Brandee Evans Is Strong As Hell. She Just Doesn’t Want To Always Have To Be.

By Taryn Finley, Huff Post

I Run This is a weekly interview series that highlights Black women and femmes who do dope shit in entertainment and culture while creating visibility, access and empowerment for those who look like them. Read my Syreeta Singleton interview here.

As graceful as she is, Brandee Evans is balancing a lot more than you know.

Before she is Mercedes of the Starz hit series “P-Valley,” she’s a caregiver to her mom, Diana Harrington, who has Alzheimer’s and multiple sclerosis. Evans shares the highs and lows of taking care of her mother on her Instagram.

“At one point it was just like, I’m not allowed to break,” she said during a phone interview. “So I would just take it all on. Having more time with my mom and being a caregiver longer, I know it’s OK to break, but I hear my grandmother in my ear saying, “Get back up now. It’s OK to break, but get back up because those diamonds got to press on.”

[…]

Playing Mercedes has taught me that it’s OK to fall down and just keep fighting because it’s going to turn around. The pendulum always has to swing back. It’s taught me patience. It’s taught me to be confident in my body and be OK with exactly who I am as a Black woman with curves. It’s OK to not have on makeup — I think you see me so much without makeup on Instagram Lives and all of that because I truly do not care. But before I think I cared more about that. That’s why I love that Katori Hall was like, “Yes, so we don’t want you in makeup on this scene,” or, “You’re just going to have those straight backs on that scene.” I’m like, this is wonderful because this is what girls at home are doing, snatching your wig off, you got braids underneath. Some days you don’t have your makeup on, it’s OK. It’s normalizing and humanizing us, and so it just makes me feel comfortable and confident.

Find the entire interview here.

Fortunately, we’re also seeing strong Black women in the Supreme Court, director’s chair, and international organizations.

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