I felt validated and valued , and here was this woman [Whoopi Goldberg ] inside my television screen who gave me a voice.

It's no mistake that Harriet Tubman is revisiting us, in different forms, right now, as we travel through a very contentious time in the world. Her spirit is one that we absolutely need today, as we face odds that are akin to the divisive and systemic oppression that we read about in our history books, but it's taken on a modern-day articulation of itself. I almost believe that Harriet Tubman asked God for a leave like, "I'm gonna need to go back down there and take care of some things. They're in trouble."

An opportunity to honor the legacy of the lives drawn into the lines in my face, the broad of my nose, the dark of my eyes, the fullness of my lips, and coal in my complexion.

I had praying grandmothers who bathed me in "The Word" and filled the atmosphere with worship. Though I developed my own personal spiritual relationship later in life, the foundation they laid is what my faith was built upon.

[Harriet Tubman] lived such a full, complex, and irrefutably-dynamic life that all the craft in the world would be insufficient in honoring her legacy.

I did my homework, of course, by inhaling as much literature as was available to find, so that when it was time to shoot I could hopefully exhale [ Harriet Tubman ].

Very early on in this process though I studied acting in high school and college, soon after graduation, I walked away from the craft because I wanted to know that this is what I was supposed to do with my life.