Kerry Washington is the cover star of Marie Claire’s November ‘Power’ issue on newsstands October 18.
After seven seasons of Scandal and playing one of the most powerful and history-making female leads on television, Washington is ready to return to the Broadway stage in American Son (opening November 4). The notoriously private Bronx-native opens up to Marie Claire about how she defines power, her special connect to theater, how Shonda Rhimes changed her outlook on Hollywood, her mission with for Times Up, and what her children teach her.
On how she defines power: “Honestly, I think about power as more of an internal phenomenon. I tend to think about empowerment for myself so that I have the courage and ability to act on the ideologies and priorities that resonate with me. I’ve always wanted to cultivate a sense of empowerment within myself without seeking approval from outside sources.”
On her work with Times Up: “Our priority has been to not reinvent the wheel, to not feel like, ‘Oh we’re going to come in and do what nobody has been able to do,’ but rather to acknowledge that there are so many communities of powerful women committed to advocacy, and our job is to leverage whatever power we have to support that work, grow that work, shed light on that work.”
On how Shonda Rhimes changed her vision of what power looked like in Hollywood: “I didn’t feel like I had to twist myself into some other understanding of what black womanness is supposed to look like, because Shonda [Rhimes, Scandal creator and showrunner] got me, and so I could get closer and closer to my truth because I wasn’t worried about going to work on Monday and somebody being like, ‘Why would you talk about that?’ Just her existence and working with her so intimately changed the idea of what power looked like in this business.”
On her special connection to theater: “The last time I did theater, it completely transformed my life. That’s where I met my husband.
On learning from her children: “My children are my teachers. We get sent by God the kids we need so we can grow in order to be the parents they need us to be. The children I got sent came in perfect, and I have to figure out how to grow and evolve so that I can support the truth of them. I’m in a constant state of learning and challenging myself to make room for their perfection and beauty.”
https://www.marieclaire.com/celebrity/a23596751/kerry-washington-november-2018-cover/
FASHION CREDITS
Dress by Proenza Schouler