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Actors often seek connection with their roles to help them embody their characters. For Anna Diop, the many links she shared with her character in Nikyatu Jusu\u2019s directorial debut, \u201cNanny\u201d \u2014 from her Senegalese culture to the reflection of her own mother\u2019s immigrant story \u2014 drew her to accept the role.<\/p>\n
In \u201cNanny,\u201d an undocumented Senegalese woman named Aisha works for an affluent Manhattan family (Michelle Monaghan and Morgan Spector) while hoping to bring her own son she left behind to the United States. She is tormented by visions of African spirits Anansi the spider and Mami Wata, whose chaotic energy push Aisha to become bolder. \u201cNanny\u201d won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival in January, and Diop just earned a Gotham Award nomination for best breakthrough performer.<\/p>\n
Aisha navigates complex emotions and situations in \u201cNanny.\u201d What part of her character did you relate to the most?<\/p>\n
The trepidation Aisha carries through the beginning of this film, I really relate to because as an immigrant, I relate to tiptoeing around environments. I\u2019m just getting to a place where I\u2019m growing up from that and becoming a lot more unapologetic and taking up space myself. \u2026 It\u2019s also something as an immigrant I saw my mother navigate. Especially when you first get here and especially if you\u2019re undocumented, you\u2019re so careful and your parents, if they\u2019re first-generation, are raising you to be careful and cautious. That\u2019s just an experience I relate to as an immigrant as a Black woman. I am just myself evolving into the place that we see Aisha evolving into.<\/p>\n
What conversations did you and the director have in exploring Aisha\u2019s story?<\/p>\n
So we talked about Aisha\u2019s emotional arc. \u2026 For Aisha, it\u2019s certainly her coming into her own power and articulating and standing in her own dignity. The conversations I had with Nikyatu were why or how is this happening to her now, what is it that\u2019s bringing her into this new place of having more confidence and having less fear and speaking up for herself\u2026 this is happening because of these spiritual entities that are now imbuing her, Mami Wata and Anansi, these figures of resistance and rebellion, these chaos agents. This is how or why I [as Aisha] should begin to behave in this way that\u2019s much bolder and less apologetic, despite her very fragile position.<\/p>\n
How do you feel about all the awards recognition you and film are getting?<\/p>\n
I am so proud of our film and I\u2019m so honored by it. When you care so much about a subject matter \u2014 this story is my mother\u2019s story in so many ways, and it\u2019s a story that I\u2019ve always cared so much about. It\u2019s a character I\u2019ve always cared so much about. An African immigrant woman and a mother, this is something that means everything to me. To find other people responding so positively to it and connecting so much with it, and celebrating it, is very moving.<\/p>\n
\u201cNanny\u201d is a film covering a story and character we do not see enough of onscreen \u2014 and need to see more of.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s never quite our stories or people that look like us or exploring the nuances of who and what we are. It\u2019s rare.<\/p>\n
What do you hope people take away from \u201cNanny\u201d?<\/p>\n
I hope that those of us who aren\u2019t used to seeing ourselves centered find some sort of recognition in Aisha \u2014 either that she reminds them, or her story reminds them, of what their own mothers have experienced or what they themselves have experienced. We just simply need more of that. We\u2019ve been, I think, longing for it for so long and deprived of it for so long. It is refreshing when you get to see yourself reflected on screen \u2026 and for those who don\u2019t necessarily relate, I hope it blows up a deeper empathy in them for these individuals and these people navigating vulnerable, precarious, dangerous, sometimes vulnerable situations.<\/p>\n
View this article at Variety<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Anna Diop Talks Personal Connections to \u2018Nanny\u2019 Role and Joy of Being \u2018Reflected On Screen\u2019: Actors often seek connection with their roles to help them embody their characters. For Anna Diop, the many links she shared with her character in Nikyatu Jusu\u2019s directorial debut, \u201cNanny\u201d \u2014 from her Senegalese culture to the reflection of her
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