In the summer of 2015, I had the honor of interviewing award-winning actress and singer Naturi Naughton. We had an amazing conversation about her Broadway experience, movie career, and her second season as Tasha St. Patrick on STARZ hit drama Power. Unfortunately, the recorded file experienced an error that made it unusable. I thought the interview was lost forever.
Thanks to advancements in technology, I was finally able to recover the interview with Naughton and present it to you right now! Please enjoy THE LOST INTERVIEW.
You’ve done stage, television and movies. Which one made you respect character development the most?
Hmmm… I feel like during stage, being on Broadway is a little different because it incorporated more of a skill of how to tell a story through music. Being on stage in a musical is different because you’re acting and singing and dancing.
Was there a learning advantage going from theater to film?
Film really, really taught me. During my first film, ‘Notorious’, I played Lil Kim. I learned about breaking down a character. Throughout the film Lil Kim grows, the character changed.
Theater made you a storyteller. Film taught you to break characters down. So tell us how you feel about acting on television.
I feel like with television, I’m on a series where you’re doing multiple episodes. We’re on every week. The characters are doing different things. Things change because the season is growing. Every season things shift. So I feel like television has really taught me to understand and have a greater respect for character development. I think I always had a respect for it, but it’s even greater now doing a television series because these characters are forever changing.
On ‘Power’ you play the lead character’s wife, Tasha St. Patrick. I’m sure we can agree she can be over-the-top. What’s her most unrealistic characteristic that causes real life reactions from the audience?
I don’t think she’s that unrealistic! The audience sure has a strong, visceral reaction to the fact she doesn’t want Ghost, her husband, to get out of the drug game. She wants him to stay a drug dealer instead of going legit with the club business. I think maybe, initially, that seems a little…weird, or off-putting for some.
Tasha seems like the type to get a rise out of people, which has to be difficult at times for you because some people can’t separate television from real life.
I remember Season 1 people were mad at me! I was masturbating in the backseat with the driver. These are all daring things that most of us wouldn’t be doing. But at the same time there’s a lot of women who can connect with and understand Tasha in a different way. We got a lot of reactions in Season 1 with some of Tasha’s crazy behaviors and outbursts. | By Mr. Joe Walker
