Self-deprecation is not an answer to keeping one's balance. I think that it's very damaging.

No matter what, people don't think of me for glamorous parts. I'll go to an audition or a meeting in a pretty dress, and they still think of me as depressed or embattled. Hopefully, that will change.

We grew up in abject poverty. Acting, writing scripts and skits were a way of escaping our environment at a very young age.

It feels really good to embrace exactly who I am and be my sexy, to be my sexualized, to be my woman.

I just hope this [Emmy] is now a part of the status quo that women of color are included in the narratives that continue to write lead roles for us.

That is a huge need for a lot of women, even in 2016. You can have the most ambitious career woman, and at the end of the day, she's like, 'I just want to be a mom.

And I sit in my jacuzzi with my script.