September 24, 2024 • 25 mins
A decade ago, Laverne Cox burst on to the scene with her role as Sophia Burset on Netflix’s “Orange is the New Black,” becoming the first openly transgender actress to be nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award in an acting category. This month, Laverne stars in the Netflix film “Uglies,” a dystopian story set in a future society where everyone undergoes extreme cosmetic surgery at the age of 16 to become “pretty.” Laverne joins the Bright Side to discuss her latest role, her changing perceptions of beauty standards, and how at 52, she is saying “yes to life.”
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey fam, Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Today on the bright Side, we're joined by actor and
Emmy winning producer Laverne Cox. She's here to talk about love,
beauty and her decision to rebrand. Also, why is she
saying yes to life? Her new Netflix film Uglies is
out now. It's Tuesday, September twenty fourth. I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
And I'm Simone Boyce and this is the bright Side
from Hello Sunshine, a daily show where we come together
to share women's stories, laugh, learn and brighten your day.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Simone.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
We're so lucky that we've experienced so many firsts in
our lifetime. I think that means it signals progress, really,
but I think that our culture talks about first a lot,
and Laverne Cox has always been a person who has
gone first. She burst into the spotlight when she starred
as Sophia Bursette in the critically acclaimed Netflix series Orange
(00:59):
is the New Black. That role earned her Emmy nomination,
and it made Laverne Cox the first openly transgender actress
to be nominated for an Emmy in any acting category.
Laverne also started a national conversation about trans representation when
she became the first ever openly transgender person to appear
on the covers of Time magazine and Cosmopolitan magazine.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
And now Laverne is sparking a whole new dialogue around beauty,
the price of beauty, and the pressures we feel to
be perfect with her new movie Uglies, which is now
streaming on Netflix. Welcome to the bright Side, Laverne.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Hire every time of day it is for you, wherever
you are.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Well, Laverne, you have a new project out on Netflix
called Uglies, and it's a story that takes place in
a dystopian world where everyone has mandatory cosmetic surgery when
they turn sixteen. Talk about triggering, I'm already triggered. Just
your trigger? Why are you triggered?
Speaker 4 (02:01):
So this like what I'm most excited about now because
we started this journey like over three years ago. Is
I get to talk to people about it. So why
are you triggered? Just describing the film, because.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I mean, the first of all, the idea of mandatory
cosmetic surgery, any anything where women lose agency is automatically
very triggering to me.
Speaker 4 (02:22):
But just women, though it's men, it's everyone in this society.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
But go on, Yes, I can remember working in news
and legacy media and just hearing through the grapevind that, oh, yeah,
you know, it's HD footage and if your wrinkles start
to show on camera, the talent department is going to
make you get botox. Or I can remember, you know,
interviewing for a job as a local news reporter here
in LA and it became very clear in the interview
(02:48):
that if I wore my natural hair on TV then
I would not get the job. So I think it's
triggering for me personally, just as a black, biracial woman
who's been in a very public facing role. What did
it bring up for you?
Speaker 4 (03:04):
When I read the script, I was just I had
been manifesting a sort of sci fi futuristic project for
me as an actor. I've always loved the idea of
the future, particularly as a trans woman, like some sort
of you know, alien future dystopian something or other, because
(03:25):
in the future, like gender would matter less. So like,
I was just excited by that. And then when I
read the script, I just I was excited about my character.
I was excited about this world. The triggering piece for
me I didn't focus so much on because what's interesting
is that doctor Cable and ugly is My character is
(03:46):
the architect of this brave new world, brave scary world.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
She's the architect of the whole world.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
For her, it's about everyone being equal and no one
being discriminated against because of how they look. It's interesting
because there is a certain look that that characters have
post surgery and uglies after they have their surgery.
Speaker 3 (04:05):
It looked like Instagram filters.
Speaker 4 (04:07):
I was on Instagram in my stories like last week,
and I was playing with filters, which I don't do
a lot, and it didn't just give me different color eyes.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
I gave me a nose job.
Speaker 4 (04:17):
Then I remember that, like a lot of plastic surgeons
are saying now that people are used to bring in
photos of celebrities and now they're bringing in photos of
their filter itselves for cosmetic surgery. And I can see
how people get addicted to these filters because I've done
a lot of work to accept myself, and I think
the interesting thing about being trans is that there's still
(04:38):
a misconception that when you're trans you've had all this
surgery and that there's a big shift that you've had.
But I haven't had any face surgery yet. You know,
and I say yet, because I'm fifty two, who you know,
I might need or want to do something, but I
haven't done anything in my face. So last night I
was in the filter and then the filter like narrowed
my nose and I was like, oh, that looks kind
of cool. And then I was like, oh, going from
(04:59):
the filter face so the real facing back and forth
and just being like the real face is good.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
Like the bulbous tip of my Negro nose.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
It's so important for me as purely as a black
woman to embrace this nose. So many black women in
Hollywood have had nose jobs. I mean, it's cute. I
don't think I need a nose job. But then sometimes
I'll pick myself apart, and like that has been the
journey for me as a woman, as a trans woman,
as a woman of color, to be like, Okay, there
(05:30):
was a period in my life when I wanted a
certain kind of perfection and then I was just like,
how do I just accept myself? You know, because I
think like when you get into this surgery thing, it
just kind of never ends. I've seen a lot of
friends just kind of like once you start, you don't stop.
