting for the school. I was the only black girl in the theater department. Played a lot of slaves and narrators [laughs] but they did love me there and there were three black guys when I got there that took me in. I got a great education. If it wasn’t for Evansville, I wouldn’t have gotten into Juilliard. They really prepare you for graduate school. It was great.”
Rutina talks about her experiences with racism and acknowledges that sometimes being a black woman in Hollywood can be challenging, but that the tides are shifting. She points to Academy Award nominee Viola Davis as one of her role models and notes that the actress is “on fire” right now. She also mentions Kerry Washington being the lead actress on a hit television show (‘Scandal’) as evidence that things may be changing, but wonders why it took so long.
Despite all the challenges she has faced, Rutina is at a place where she is truly happy with her life. She says that she loves moving an audience and talks about her most touching fan moment:
“I met a woman at Annie on Broadway. I was with my husband and she came by and noticed me and didn’t say anything. I [stepped out] and came back and my husband said ‘That woman wanted me to tell you that she loves you on the show.’ I found her and gave her this big hug and she said ‘My husband passed away and we used to watch the show. I believe in angels and he put me here to meet you right now.’ We were both just standing there crying. It was an awesome moment.”
To read more of Rutina’s interview with Rolling Out Magazine, and check out the stunning pictures from her layout, you can pick up the magazine or click here to visit the website.
Source: RollingOut.com – ‘True Blood’ star Rutina Wesley on strength and sex appeal
Image Credit: Rolling Out Magazine
