YouSaid · the spoken record

Taraji P. Henson

lines on the record
27
first
2023-12-27
most recent
2023-12-27
sittings or episodes
1
sources
podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

  1. “God, I just felt beautiful. It reminded me of my family because I have a huge family. We just celebrated my grandmother's 99th birthday and we were in her backyard and we do this often. We will convene down in North Carolina where she lives. This year, you know, she requested her celebration being her backyard. And so it literally took me to my family. I just felt like I was home.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Your mom cleaning up if you lived in the project, she turned on the radio and cleaned up the house dancing, sweeping that broom, even though you sweeping roaches away. You know, it's just, it's something that's innately in us, and I think it's a gift. To live through so much BS and still be able to smile through it all Like that's a gift”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “For me, what I love about it is that, yes, as a culture, we have been through some traumatic experiences, but the great thing about black people is that we always lean into that joy. We always miraculously find a way to lean into that joy, whether we were picking cotton, we would sing folk songs, we would gather in the night and dance and celebrate. That's in us. You can't take that away singing gospel.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “In order to heal, you must forgive, and first, you must forgive yourself. That's the place where healing lies in forgiveness. So hard to do”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “Oh my goodness. I was speechless. Like, I knew it was special, but to sit there and see it finally all put together. I'm still not over it. And I'm annoyed that I have to wait until Christmas to see it again.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “Camaraderie with the cast. Yeah, and just how loving blitz is. He's such a nurturer. Every little thing mattered to him. He was in all of the fittings. He cares like the great care that he took with each and every one of us in every department, whether it was light, costuming, set design, he was going to”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “It did because when I first was cast, I was told I only had to hum and the song wasn't there. And then all of a sudden, oh, the song is in. And I'm like, what? Because it's jazz, and jazz is tricky. My character work more because that's what sugar is. She is jazzy. She's improvisational. You don't know what she's gone. She'll give you a sketch. She'll give you, you know, so. For me, it helped a lot, but again, like I said, I was scared because that's the song everybody remembers.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “You know what I mean? And I think that's what made it so special and different because it was just about her and her father. It didn't have anything to do with the congregational outsiders that was healing and reconciliation and forgiveness that those two needed to do alone with God. That's why it was so beautiful and so touching. And it just was a small moment. Like it wasn't huge, but it was a powerful moment.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “I think it was how it was written. It wasn't the big grand scene that it was in the first. And that's what God is. God is personal for each person”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “And it worked And it's just beautiful. And we were just a great thing to be with a group of people who have humility. You understand what I mean? Who realizes that this is really a blessing and understands the task at hand. And it's not about vanity and it's not about, well, I'm going to be better or you, you know, because it can get like that in this industry. We were all there as a family. And that's what it takes to pull off this great story. You have to have the family has to be there or it doesn't work. And we moved as a family unit on and offset.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “It will be one of the most memorable experiences of my career for sure, just knowing that we were all handpicked, you know? And it was like unlikely that we would all be together, but it works”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Oh my goodness. It's very significant because of the bond that they created. It had to be fully realized. We just had to see it and we had to see it in that beauty. That scene was so beautiful and so delicate. And that's what real true love is. And it'll bring out the most beautiful parts of yourself if you're loved properly.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “And so that's what Celie teaches her. Basically, you gonna keep running, but you're going to, every time you run, you run right back into yourself.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “There's a lot of, you know, if you read the book, but there was a scene that didn't make it in the film where Sug is running because she's always running. She can't stay married. She can't, and really she's running from herself.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “I think she'll teaches Ceely that she's more than what she sees. She teaches her about her beauty and her sexuality and her sensuality because she certainly wasn't married to a man who honored her in that way. And so she showed her her sexuality as a woman and how to love herself and her beauty because she had it inside, but she wouldn't display it and shook put it on her. And I think Celie Heart shook for sure that love is deeper than just sex.