And so What it's been beautiful for me about my
journey around just affirming my gender is that I believe
(05:54):
every surgery I've had has been necessary and has helped
me match inside to my outside, but it hasn't turned
into this perfectionistic thing.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
When I think about your breakout role in Orange is
the New Black, and then I think, you know, you've
been acting since even before that, in the early two thousands.
How has your perception of beauty standards changed, especially once
you reached the spotlight? Was it the same before as
it is now?
Speaker 3 (06:21):
That's a really interesting question.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
So I'm fifty two years old and I moved to
New York in nineteen ninety three, and I think about,
like my journey from like being gender not conforming to
like accepting my womanhood. And as I went on a
feminizing journey, I had to like reckon with female beauty
standards sort of being tied to white supremacy in a
(06:43):
way that other standards of beauty aren't. So I had
to really interrogate my own relationship to white supremacy and misogyny.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
And then also this thing of being seen.
Speaker 4 (06:54):
It's it's hard to talk about this stuff without bringing
up white supremacy and feminism and patriarchy for me, And
I'm trying to, like my rebrand, I'm trying to like
not use words like that, but I'm like, that's just
kind of how I talk and how I think about
the world. And I think it's really hard to talk
about beauty students without talking about why supremacy and patriarchy.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
So here I go again.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
Did you have a period in time where you would
think about it more like when you were on Orangees
and New Black?
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Were you thinking about it more?
Speaker 4 (07:20):
No, there was the period when I was thinking most
about how I looked was probably.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
The late nineties early two thousands.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
It was early transition, so it was like, I think
it was like a twenties thirties thing for me. Like
that was it was in my twenties and thirties and
not feeling fit enough, not feeling pretty enough, so I
was like obsessed with how I looked. Back then, I
did a movie, a student film, like in two thousand
and four, where I played a character where I thought
(07:48):
the character was really unattracted. I remember having a makeup
artist in my makeup and I did not look at
myself because in two thousand and four I was super
self conscious about how I looked, and I wanted to
look pretty at all times, but the character didn't. And
what was so freeing about that playing that character and
not looking at myself is that, like the revelation is
that if I'm.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
On camera thinking about how I look, I'm not in
the character.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
With Orange's New Black, where I've gotten to as an actor,
and with Orange, I was in a prison and I
was maybe one of the more glamorous prisoners, but not
by my standards, and so it wasn't about how I look,
very high standards, and so I had to not think
about how I looked. And through the progression of the
seven seasons of that show, I mean, speaking of natural Hair,
(08:33):
a lot of things happened to my character where I'm
in natural hair and I'm in spoiler alert, I'm in
solitary confinement, and I wouldn't say I'm glamorous, you know,
in retrospect, I wouldn't say I was ugly. But I
couldn't think about how I looked. I had to think
about the emotional life of the character. And that was
That's pretty much always where I have to land when
I'm acting. It can't be about how I look, and
(08:56):
as much as like how I look as a part
of what I do in my brand, I have to
let that go to actually do my job and not
be self conscious.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Does that make sense? Yes?
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Completely?
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (09:09):
When I think about this film, at least, I think
it's a great way to think about like the system
and everything you're taught and like we're taught to think
a certain thing is beautiful. We're taught to think a
certain way of being is the way you should be,
and there are other ways. In this film, Tally goes
on like this great hero's journey, and I kind of
think of like Doctor Cable my characters across between, like
(09:29):
Darth Vader and Miranda Priestley, and you know, Tally is
kind of like Luke Skywalker who goes on this journey.
Tally has just like sort of drunk all the kool
aid about like I'm supposed to have this surgery and
my life is going to be better.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
In Shaye is her.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
Friend, and she's just like, I don't know, I don't
know if if I maybe want to have this or
she's like, what are you talking about? And she questions
the system right, and so like we can be the
person who unquestionably takes in everything about that system, or
we could be the person who maybe questions that systeming
goes on this other journey of enlightenment. And I always
(10:07):
encourage people to question the system, to discover that there
may be another way, because there's always another way, and
sometimes there's other ways are a path to real freedom
and real enlightenment, and that is a beautiful thing that.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Stories can do.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
A really good story puts us in the shoes of
somebody else and getting to be an artist, like my
job is to constantly step into someone else's shoes and
see their humanity. And that is so much of what
we need in the world right now. It's like more stories,
more stepping into other people's shoes to go on their
(10:42):
journeys with them. There's so many ways we can do that,
but like a good movie can be an invitation for
us to do that in the rest of our lives.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
We need to take a quick break. But we'll be
right back with more from Laverne Cox. Stay with us,
and we're back with Laverne Cox. Laverne, We've talked a
lot about beauty standards, but I'm curious how has age
affected how you see yourself.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
Now, I think you hit a certain age where it's
just like it is so much energy trying to fake
it and be somebody else. That is just so much
easier to just be yourself. And it's so much easier
to just to show up. And then like even if
I'm trying to, like even in this sort of thinking
of rebranding kind of thing, it's like I just I'm
gonna I'm gonna start talking. I'm gonna be Laverne, you know.
(11:34):
I kind of just can't help it. And that is
a wonderful gift of getting older. It's just like, girl,
it is what it.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Is, Simon, She's in the fuck at fifties.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Yes, I am.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
You know the fear.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
Can I tell you what the fear of the rebranding
thing is? I think I need to name the fear.
