00:00yes indeed it's going down essence fest is a happenstance in a situation i am trying to tell
00:08you i'm so excited erica alexander say hi how are you yes hello beautiful queen thank you
00:17and looking good as always hold on i can't hear you that well you can there you go okay i was
00:21saying you're looking good thank you but not better than her she always look good i'm working on her
00:26but pretty awesome there's no doubt about it how are you feeling you're here at essence fest what
00:32is how how's this moment for you feeling right now well it's a beautiful moment always to celebrate
00:37women essence is about that all these years they've been doing such a good job and i'm glad to be
00:41invited to the party and you know first time in history there's three rappers that are headlining
00:47um this year and that is like a monumental moment so how does that make you feel well it's wonderful
00:53i mean those women have been working hard for a very long time and it's not about flowers they're
00:58getting what they deserve and what's powerful is i worked with one for a very long time queen latifah
01:04and she's powerful in her own right and has gone on to be really successful in a lot of spaces and they
01:09all will too but the thing is where they're most dominant they should be headliners all the time and
01:14we should lift them up so therefore essence is doing the right thing but we should all lay out the red
01:20carpet for these women and for other women behind them and for the younger women to see them as such
01:25because what's powerful about missy elliott is that she's a producer and she learned how to work the
01:30board and that created her own destiny so i'm down with all that and i'm certainly down with essence
01:35doing the right thing here and i applaud you listen you mentioned living single we are remember
01:4119 19 but you were also on the wu-tang american saga hey hey come on and you know that was produced
01:48by rizza so what has it been like for you to watch these iconic hip-hop artists transition like you
01:53mentioned missy what is it like to watch them transition into other parts of the of the of the
01:57situation well that's also part of an evolution of a performer that literally you start one place and
02:03then you hope to get to another but the truth is it's about resilience and how long you can keep your head
02:08in the game and i'm not talking about in the industry about knowing who you are and being
02:12able to express it fully because it doesn't necessarily always turn out the way you want
02:16but they've found a way to do it and i'm really glad to see 50 years of hip-hop i've been a part of
02:22it for a long time next year will be 40 years in the industry for me since i was 14 and so all that
02:28time i've had a chance to matriculate with them and with the rizza and with method man and all these
02:33people will now work on a show about them in american saga with new actors who are outstanding
02:39from ashton sanders and elijah martinez all of them should be more who's in spidey verse right
02:45they're fantastic performers mark his calendar i love them all and i just want to give them all their
02:50props and we're going to give your flowers tonight because you have an amazing job over the years thank
02:56you let's get into i appreciate it let's get into color farm media tell us more about that and what we
03:00look forward to in that space well color farm media is a company that i founded seven years ago with my
03:07co-founder ben arnon and we've been working hard so like i was saying to you that you find ways to try
03:13to um uh grow and it's not always up it's across right and when you're so-called not doing anything
03:20where people think oh they don't see you that's probably when you're working your hardest and what
03:24i found is i learned how to write and produce and direct and do all those things but it took me a long
03:28time to convince people that i could do those things and to learn your craft takes a long time
03:33you can want to write but it takes a long time to actually do it so it took 20 years two decades
03:38for people to realize but it took me that long to realize that i could do it and then actually turn
03:43out good quality work so that's color farm media and we did finding tamika with uh produced uh with
03:49audible on it's an audible series produced by charlamagne the god and uh kevin hart and we won the
03:55dupont columbia uh award for journalism this year and then also there's uh the big payback
04:01which is a documentary that came out in npr and we produced good trouble john lewis good trouble so
04:07we're really proud of what we're doing and what we're continuing to do and i think i'm on that audible
04:11erica i think i'm on an audible with kevin hart and charlemagne so shout out to i think i did
04:14shout out shout out charlemagne is always lifting up women and kevin hart thank you well listen you're
04:19a run the world but tell me about wildflower coming out on hulu oh wow so wildflower is a wonderful
04:25uh movie about um a woman who's newer divergent she has a child and the child is raising them because
04:32the woman has uh married someone who was also uh mentally challenged okay and it's about their child
04:38realizing they want to go to college but they feel like they can't because if they do what would their
04:42parents do and kieran and shimka is the lead in that and i play her social worker i'll try to help
04:48her figure that out and then also i'll be doing a movie coming out july 7th called earth mama within
04:53the same vein savannah leaf is in that tia namour we did that in oakland we did that with doji it's
05:00excellent uh please look out for that and support us and then coming out soon with another film that
05:05i did with jeffrey wright and isa ray and uh yeah it's a fabulous movie with um sterling sterling
05:14starting brown okay yeah it's called american fiction and i play jeffrey wright's girlfriend
05:18it's going to be a comedy and so look for that in the fall so me and me are available every time
05:23you have all these wonderful projects this is working working working you know that's what it's
05:27about i really well erica we love you thank you for coming by and stopping by we're looking forward
05:32with the wildflower on hulu and all your other projects congratulations for all you're doing
05:35and everything that you represent thank you for holding it down here at hulu but also in your lives
05:41what you do matters and i appreciate you thank you thank you so much in the building please believe it
05:47what's coming up next boo and don't forget that meg the stallion is hitting the stage later y'all
05:52um on our first and uh real ladies night because we've got angie martinez eve
05:57mia x remy maz salt and pepper trina coming to the stage for the women in hip-hop let's go right now
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