'Queen Sugar' Star Nicholas Ashe on Working with Oprah and Playing a High Schooler
Nicholas Ashe's baby face may fool you on Queen Sugar, where he plays a 15-year-old high school student caught in the midst of a nasty family scandal, but in real life, the 21-year-old actor possesses all the confidence and wisdom of a person twice his age. Perhaps this maturity is what led series creator Ava DuVernay and executive producer Oprah to cast Ashe in Queen Sugar, a new OWN series which follows the Bordelon siblings-Nova (Rutina Wesley), Charley (Dawn-Lyen Gardner) and Ralph Angel (Kofi Siriboe)-as they deal with the challenges of running their recently deceased father's sugarcane farm. Ashe plays Micah, the teenaged son of Charley and disgraced NBA basketball player Davis West, who has his own problems-both public and private-to deal with as his own parents' marriage falls apart. For Ashe, playing a person six years his junior isn't without its difficulties: "Sometimes I'll do a scene and Ava will be like, 'That was the 21-year-old version. Let's try it again and do the 15-year-old, innocent, doe-eyed, high school version," he says. Below, the actor on working with some of the biggest names in Hollywood, his Broadway origins and how skipping senior prom led to one of the greatest gifts ever:
Harper's BAZAAR: How did you get involved with Queen Sugar?
Nicholas Ashe: I had been auditioning for what's known as pilot season-that's when all the new shows are coming out-and I got the script. Ava [DuVernay] was kind enough to give us the entire first episode. When I was reading it, I was like, "I really have to be a part of this," so I auditioned, and Dawn-Lyen Gardner, who plays my mom, flew in to read with me, and eventually Ava flew in to read with me. And the stars kind of aligned and it worked out.
HB: You're working with Ava DuVernay and Oprah is an executive producer for Queen Sugar, you've acted with Viola Davis in Custody-what's it like working with such major Hollywood power players?
NA: I obviously feel super blessed to work with those three women-three women who I admired before I even knew I'd be able to work with them-so when it happened I was kind of beside myself. But what was most comforting was that these three women-with all of their power and success and knowledge-were not pretentious, were not unwelcoming, they came to me with open arms and led by example and made me feel like my opinion was valid. Viola also worked as a producer on the film we did, so at the same time we were working together she was running behind the camera and being like, "Good, let's do it again!" I feel really lucky and I hope they keep me on their roster of actors.
HB: What's the best piece of advice you've been given in your career so far?
NA: I learned, especially from Ava, to always be a part of a project that celebrates my uniqueness, be it my blackness, my youth, how I identify with community... Just to make sure that anything I'm in, I'm proud of. If you're always proud of your work, you'll never regret your career, you'll never do something that's beneath you or be embarrassed. If that's the best you could do at 21 or 43 or 68, then you'll have a nice, meaningful career.
HB: You're 21 but your character's 15. What are the challenges that stem from playing someone younger than your actual age?
NA: I always talk about the fact that Micah is finding his voice and discovering who he wants to be. I think there is never an age where you stop learning or stop wanting to be a better version of yourself, so that isn't difficult. The challenge is that sometimes I will do a scene and Ava will be like "Okay, Nic, that was the 21-year-old version. Let's try it again and do the 15-year-old, innocent, doe-eyed, high school version." It's funny. And I'll have to shave my chest and my facial hair. I literally get a haircut every day on set.
HB: The cast of the show is excellent and you all work together so well. What have you learned from your time on set?
NA: I know sounds so corny, but to have fun. You hear these big producer names, like Oprah's here and Ava's here, and I wanted to be dead-letter perfect on my lines, but a lot of Queen Sugar, especially as the season evolved, turned into the writers writing for us as people and trying to find out where Nic meets Micah and vice-versa. As it went on a lot of the scenes became improvised. I remember laughing on set until I cried; if there's a blooper situation you'll see that. I learned that with the career I'd chosen to do, obviously there's a lot of hard work, but it's also a lot of fun too. Work hard, play hard.
HB: How did the writers start writing you into the character?
NA: I come from a musical background of singing and playing the piano, and I remember one of the writers asking me if I played the guitar and wanted to incorporate that. I don't want to talk about what's gonna happen because obviously we have Season 2 happening next year, but they got to know us more as they were seeing the dailies and sometimes I'd see something in the script that was either a conversation I'd had with one of the writers or one of the other actors. It was cool to know that they were creating these characters out of a place of honesty.
HB: What are the biggest similarities and difference between you and Micah?
NA: We're both pretty sensitive people [laughs]. I'm proud of it. We're sensitive, were compassionate, were mama's boys. The biggest differences between Micah and I is that he can be a little stubborn sometimes, even in his passions. Sometimes he holds onto the wrong thing and can defend the wrong people. I think because he's younger it's hard for him to be objective about things. I think as I've grown I have the ability to assess every part of the situation, but he's 15 years old, so he's learning and he's growing and watching and reading. He's got the rest of high school to figure it out.
HB: Are you close to your family like Micah?
