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Meet another girl/teen in our club who likes the same movie favorites as you do. To write her, click on the link to join the penpal club! Hangin' With Archives
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Updated
4/12/02 We're Hangin' With.... RACHEL TRUE Cute,
spunky actress Rachel True first impressed teen fans as one of the "witchy
girls" in the film The Craft AGW: What was growing up like for you? Rachel: I was sort of mixed up middle class. My parents moved to upstate New York when I was about 11 and I went to an all white kindergarten through 12th grade. The whole tri-county area was all white except me, my brother and my stepmom. My brother sucked at basketball and I was awful at track so they were just really disappointed in us (laughs). On another level it freaked them out because we were smart. I got the highest SAT scores the school had ever gotten and they weren't that high. They were disappointed that this interloper had come in and outdone them. AGW: Was it really hard fitting in? Rachel: It was quite uncomfortable. I'd never had my hair in cornrows ever in my life but my stepmother decided to put my hair in cornrows. So I went to school with cornrows and I'm a little freaked out already about where's my hair. I go out during the lunch hour and two kids are fighting and they're screaming at me. So that was my introduction to upstate New York and the school system. As I got into high school, I tried to start a theater company. We were going to do "The Miracle Worker" and they wouldn't even let me be a blind kid. They were like 'you have to be a maid'. I was like 'I just want to be a blind girl. I don't have to be Helen'. They wouldn't let me so in the end I scrapped the whole idea. That's when I came home and I remember saying 'I guess I'm going to have to write my own parts' and I still think that's true.
Rachel: Sure. Slowly. For the first Black female lead to win, I think that's very meaningful. I was at the Vanity Fair dinner and I got a little (teary-eyed) when she won. Not just for her but the whole thing. Just taking in the magnitude of it all. This has never happened before so, on that level, I think it's a really big deal and there are a lot of nay Sayers that say 'I don't think she deserved to win'. But I just feel like she was in a really good movie. I think I'm clever enough to be a little cynical though. As soon as Halle Berry won they're running around trying to snap pictures of the four black people at the (Vanity Fair) dinner. That's not a bad thing for me because I'm one of them. Smile, absolutely. Do I know why they are doing it, yes. I think Black is beautiful. If I'm going to call myself African-American then I want a round trip ticket to Africa so I can go there and come back to my country where I was born because it seems to change. At the Vanity Fair dinner Artie Shaw was sitting next to me and said 'oh Black, African-American, I prefer Colored'. He's 94 so you're like 'oh, okay', Mr. Shaw'. I get that it's his generation. There's always a new label for it. I think I'm just tan and lovely! AGW: Do you want to direct a film? Rachel: Yes I do. I think I thought for a while that if you're an actor that's all you could or should do and just focus on that and then I realized that, as an actor you work a certain part of the year and then have time off and what do you do to utilize that time? So I write and I love editing. I love that you can have technology in the home now and I can edit on my laptop wherever I want. People seem to love the little shorts that I've made so I'm happy with that. AGW: Do you act in your own movies? Rachel: Oh yes. In way too many of them because I get these ideas late at night and just set up the camera and go and people are mocking me because apparently I star in all of them. I think that technology is bringing great things to the masses and I'm hoping that it will make it a more global world and more people can take advantage. I loved the library when I was a kid. That was my second home. So if you use the internet properly and don't make it just a catalogue (to buy stuff) you can actually learn something from it. AGW: What films do you get recognized from the most? Rachel: I've always been in these weird kind of culty movies. All of them, even the silly, silly ones are all specific and culty and they all have their fan base which is kind of neat. One of the last films I had out was "Groove" which was a rave movie so little ravers come up with their glow-in-the-dark sticks and try to talk to me. Then I did a pot movie called "Half-Baked" where I can't tell you how many stoner boys tried to hug me which is lovely but I'm like stay back..I'm an actor. And like with "The Craft" quite a few young Wiccans have given me hemp bracelets so in a way, even though they are sort of silly and off the center projects I like the way they have sort of garnered their own little base. AGW: What would be your ideal role? Rachel: Hummm, I think every girl says this now but I would love to run around and save the world. AGW: Action hero? Rachel:
Yeah. I was talking to a friend that's Canadian about the Wonder Woman
movie. She was saying 'Oh, I'd love to be Wonder Woman'. But she's Canadian.
She didn't quite have the same American perspective on it that I did.
No. It's WONDER WOMAN! Woman of Wonder. That would be really exciting
to me to be Wonder Woman. Plus I love mythology so characters out of mythology.
Almost any of them and that's where it gets to be a struggle as a black
actor. I'm like 'They'll never cast me as Hera (Queen of the Gods)'. Certain
things like that or period pieces. This t.v. movie "Dinotopia"
coming up, I would love to be in that. But there's nobody who looks like
me in that. I like the Morgan Le Fay story "Mists of Avalon"
because I loved that book. I throught the lead girl that played her (Joanna
Marguiles) was really good. But, I want to be in that and wear fluffy
costumes. I feel like there's a limit on that for my type. AGW: What movies are you looking forward to seeing? Rachel: I talked to George Lucas at the Vanity Fair party who is amazing and really nice too. It was lovely to talk to him and I couldn't geek out because I through that's the last thing he wants to hear so I had a normal conversation but I'm very much looking forward to (Star Wars). AGW: Okay, totally off-the-wall but fun question. What was your favorite toy? Rachel: Oh, I have to say I had that big Barbie head with the hair.. Loved it. Kept doin' her hair. I didn't have the black one. I had the white one but she had copper wire in her hair so I could make it curly like mine. That was my favorite toy so I guess I am a (girly) girl.
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a
few years ago. She's done tons of guest shots on t.v. shows. Now she stars
as a bulimic college coed in New Best Friend. We talked with Rachel
in Los Angeles and she was just so "normal". She had put Retin-A
creme on her face and it was peeling so, reacting just like any of us,
she was freaked! We assured her that she looked great in an African-print,
multi-colored shirt and cool necklace. She told us about her struggles
as an African-American actress, her career so far, feelings about Halle
Berry and Denzel Washington winning their Oscars and plans for her future.
AGW:
How did you feel about Denzel Washington and Halle Berry winning Oscars
this year? Do you think things are changing in Hollywood for people of
color?