00:00What do you want audiences to take away from this film when they see it?
00:03I want black girls who have been called difficult to feel seen.
00:10Noni here in the Macro Lodge with the cast and director of Sella and the Spades. Hello you guys, welcome!
00:16At the Haldwell School for Boarding and Day Students, there are five factions.
00:22The Spades deal on the most classic of vices.
00:25Booze, pills, powders, fun. Led by Sella with Maxie at her side.
00:33Lovey playing Sella, like she is the badass. Tell me a little bit about your character.
00:41Sella is the head of the Spades. She is, she's a powerhouse. She's, she's a strong unapologetic woman.
00:50She's, she's her. She's Sella. That's all she has to be. She doesn't want to be anyone else.
00:55She doesn't want to do anything else. But you know, I'm very vulnerable.
00:59I don't feel like Sella allows people to see that side of her.
01:02She doesn't allow people to get close. But me, I'm a Pisces rising, so I'm really emotional.
01:12And then Celeste, how would you say the experience of high schoolers in this movie
01:17was relatable to your own personal high school experience?
01:22I went to an all girls private Catholic school, all white. I was one of like five black girls in my
01:31year. And just like feeling like an outsider, like that otherness was something that I was like very
01:38familiar with. So there was a lot of truth to that for sure. In terms of like high school politics.
01:44I'm a little bit older than the kids in the movie. And I'm very grateful that social media was not
01:51alive when I was in high school. But you guys going back to your high school experience with the five
01:58factions that's in this school, like what faction would you guys have belonged to in your school?
02:03Honestly, I see myself as a Bobby. I was very much, I mean, I wasn't like that. I wasn't as dramatic
02:10as the bobbies were. And I went to a performing arts high school in New York City. So that was my life
02:16pretty much. And we were, you know, the entire, my entire high school experience was a Bobby experience.
02:22Yeah. We were just a school full of bobbies.
02:26It would probably be spades just because really the economics of it. I went to a private school.
02:32Mm-hmm. I grew up poor and got sent, got a scholarship to go to this rich waspy New England
02:39private school. So I was trustful on kids and it changed my life. It was an amazing experience.
02:43But I was broke. Yeah. So I would pick spades because I could, I would be hustling to try to
02:49figure out a way to not be broke. What do you want audiences to take away from this film when they
02:53see it? I want black girls who have been called difficult to feel seen. That for me is the most
03:02important thing. Everything else is great, awesome, like wonderful. But this movie is for black girls
03:07who've been called angry and difficult and hard to work with. All of those things. That's, it's for,
03:14it's for us. Oh my gosh. You just struck such a chord when you said that just now.
03:18So incredibly amazing. We at Essence, we love to see a black woman at the helm of a film behind the
03:24camera. Why do you think it's so important for us to tell our own stories through our own lens?
03:29Hmm. I don't think other people have been doing a very good job. That part. When we tell our stories,
03:35we don't otherize ourselves. We see ourselves as the center. We see ourselves as the main character
03:39because when I wake up in the morning, I'm Taya Risha. Like I am, I'm, this is, I take up as much
03:45space as I want to. So I think that when we tell our stories, when we write our stories, when we direct
03:49our stories, when we act in our stories, we don't otherize ourselves. And that's so important for every
03:54person. So everybody should have that opportunity to be the main character, to be in the center.
04:01Incredible. And then lastly, this seems like such a great ground setting for something that might
04:07expand to like a series or something like that. Is there any thoughts to expanding? Definitely.
04:13I think it's just, we've built this very complex, fascinating, and fun world that people just want
04:20to feel like they're a part of. And I do think that like making a series or going down that route
04:24is a very, just a natural progression of events for us. So we'll see. We'll see.
04:28It'll be a dope series. Yeah. Yeah. That'd be great.
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