It is that I'm in my fuck at fifties. But
it's also like I'm in my fifties and I'm in Hollywood,
and I'm an actress, and I'm a black actress, and
I'm a transactress, and We're in this deeply anti trans moment, right.
The fear is that we're in such a deeply anti
(12:09):
trans moment. And it's affected my work, and it's affected
the work of other trans people and opportunities, and it's
just real, like there is this really coordinated backlash against
the trans community, and like it not only affects rights,
you know, and our ability to access healthcare, etc.
Speaker 3 (12:26):
It also affects work.
Speaker 4 (12:28):
And you know, corporations are more afraid to like partner
with you because of this anti trans backlash. And so
that's so I'm like, I must rebrand, and it's just
like I just got to be myself.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
So Laverne, you mentioned this rebrand a couple of times,
and I'm so curious about the genesis of it.
Speaker 4 (12:46):
The rebrand was about me looking at the world around
me and then looking at the opportunities that were in
front of me. For most of my time post Oranges
New Black, most years, I've made more money doing speaking engagements.
And in twenty nineteen to twenty twenty one or so,
brand deals and brand endorsement and those things have.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Severely dried up, severely.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (13:11):
And so I'm just like, and I've had meetings, I've
had meetings with my team, like what's going on, especially
we had a strike last year, and I'm really I
was really blessed with the strike because I have a
diverse career, like I do other things besides just at
and so that got me through the strike in a
way that a lot of my friends were affected really badly.
So I call several meetings, honey, you know, several means
of my team, and I'm like, what's going on, what's
(13:32):
the deal? And I'm aware that post that, you know,
the dilomovating but light thing last year and the target
anti trans campaign that corporations were getting scared to work
with trans people, And like I was told by my
team and I just have trans friends who do this work,
that a lot of work is dried up. And so
in this moment, I'm just like, I just have to
be myself and the people who rock with me.
Speaker 3 (13:55):
I'm so grateful for I could cry.
Speaker 4 (13:57):
I really could cry, because there are there's a lot
of love, there's a lot of and that's just it
just it's gonna be okay. It's gonna be okay. I
think there's like a lot of fear and scarcity thinking going.
Speaker 3 (14:08):
On right now.
Speaker 4 (14:09):
But and however, all of this is happening for a reason.
It's horrible as it all is as scary as it all,
it is all happening for a reason. So that's what
the rebranding is about. And no, that didn't come from
anyone from my team saying I need to do that.
I've always been the leader in terms of my brand.
I've always been the one kind of setting the agenda
(14:32):
in terms of how I go out in the world
because I'm so specific. There's never been another Laverne Cox, right,
Like if you look at my resume and the first.
Speaker 3 (14:40):
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, however, and you
push the windows and doors open, and I'm proud of that.
I'm proud of that.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
I want to ask you about that because I don't
know that we ever really take the time to acknowledge
the fact that you were the whole face of a
seismic cultural movement, like when you burst onto the scene
with Orange the New Black, and I know you had
been working on camera long before that, for sure, the
same year you were on the cover of Time magazine.
(15:10):
I mean, when you think about I don't know, as
I'm hearing you like get emotional about what it feels
like to have support from your fans who really ride
with you. I have to wonder, like, is that because
there was a lot of weight that came with becoming
the face of this movement.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
I mean there still is. And what I've also had
to reckon with And this is what in the documentary
Disclosure that's on Netflix for people to see Sam Vader,
who directed it and brought me on to EP and
work with him on it. After my Time magazine cover,
he was like, usually when a marginalized group breaks through,
there's invariably backlash and weird eyebrows deep, you know, in
(15:52):
the anti trans backlash. Now, when I was on the
cover of Time magazine, there wasn't this organized, well funded,
glow mobal campaign with this focused group tested propaganda against
trans people, right, So trans people got to set the
agenda a bit more ten eleven years ago, And now
the backlash is so coordinated and organized, and I I
(16:15):
don't want to fully blame myself for it, but at
the same time, this is part of how things go
when we're more visible now more than ever before. And
I think that for those people out there listening who
aren't trans and who want to be allies and say
their allies, I think these are the moments when like
(16:36):
the people who say that their allies and say they
rock with us have to really show up. They have
to really show up and like for real with like jobs,
with opportunities, with speaking up and speaking out, and not
just speaking up for us, but like inviting us on
to like speak about our own experiences.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
So I think the point is.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
Now that like our allies, we really need them now
more than ever. But I think it's not just about
I think that the fight for trans rights is very
much just entied into the fight for reproductive rights, the
fight for immigrants, just humanity, Like the ways in which
at the center of all of the sort of civil liberties,
(17:18):
discriminations stuff is dehumanization. And so for those of us
who are who believe in justice and equality, the process
of rehumanizing everybody, even when we disagree with them, is
so crucially important seeing everyone's humanity in these moments and
like being just really careful about dehumanizing. And this is
(17:40):
the wonderful thing about being an actor and getting to
tell stories.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
We have to take another short break, we'll be right
back with Laverne Cox. And we're back with Laverne Cox. Well,
in thinking about great stories, I'm curious as to the
(18:07):
most fun you've ever had in entertainment.
Speaker 4 (18:10):
Oh, the most fun. Oh that's a great question. Well,
I just love being on set one of them. I'm
happiest when I'm on set with other actors, just in process.
