10. What has been the most rewarding and the most challenging part about navigating your career as a young, Black child star?
The most rewarding part for me was having other young girls see themselves in me and being that representation for them. The first main Black girl on Stranger Things; them seeing themselves in that and then seeing a Black girl on an animated series exploring an intergalactic world. That’s important and that’s rewarding. I’d like other young girls of color to see that, because I used to want to see that more when I was younger.
It’s going to always be a struggle when you’re a person of color. Trying to get somewhere in this industry, or anywhere in life, you’re always gonna have to put a little bit more effort into anything you do. So when you kind of, quote unquote, “make it” or get to the point where you’re someone in your career and you’re really happy, you kind of have to keep that status up there. You have to be careful of everything that you say and do, because anything could jeopardize that, especially for us. Yeah, that’s the challenging part. We don’t have a lot of leeway when we do make it and we don’t have a lot of room to mess up.
