Viola Davis has become one of the major creative forces in Hollywood. From The Help in 2011 to Fences this year, Davis has starred and given iconic performances in a number of recent films. And now, Davis is opening up more about her family life. Particularly, when it comes to raising her daughter, Genesis.
In 2012, Davis said: "I believe that the privilege of a lifetime is being who you are, truly being who you are. And I've spent far too long apologizing for that—my age, my color, my lack of classical beauty—that now at the age of, well, at the age of 46, I'm very proud to be Viola Davis, for whatever it's worth."
Now, the 52-year-old mother has one rule for her daughter Genesis, who is currently almost 3 years old.
Genesis can dress up as any Disney princess she chooses, however: "You gotta wear your hair exactly the way it is. You can be Wonder Woman, but you gotta be Wonder Woman with your hair. You can be Elsa, but you gotta be Elsa with your hair."
This is nothing new - in 2013, Davis said: "The one thing I feel is lacking in Hollywood today is an understanding of the beauty, the power, the sexuality, the uniqueness, the humor of being a regular Black woman."
Davis sees the afro as a representation of black female beauty, and so she doesn't want her daughter to be raised thinking it's ugly.
In 2015, she told Entertainment Weekly:
"The internal sexism within womanhood is very predominant in Hollywood, because we all want to be successful. There's a plug to it: You all have to be skinny! You all have to be pretty! You all have to be likable, because that's the formula that works. On an executive level. On a power level. And it's not always the same working with black people, because of the internalized racism. The colorism."
She even referenced the caterpillar/
butterfly metaphor for black achievement long before Kendrick Lamar released his album, To Pimp a Butterfly:
"As Black women, we're always given these seemingly devastating experiences—experiences that could absolutely break us. But what the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls the butterfly. What we do as Black women is take the worst situations and create from that point."
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She repeated this sentiment in her 2016 acceptance speech for a Hollywood Star:
"Every time I look at the [photo of myself as a] little girl, I always thought, Oh, that's a cute outfit.' But she was always hungry, she was always shy, she was always kind of in the background, but inside she had big dreams bursting. And the only thing I could think about is that saying, 'What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls the butterfly.'"
Basically, Viola Davis, concluding from her own words, wants her daughter to grow up unapologetically black and to embrace who she is, so she doesn't experience self-hate or go through some of the issues that Viola went through as a kid. Sounds
good to us!