NA: I have eight siblings; I'm the seventh of eight. I come from a big family, so leaving them to work on Queen Sugar, it was so familiar to have eight new aunts, uncles, cousins. I jumped right into that and I love them just as much.
HB: Anything you can tell us about what's coming for Micah in the rest of the season?
NA: Micah does find his voice. I think that he allows himself-and even his family allows him-[to let out] some of the emotions he has bottled in. Again, speaking in very broad terms, because I don't want Oprah to find me and say, "you ruined the rest of our season!" But yeah, you'll see him find his voice. Like I said, everybody in Queen Sugar has been building this wall and blocking themselves from complete happiness and complete honesty, and I think by the end of the season, if that wall isn't completely knocked down, they definitely started to chip away and push down some of those cinderblocks. I'm excited for the rest of the season and to see Micah smile for once. He's been really distraught.
HB: Are you still filming the show?
NA: No, we finished filming in July and we start Season 2 in February or March next year.
HB: What are you working on right now?
NA: I'm kind of hanging out after doing six months of working. I just finished my scholarship show this summer. I'm interested to see what's next.
HB: Tell me about your scholarship.
NA: It's called the Steam Train scholarship. It was funded last year in 2015. I knew I wanted to create a scholarship when I lost all of my scholarships in high school. I had really great academic standing but because I wasn't going to school-I had chosen to do a play Off-Broadway-they were like, "Oh, Nic, I'm so sorry but we have to scrap what your hard work had earned you." And I thought, "Well that's not fair," and I wanted to create a scholarship for people who are taking the quote-unquote "unconventional" route post-high school. That's the rappers, the dancers, the artists, the poets. I wanted a scholarship for those people. And then I thought, "Well, Nic, you're a struggling actor. How are you going to raise this money?" So I decided to get the local artists, rappers, poets, dancers from my community to put on a show. We charged admission and every penny we raised, whether it was $236 or $1,500, goes toward a scholarship for someone pursuing the arts in their post-secondary education. And it's fun! I get to direct some fun musical theater songs, so it's cool.
HB: You spent time working with the playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney. What did you learn from that?
NA: I've worked with Tarell in a couple different capacities. When we did Choir Boy at the Manhattan Theatre Club, I was just an actor for him. I auditioned for him and did some workshops of his shows, and the workshop finally went into production, and after that, I told him, "I'm not in school, I don't have anything to do," and I began working under him as his assistant, both revising his scripts and developing works of my own. He really challenged me as a writer, because anytime I'd write something and I'd be so proud of it, he'd be like, "Nope, try it again. Write it over, rewrite, rewrite, keep writing, keep reading, keep writing, keep reading.
When I was doing Choir Boy I chose not to go to college and it was right after I graduated high school, so I got to either go to graduation or prom. I chose graduation and missed my prom, so the cast held this imaginary prom for me and everyone in the cast came and gave me prom king gifts; they all got me their favorite book and script. So now I have this huge 40+ book/script collection that I'm still trying to get through. People like Austin Pendleton were in the show and he got me some of the scripts that he had written and directed. It was the most thoughtful gift. I love that I can still go to revisit some of those works.
HB: Growing up did you always know you wanted to be a performer?
NA: No, I didn't start performing until I was 10 or 11. What 10- or 11-year-old knows what they actually want to do with their life? What 20- or 25-year-old knows what they want to do with the rest of their life? [Laughs] But I was singing in the chorus like every other middle schooler and my mom heard about an audition for The Lion King on the radio. She said, "Do you want to go audition?" And I was like "No..." I had no interest whatsoever. She ended up dragging me and honestly, we thought this was some local Harlem production that I wasn't going to be paid for, that was all kids. And then when I got the role they took me to see it on Broadway and I was like, "Wait I'm doing that?" And that's how that happened. I don't think if I had done Lion King that I'd be in this field. I was just working with a bunch of adults who were passionate about it and who had built these really long resumes and helped me develop a work ethic that you can only get in theater.
HB: Do you have any dream collaborators or dream projects you want to work on?
NA: This is so tricky. Obviously a million names are flooding through my head. I'd love to write or star in a Netflix situation. I'd love to work with young people telling our stories. I feel there is yet to be an accurate depiction of the high school/17-25 experience going into college. I think if I could get a bunch of young actor/writers of all sorts of colors and sexualities and identities to tell our narrative, as opposed to a 43-year-old white man on his MacBook trying to create it, I think that'd be something worth watching.
HB: Speaking of Netflix, do you do the whole binge-watching thing? What are you watching?
NA: I do binge watch. I just started binge-watching Stranger Things, The Get Down and Luke Cage. It's really cool, my mom in Queen Sugar has a cameo as a reporter in Luke Cage. The word diversity is tricky, but I'm glad we're seeing more people that look like us in the media. I hate when people say, "It's happening so much more," but when you look at it in relation to everything that's happening, we still have a long way to go. I'm glad that Queen Sugar and Luke Cage and The Get Down are adding to the big pot of soup.
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