So there's like my my favorite onset moment has to
be I did a show on CBS called Doubt that
we shot thirteen episodes. We was canceled after two in
(18:30):
twenty seventeen, but I got to have a whole day
of acting with Juda's Light.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
And this is twenty sixteen.
Speaker 4 (18:37):
We were shooting the show and we shot the day
after the Emmys, and that happened to be presenting at
the Emmys the night before, and I remember presenting on
stage and trying to rush out because I had to
be up at three am. And I was like, I'm
working with Jud's Light tomorrow. I have to be like
on my you know, my p's and q's. And it
was a masterclass. And she just Light at the time,
was sixty seven years old and she had flown in
(18:58):
she had flown from la the day before. She was
doing a one woman show, so she was doing eight
shows a week in New York. She was six or
seven years old, and she was working all day on
that Monday to shoot all her scenes for the episode,
and then she had a heart out at six pm
to fly back to New York to do eight more shows.
And I get really emotional every time I think about this.
(19:21):
We did a rehearsal with the director before lunch, no camera,
just so the director can kind of block, and it
was a blocking rehearsal, right. She was full tears, full emotion,
full out before full out. And I was just like,
and I watched her take in the place and let
that affect her, or watch her pick up an object
(19:43):
and let that affect her. And I watched her just
so utterly completely committed to the circumstances and the character,
and every single take she was finding something new. Every
single take was different, Every single take was a commitment
to going deeper and further. I get emotional thinking about
it because it's like, I just aspire to do that
(20:04):
kind of work as an actor. I want to be
a great artist. I want to be that committed, I
want to be that exploratory. Every time I work, and
everybody works differently, there's a level of intensity and concentration
and focus that you have to have that I'm not
there yet. It's this full surrender to the artistic process
(20:29):
that I am utterly obsessed with and that I have
such deep respect for because what I was taught from
Susan Batts and my acting mentor is that when you
really do the work of being an actor, like creating
characters that are creating walking, talking, human beings, that it
can shift people's molecules, it can shift the world. And
(20:50):
my life is a testament to that. I do a
lot of different things, but the reason anybody knows who
I am is, like the work that I did on
org Just and New Black, it was because I'm an
actor and I got this part in this beautiful writing
that people could see into the character soul, heart and
soul and then maybe see a little bit into mine,
(21:12):
and that is so incredibly powerful.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Okay, I'm going to take a hard left turn. I'm
hoping that love is part of the rebrand because I
want to ask you about that. I know that you
were in a long term relationship and you recently got
out of that relationship. I want to know what the
last few months have been like for you and what
are you looking for, Like what is your heart desire
in this season of life right now? I love that question.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
Well, love is everything. It was the beginning of April
I broke up with my boyfriend. We met during the
pandemic in twenty twenty, and we broke up, and then
I do whenever I break up with someone, I do
at least thirty days of no contact to detach. And
then when we started talking after the thirty days, he
was heartbroken and so was I. So I feel like
(21:59):
I'm in this weird limbo with my ex right now.
Speaker 3 (22:01):
But I do.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
Believe what's been really important for me in this since
we've been talking again is the processing I've been doing
with my therapist and the processing I've been doing with him,
and the clarity that I've gotten about how I operate
in relationships. Rene Brown has this acronym big Big Obviously
(22:24):
big what boundaries need to be in place for me
to stay in my integrity and make the most generous
assumption about you big? And so that becomes the standard
going forward with like can we get back together or not?
And really, right now, I'm the boundaries are pretty good,
but the integrity piece is like, I don't know if
(22:46):
I can stay in my integrity and stand this relationship.
But what this relationship has reminded me of is that
love is the most important thing. It's not always romantic love.
I also reminded that I have to love myself more
than I have to love him.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Right, that.
Speaker 4 (23:01):
It is, but it is that's part of my integrity,
that's part of my values, right that like I have
to and I must love myself more than I love him,
And just the relationship, and that at this point in
my life I can since the pandemic. I love being alone.
I love my time alone, and I am good by myself.
(23:23):
Do I want? I mean, at this point, what it's
so beautiful about whatever happens with this relationship is that
at this point in my life, I've had great love.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
Thinking sex and the City.
Speaker 4 (23:33):
And Charlotte and Carrie, I've had great This is a great,
great love, and if it ends, I wanted to end
well so I have been able to take the good
memories from it. I've had like mind blowing sex like
I've lived, and I've had great love. I've had great sex,
I've had wonderful adventures. And if I'm done, I just
(23:55):
I can't even see myself going back on apps. I'm
saying yes to life though, I'm saying yes to growth,
adventures and living and that is like very very exciting
that Like I feel at fifty two invigorated and I'm
loving life and I'm loving all the possibilities that are
in front of me. And what a blessing all that
(24:17):
stuff is. So yeah, it's got a nice you know.
She still is cute to fifty too, honey, so she
wants to.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Yes, she does.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
It's not cuter.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Laverne, thank you so much for coming on the bright side.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Absolutely.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
I hope people have been able to take away her
brightside from all that.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Real is always bright to me, amen.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Amen.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Laverne Cox is an Emmy nominated actress and Emmy winning producer.
Her new film Uglies is out on Netflix right now.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
That's it for today's show. Tomorrow, we're talking professional wellness
with communications expert, entrepreneur and author Maha Abu el Nin.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
The conversation using hashtag the bright Side and connect with
us on social media at Hello Sunshine on Instagram and
at the bright Side Pod on TikTok, and feel free
to tag us at Simone Boys and at Danielle Robe.
