(Cover) - EN Showbiz - Thandie Newton felt like she was part of a sisterhood while shooting For Colored Girls.
The actress plays Tangie/Orange in the movie, which is about the way nine womens lives are interconnected in part due to their race. It has an ensemble cast including Janet Jackson, Whoopi Goldberg, Kimberly Elise and Kerry Washington, which is one of the reasons Thandie wanted to take part. She was thrilled to have the opportunity to team up with such strong women, and said it had a huge impact on her.
To find myself in a situation where I could actually address my previous beliefs, which is that race doesnt matter, but it does and Anika Noni Rose and Kimberly Elise and Loretta Devine and Phylicia [Rashad] and all these wonderful women know how it feels, and I havent been in the presence of, yes, a kind of sisterhood because we have experienced the same thing, the same frustrations, the same prejudice, the same blessings because of the way we look, she explained. And that has been extraordinary and I am so grateful for that.
Tangie is a fierce character, whose mother Alice is portrayed by Whoopi. The two women have a very difficult relationship because of what they have been through, which was another area of interest for Thandie. She liked the way it was dealt with, and that there are no cut and dried answers when it comes to the characters behaviour.
Tangie is feral. She is fierce. She is uncompromising. She is destructive of herself and everything around her. And she has a metaphoric splinter in her soul, which was placed there when she was very very young, Thandie explained.
Its a fascinating and toxic journey that all these women have gone on. But whats so beautiful about this piece is that, yes Alice helped perpetrate the crime that has created this hatred and rage in Tangie, when in fact Alice was just like Tangie as a child. So what our characters are illustrating is the cycle of pain, the cycle of abuse, that if we dont interrupt it with wisdom and with strength and with self-love it will keep snowballing into the future. (C) Cover Media