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “Like again, like I said, it's in the page. It's on the page. This woman is sexually advanced. She knows, I mean, they say it and sugar's coming to town in the song. She'll take your man. She'll take your woman. You know, she's just very confident. Lock up your men, your girlfriends. I mean. She is just someone who is comfortable in her sexuality, and you didn't really see that a lot in that time.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Yeah, and I went down, and you know these knees aren't what they used to be, but in between takes, I did have ice packs waiting for me. So in between takes, when they were changing the positions of the camera, I was icing my knees”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “I mean, it's in the song. It's in the music. The writing isn't on the page. It's there. You know, I just had to suspend my disbelief and give my body to shug. I always feel like acting is sort of a, I'm not a possession in a bad way, but you're allowing this character to use your body as a vessel. So Taraji has to disappear and I have to just trust the process. I did my homework. I know who this woman is. I know this is her life. Shug lives on stage. And in a way, that's how I live. I live on stage. When you held action, something comes alive in me. And so I just leaned into that and I trusted the process, you know, blitz makes the set. I felt safe. I felt uninhibited. And I just believed I was there. And once you put the wardrobe on.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “The camera's gonna pick it up and the people will be moved. So it's not like theater. You don't have to do much because the camera's right there picking everything up. So John Singleton taught me about my eyes when I first did baby boy and he was like, Taraji, you don't, because I was coming from theater. Everything was so big and grand and I know how to use my body and feel the space. But he was like, you don't have to do that because if you just think it, your eyes are going to tell it. So he taught me about the power of my eyes. In what was that 1999 in the 1900s?”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “I'm always a person that believes less is more. Know, especially when the camera's there, the camera's doing most of the work. So if it's here,”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “Fighter. She's a woman who you can't keep down. She was born in a time when women really didn't have voices. They had to live under the rule and under the thumb of a man. She grew up in a time where women were mistreated by men. Often a lot of times men in the family and she did not let that stop her. She didn't let that smother her voice. She had God in her. She believed in God no matter what people thought or said about her. God was in her. And God never left her, even though she was a worldly woman. She still had a very deep connection with God. She was very clear about who she was as a woman. She had a very powerful voice and she wasn't afraid to use it. And I think that's how she was able to save so many women.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “Yeah, like I said, it's something that I could always do, but I just hadn't been challenged to do it until Annie. I did a live version of Annie for NBC. And I think people were like, oh, wow, she really can sing because people kept saying, but you can sing. You sang, it's hard out here for a pimp and hustle and flow. I'm like, that's not singing. Like that's a hook on a rap song. You sing it once and they loop it. Like it's not really challenging. And so like I said, I just put that away. I didn't really work that muscle anymore. And so I just had to get with a vocal trainer and wake up those muscles again. It was fun. It made me, it reminded me of my college days. Wow.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “First of all, let's talk about the music. You know, I hadn't sang like that since college. I kind of put it away because when I studied at Howard University, I started off studying musical theater. And then I became a mother of my junior year. And I wanted to graduate. And music theory was giving me a problem because it's like math and I'm not wired mathematically. And so I changed my major back to drama. But the singing was always there. I never thought about going into the music industry because something about the music industry scared me spiritually. I just, there is nothing to protect the artist. The contracts always seem to be kind of janky. And then raising a son as a single mother, I just felt safer. Just sticking to acting.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “And I will be transformed in a way. And if I'm transformed, then the audience will be. So it has to move me to a place of fear. Like if I'm not scared, then it's like, oh, well, maybe that's too easy for me. It has to be challenging for me because I have to challenge the audience. Yes, yes, yes.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “From the Color Purple, I used monologues to audition for other jobs, you know, and the fact that I had an opportunity to audition for Broadway and I didn't, it's like whatever God has for you, you can't run from it. I was supposed to play Shug. I couldn't run from it. Even though I said no years ago, it came back.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “Well, because studying theater, reading the book, we used a lot of the monologues in college to study, used them to audition for.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “Because I felt like I was ready. You know, you have to give your whole self to this project. And because it was the musical version, I felt like I was better vocally prepared to, you know, theater's different. That's eight shows a week. That can be grueling on your vocal cords. I didn't feel like at the time that I could deliver.”

    2023-12-27 · Oprah's Super Soul · The Color Purple Ep 2: Taraji P. Henson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source