We'll see you tomorrow, Keep looking on the bright side.
Hey fam, Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Today on the bright Side, we're joined by actor and
Emmy winning producer Laverne Cox. She's here to talk about love,
beauty and her decision to rebrand. Also, why is she
saying yes to life? Her new Netflix film Uglies is
out now. It's Tuesday, September twenty fourth. I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
And I'm Simone Boyce and this is the bright Side
from Hello Sunshine, a daily show where we come together
to share women's stories, laugh, learn and brighten your day.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Simone.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
We're so lucky that we've experienced so many firsts in
our lifetime. I think that means it signals progress, really,
but I think that our culture talks about first a lot,
and Laverne Cox has always been a person who has
gone first. She burst into the spotlight when she starred
as Sophia Bursette in the critically acclaimed Netflix series Orange
(00:59):
is the New Black. That role earned her Emmy nomination,
and it made Laverne Cox the first openly transgender actress
to be nominated for an Emmy in any acting category.
Laverne also started a national conversation about trans representation when
she became the first ever openly transgender person to appear
on the covers of Time magazine and Cosmopolitan magazine.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
And now Laverne is sparking a whole new dialogue around beauty,
the price of beauty, and the pressures we feel to
be perfect with her new movie Uglies, which is now
streaming on Netflix. Welcome to the bright Side, Laverne.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Hire every time of day it is for you, wherever
you are.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Well, Laverne, you have a new project out on Netflix
called Uglies, and it's a story that takes place in
a dystopian world where everyone has mandatory cosmetic surgery when
they turn sixteen. Talk about triggering, I'm already triggered. Just
your trigger? Why are you triggered?
Speaker 4 (02:01):
So this like what I'm most excited about now because
we started this journey like over three years ago. Is
I get to talk to people about it. So why
are you triggered? Just describing the film, because.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I mean, the first of all, the idea of mandatory
cosmetic surgery, any anything where women lose agency is automatically
very triggering to me.
Speaker 4 (02:22):
But just women, though it's men, it's everyone in this society.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
But go on, Yes, I can remember working in news
and legacy media and just hearing through the grapevind that, oh, yeah,
you know, it's HD footage and if your wrinkles start
to show on camera, the talent department is going to
make you get botox. Or I can remember, you know,
interviewing for a job as a local news reporter here
in LA and it became very clear in the interview
(02:48):
that if I wore my natural hair on TV then
I would not get the job. So I think it's
triggering for me personally, just as a black, biracial woman
who's been in a very public facing role. What did
it bring up for you?
Speaker 4 (03:04):
When I read the script, I was just I had
been manifesting a sort of sci fi futuristic project for
me as an actor. I've always loved the idea of
the future, particularly as a trans woman, like some sort
of you know, alien future dystopian something or other, because
(03:25):
in the future, like gender would matter less. So like,
I was just excited by that. And then when I
read the script, I just I was excited about my character.
I was excited about this world. The triggering piece for
me I didn't focus so much on because what's interesting
is that doctor Cable and ugly is My character is
(03:46):
the architect of this brave new world, brave scary world.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
She's the architect of the whole world.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
For her, it's about everyone being equal and no one
being discriminated against because of how they look. It's interesting
because there is a certain look that that characters have
post surgery and uglies after they have their surgery.
Speaker 3 (04:05):
It looked like Instagram filters.
Speaker 4 (04:07):
I was on Instagram in my stories like last week,
and I was playing with filters, which I don't do
a lot, and it didn't just give me different color eyes.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
I gave me a nose job.
Speaker 4 (04:17):
Then I remember that, like a lot of plastic surgeons
are saying now that people are used to bring in
photos of celebrities and now they're bringing in photos of
their filter itselves for cosmetic surgery. And I can see
how people get addicted to these filters because I've done
a lot of work to accept myself, and I think
the interesting thing about being trans is that there's still
(04:38):
a misconception that when you're trans you've had all this
surgery and that there's a big shift that you've had.
But I haven't had any face surgery yet. You know,
and I say yet, because I'm fifty two, who you know,
I might need or want to do something, but I
haven't done anything in my face. So last night I
was in the filter and then the filter like narrowed
my nose and I was like, oh, that looks kind
of cool. And then I was like, oh, going from
(04:59):
the filter face so the real facing back and forth
and just being like the real face is good.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
Like the bulbous tip of my Negro nose.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
It's so important for me as purely as a black
woman to embrace this nose. So many black women in
Hollywood have had nose jobs. I mean, it's cute. I
don't think I need a nose job. But then sometimes
I'll pick myself apart, and like that has been the
journey for me as a woman, as a trans woman,
as a woman of color, to be like, Okay, there
(05:30):
was a period in my life when I wanted a
certain kind of perfection and then I was just like,
how do I just accept myself? You know, because I
think like when you get into this surgery thing, it
just kind of never ends. I've seen a lot of
friends just kind of like once you start, you don't stop.
And so What it's been beautiful for me about my
journey around just affirming my gender is that I believe
(05:54):
every surgery I've had has been necessary and has helped
me match inside to my outside, but it hasn't turned
into this perfectionistic thing.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
When I think about your breakout role in Orange is
the New Black, and then I think, you know, you've
been acting since even before that, in the early two thousands.
