NICOLE BEHARIE

I was the jokester, the one who made the family laugh.

I think it's a great time to be a person of color and with talent. And actually, to be a woman as well. Our show is one of the most diverse television shows on television right now.

I went to Juilliard in New York and used to do cabarets just for fun. Occasionally, I would get together with a jazz musician and play at a restaurant for cash. And I've done some background vocals for recording artists.

I've been fortunate to work with Alfre Woodard and Jeffrey Wright; people who are artists, have careers, longevity and full lives. That looks good to me.

When I was younger, my father was in the Foreign Service and we lived in Nigeria, Panama, and London, but for the most part I grew up in the South and D.C. I got the travel bug as a little person and I've bounced around a lot.

Everything about us black people is complicated, us being here, being a minority, being a woman, all those things are complicated.

My mom has an English accent, so we always referred to the trunk as the 'boot.' And then, suddenly, we moved to Georgia and I would say things like 'open the boot' with a bit of an accent, and I quickly realized I had to adapt; that kind of thing will get you beat up!

Stone Mountain, Georgia, still had Ku Klux Klan marches, and I had a wild and courageous mother who'd put us in the car to watch them. She wanted us to know those things existed.

There are expectations in how you play your character as a black woman, to be sassy and the same kind of feel, as if there are no quirky black women. I struggle with those things constantly, trying to add dimension to my work, and that's the goal, too.

I was kind of a bully, even though I'm tiny, 5' 2". As a child, I'd boss other kids around and dress my little brother up, just putting on shows, singing and dressing up.

There are expectations in how you play your character as a black woman, to be sassy and the same kind of feel, as if there are no quirky black women. I struggle with those things constantly, trying to add dimension to my work, and that's the goal, too.

Everything about us black people is complicated, us being here, being a minority, being a woman, all those things are complicated.

I've been fortunate to work with Alfre Woodard and Jeffrey Wright; people who are artists, have careers, longevity and full lives. That looks good to me.

My mom has an English accent, so we always referred to the trunk as the 'boot.' And then, suddenly, we moved to Georgia and I would say things like 'open the boot' with a bit of an accent, and I quickly realized I had to adapt; that kind of thing will get you beat up!

Stone Mountain, Georgia, still had Ku Klux Klan marches, and I had a wild and courageous mother who'd put us in the car to watch them. She wanted us to know those things existed.

When I was younger, my father was in the Foreign Service and we lived in Nigeria, Panama, and London, but for the most part I grew up in the South and D.C. I got the travel bug as a little person and I've bounced around a lot.

I went to Juilliard in New York and used to do cabarets just for fun. Occasionally, I would get together with a jazz musician and play at a restaurant for cash. And I've done some background vocals for recording artists.

I was the jokester, the one who made the family laugh.

I was kind of a bully, even though I'm tiny, 5' 2". As a child, I'd boss other kids around and dress my little brother up, just putting on shows, singing and dressing up.

I think it's a great time to be a person of color and with talent. And actually, to be a woman as well. Our show is one of the most diverse television shows on television right now.

I kind of feel like I have grown as just like a human being as a human being by being able to adapt and adjust and know that like you can't ever rest on your laurels, you have to sort of wake up; you actually have to be present.