How has your perception of beauty standards changed, especially once
you reached the spotlight? Was it the same before as
it is now?
Speaker 3 (06:21):
That's a really interesting question.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
So I'm fifty two years old and I moved to
New York in nineteen ninety three, and I think about,
like my journey from like being gender not conforming to
like accepting my womanhood. And as I went on a
feminizing journey, I had to like reckon with female beauty
standards sort of being tied to white supremacy in a
(06:43):
way that other standards of beauty aren't. So I had
to really interrogate my own relationship to white supremacy and misogyny.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
And then also this thing of being seen.
Speaker 4 (06:54):
It's it's hard to talk about this stuff without bringing
up white supremacy and feminism and patriarchy for me, And
I'm trying to, like my rebrand, I'm trying to like
not use words like that, but I'm like, that's just
kind of how I talk and how I think about
the world. And I think it's really hard to talk
about beauty students without talking about why supremacy and patriarchy.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
So here I go again.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
Did you have a period in time where you would
think about it more like when you were on Orangees
and New Black?
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Were you thinking about it more?
Speaker 4 (07:20):
No, there was the period when I was thinking most
about how I looked was probably.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
The late nineties early two thousands.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
It was early transition, so it was like, I think
it was like a twenties thirties thing for me. Like
that was it was in my twenties and thirties and
not feeling fit enough, not feeling pretty enough, so I
was like obsessed with how I looked. Back then, I
did a movie, a student film, like in two thousand
and four, where I played a character where I thought
(07:48):
the character was really unattracted. I remember having a makeup
artist in my makeup and I did not look at
myself because in two thousand and four I was super
self conscious about how I looked, and I wanted to
look pretty at all times, but the character didn't. And
what was so freeing about that playing that character and
not looking at myself is that, like the revelation is
that if I'm.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
On camera thinking about how I look, I'm not in
the character.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
With Orange's New Black, where I've gotten to as an actor,
and with Orange, I was in a prison and I
was maybe one of the more glamorous prisoners, but not
by my standards, and so it wasn't about how I look,
very high standards, and so I had to not think
about how I looked. And through the progression of the
seven seasons of that show, I mean, speaking of natural Hair,
(08:33):
a lot of things happened to my character where I'm
in natural hair and I'm in spoiler alert, I'm in
solitary confinement, and I wouldn't say I'm glamorous, you know,
in retrospect, I wouldn't say I was ugly. But I
couldn't think about how I looked. I had to think
about the emotional life of the character. And that was
That's pretty much always where I have to land when
I'm acting. It can't be about how I look, and
(08:56):
as much as like how I look as a part
of what I do in my brand, I have to
let that go to actually do my job and not
be self conscious.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Does that make sense? Yes?
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Completely?
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (09:09):
When I think about this film, at least, I think
it's a great way to think about like the system
and everything you're taught and like we're taught to think
a certain thing is beautiful. We're taught to think a
certain way of being is the way you should be,
and there are other ways. In this film, Tally goes
on like this great hero's journey, and I kind of
think of like Doctor Cable my characters across between, like
(09:29):
Darth Vader and Miranda Priestley, and you know, Tally is
kind of like Luke Skywalker who goes on this journey.
Tally has just like sort of drunk all the kool
aid about like I'm supposed to have this surgery and
my life is going to be better.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
In Shaye is her.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
Friend, and she's just like, I don't know, I don't
know if if I maybe want to have this or
she's like, what are you talking about? And she questions
the system right, and so like we can be the
person who unquestionably takes in everything about that system, or
we could be the person who maybe questions that systeming
goes on this other journey of enlightenment. And I always
(10:07):
encourage people to question the system, to discover that there
may be another way, because there's always another way, and
sometimes there's other ways are a path to real freedom
and real enlightenment, and that is a beautiful thing that.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Stories can do.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
A really good story puts us in the shoes of
somebody else and getting to be an artist, like my
job is to constantly step into someone else's shoes and
see their humanity. And that is so much of what
we need in the world right now. It's like more stories,
more stepping into other people's shoes to go on their
(10:42):
journeys with them. There's so many ways we can do that,
but like a good movie can be an invitation for
us to do that in the rest of our lives.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
We need to take a quick break. But we'll be
right back with more from Laverne Cox. Stay with us,
and we're back with Laverne Cox. Laverne, We've talked a
lot about beauty standards, but I'm curious how has age
affected how you see yourself.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
Now, I think you hit a certain age where it's
just like it is so much energy trying to fake
it and be somebody else. That is just so much
easier to just be yourself. And it's so much easier
to just to show up. And then like even if
I'm trying to, like even in this sort of thinking
of rebranding kind of thing, it's like I just I'm
gonna I'm gonna start talking. I'm gonna be Laverne, you know.
(11:34):
I kind of just can't help it. And that is
a wonderful gift of getting older. It's just like, girl,
it is what it.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Is, Simon, She's in the fuck at fifties.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Yes, I am.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
You know the fear.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
Can I tell you what the fear of the rebranding
thing is? I think I need to name the fear.
It is that I'm in my fuck at fifties. But
it's also like I'm in my fifties and I'm in Hollywood,
and I'm an actress, and I'm a black actress, and
I'm a transactress, and We're in this deeply anti trans moment, right.
The fear is that we're in such a deeply anti
(12:09):
trans moment. And it's affected my work, and it's affected
the work of other trans people and opportunities, and it's
just real, like there is this really coordinated backlash against
the trans community, and like it not only affects rights,
you know, and our ability to access healthcare, etc.
Speaker 3 (12:26):
It also affects work.
Speaker 4 (12:28):
And you know, corporations are more afraid to like partner
with you because of this anti trans backlash. And so
that's so I'm like, I must rebrand, and it's just
like I just got to be myself.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
So Laverne, you mentioned this rebrand a couple of times,
and I'm so curious about the genesis of it.
Speaker 4 (12:46):
The rebrand was about me looking at the world around
me and then looking at the opportunities that were in
front of me. For most of my time post Oranges
New Black, most years, I've made more money doing speaking engagements.
And in twenty nineteen to twenty twenty one or so,
brand deals and brand endorsement and those things have.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Severely dried up, severely.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (13:11):
And so I'm just like, and I've had meetings, I've
had meetings with my team, like what's going on, especially
we had a strike last year, and I'm really I
was really blessed with the strike because I have a
diverse career, like I do other things besides just at
and so that got me through the strike in a
way that a lot of my friends were affected really badly.
So I call several meetings, honey, you know, several means
of my team, and I'm like, what's going on, what's
(13:32):
the deal? And I'm aware that post that, you know,
the dilomovating but light thing last year and the target
anti trans campaign that corporations were getting scared to work
with trans people, And like I was told by my
team and I just have trans friends who do this work,
that a lot of work is dried up. And so
in this moment, I'm just like, I just have to
be myself and the people who rock with me.
Speaker 3 (13:55):
I'm so grateful for I could cry.
Speaker 4 (13:57):
I really could cry, because there are there's a lot
of love, there's a lot of and that's just it
just it's gonna be okay. It's gonna be okay. I
think there's like a lot of fear and scarcity thinking going.
Speaker 3 (14:08):
On right now.
Speaker 4 (14:09):
But and however, all of this is happening for a reason.
It's horrible as it all is as scary as it all,
it is all happening for a reason. So that's what
the rebranding is about. And no, that didn't come from
anyone from my team saying I need to do that.
I've always been the leader in terms of my brand.
I've always been the one kind of setting the agenda
(14:32):
in terms of how I go out in the world
because I'm so specific. There's never been another Laverne Cox, right,
Like if you look at my resume and the first.
Speaker 3 (14:40):
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, however, and you
push the windows and doors open, and I'm proud of that.
I'm proud of that.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
I want to ask you about that because I don't
know that we ever really take the time to acknowledge
the fact that you were the whole face of a
seismic cultural movement, like when you burst onto the scene
with Orange the New Black, and I know you had
been working on camera long before that, for sure, the
same year you were on the cover of Time magazine.
(15:10):
I mean, when you think about I don't know, as
I'm hearing you like get emotional about what it feels
like to have support from your fans who really ride
with you. I have to wonder, like, is that because
there was a lot of weight that came with becoming
the face of this movement.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
I mean there still is. And what I've also had
to reckon with And this is what in the documentary
Disclosure that's on Netflix for people to see Sam Vader,
who directed it and brought me on to EP and
work with him on it. After my Time magazine cover,
he was like, usually when a marginalized group breaks through,
there's invariably backlash and weird eyebrows deep, you know, in
(15:52):
the anti trans backlash. Now, when I was on the
cover of Time magazine, there wasn't this organized, well funded,
glow mobal campaign with this focused group tested propaganda against
trans people, right, So trans people got to set the
agenda a bit more ten eleven years ago, And now
the backlash is so coordinated and organized, and I I
(16:15):
don't want to fully blame myself for it, but at
the same time, this is part of how things go
when we're more visible now more than ever before. And
I think that for those people out there listening who
aren't trans and who want to be allies and say
their allies, I think these are the moments when like
(16:36):
the people who say that their allies and say they
rock with us have to really show up. They have
to really show up and like for real with like jobs,
with opportunities, with speaking up and speaking out, and not
just speaking up for us, but like inviting us on
to like speak about our own experiences.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
So I think the point is.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
Now that like our allies, we really need them now
more than ever. But I think it's not just about
I think that the fight for trans rights is very
much just entied into the fight for reproductive rights, the
fight for immigrants, just humanity, Like the ways in which
at the center of all of the sort of civil liberties,
(17:18):
discriminations stuff is dehumanization. And so for those of us
who are who believe in justice and equality, the process
of rehumanizing everybody, even when we disagree with them, is
so crucially important seeing everyone's humanity in these moments and
like being just really careful about dehumanizing. And this is
(17:40):
the wonderful thing about being an actor and getting to
tell stories.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
We have to take another short break, we'll be right
back with Laverne Cox. And we're back with Laverne Cox. Well,
in thinking about great stories, I'm curious as to the
(18:07):
most fun you've ever had in entertainment.
Speaker 4 (18:10):
Oh, the most fun. Oh that's a great question. Well,
I just love being on set one of them. I'm
happiest when I'm on set with other actors, just in process.
So there's like my my favorite onset moment has to
be I did a show on CBS called Doubt that
we shot thirteen episodes. We was canceled after two in
(18:30):
twenty seventeen, but I got to have a whole day
of acting with Juda's Light.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
And this is twenty sixteen.
Speaker 4 (18:37):
We were shooting the show and we shot the day
after the Emmys, and that happened to be presenting at
the Emmys the night before, and I remember presenting on
stage and trying to rush out because I had to
be up at three am. And I was like, I'm
working with Jud's Light tomorrow. I have to be like
on my you know, my p's and q's. And it
was a masterclass. And she just Light at the time,
was sixty seven years old and she had flown in
(18:58):
she had flown from la the day before. She was
doing a one woman show, so she was doing eight
shows a week in New York. She was six or
seven years old, and she was working all day on
that Monday to shoot all her scenes for the episode,
and then she had a heart out at six pm
to fly back to New York to do eight more shows.
And I get really emotional every time I think about this.
(19:21):
We did a rehearsal with the director before lunch, no camera,
just so the director can kind of block, and it
was a blocking rehearsal, right. She was full tears, full emotion,
full out before full out. And I was just like,
and I watched her take in the place and let
that affect her, or watch her pick up an object
(19:43):
and let that affect her. And I watched her just
so utterly completely committed to the circumstances and the character,
and every single take she was finding something new. Every
single take was different, Every single take was a commitment
to going deeper and further. I get emotional thinking about
it because it's like, I just aspire to do that
(20:04):
kind of work as an actor. I want to be
a great artist. I want to be that committed, I
want to be that exploratory. Every time I work, and
everybody works differently, there's a level of intensity and concentration
and focus that you have to have that I'm not
there yet. It's this full surrender to the artistic process
(20:29):
that I am utterly obsessed with and that I have
such deep respect for because what I was taught from
Susan Batts and my acting mentor is that when you
really do the work of being an actor, like creating
characters that are creating walking, talking, human beings, that it
can shift people's molecules, it can shift the world. And
(20:50):
my life is a testament to that. I do a
lot of different things, but the reason anybody knows who
I am is, like the work that I did on
org Just and New Black, it was because I'm an
actor and I got this part in this beautiful writing
that people could see into the character soul, heart and
soul and then maybe see a little bit into mine,
(21:12):
and that is so incredibly powerful.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Okay, I'm going to take a hard left turn. I'm
hoping that love is part of the rebrand because I
want to ask you about that. I know that you
were in a long term relationship and you recently got
out of that relationship. I want to know what the
last few months have been like for you and what
are you looking for, Like what is your heart desire
in this season of life right now? I love that question.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
Well, love is everything. It was the beginning of April
I broke up with my boyfriend. We met during the
pandemic in twenty twenty, and we broke up, and then
I do whenever I break up with someone, I do
at least thirty days of no contact to detach. And
then when we started talking after the thirty days, he
was heartbroken and so was I. So I feel like
(21:59):
I'm in this weird limbo with my ex right now.
Speaker 3 (22:01):
But I do.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
Believe what's been really important for me in this since
we've been talking again is the processing I've been doing
with my therapist and the processing I've been doing with him,
and the clarity that I've gotten about how I operate
in relationships. Rene Brown has this acronym big Big Obviously
(22:24):
big what boundaries need to be in place for me
to stay in my integrity and make the most generous
assumption about you big? And so that becomes the standard
going forward with like can we get back together or not?
And really, right now, I'm the boundaries are pretty good,
but the integrity piece is like, I don't know if
(22:46):
I can stay in my integrity and stand this relationship.
But what this relationship has reminded me of is that
love is the most important thing. It's not always romantic love.
I also reminded that I have to love myself more
than I have to love him.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Right, that.
Speaker 4 (23:01):
It is, but it is that's part of my integrity,
that's part of my values, right that like I have
to and I must love myself more than I love him,
And just the relationship, and that at this point in
my life I can since the pandemic. I love being alone.
I love my time alone, and I am good by myself.
(23:23):
Do I want? I mean, at this point, what it's
so beautiful about whatever happens with this relationship is that
at this point in my life, I've had great love.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
Thinking sex and the City.
Speaker 4 (23:33):
And Charlotte and Carrie, I've had great This is a great,
great love, and if it ends, I wanted to end
well so I have been able to take the good
memories from it. I've had like mind blowing sex like
I've lived, and I've had great love. I've had great sex,
I've had wonderful adventures. And if I'm done, I just
(23:55):
I can't even see myself going back on apps. I'm
saying yes to life though, I'm saying yes to growth,
adventures and living and that is like very very exciting
that Like I feel at fifty two invigorated and I'm
loving life and I'm loving all the possibilities that are
in front of me. And what a blessing all that
(24:17):
stuff is. So yeah, it's got a nice you know.
She still is cute to fifty too, honey, so she
wants to.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Yes, she does.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
It's not cuter.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Laverne, thank you so much for coming on the bright side.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Absolutely.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
I hope people have been able to take away her
brightside from all that.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Real is always bright to me, amen.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Amen.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Laverne Cox is an Emmy nominated actress and Emmy winning producer.
Her new film Uglies is out on Netflix right now.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
That's it for today's show. Tomorrow, we're talking professional wellness
with communications expert, entrepreneur and author Maha Abu el Nin.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
The conversation using hashtag the bright Side and connect with
us on social media at Hello Sunshine on Instagram and
at the bright Side Pod on TikTok, and feel free
to tag us at Simone Boys and at Danielle Robe.
We'll see you tomorrow, Keep looking on the bright side.
Hosts And Creators
Simone Boyce
Danielle Robay
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