… help you in your own walk of life, because you can imagine great things for yourself. When I was growing up, I’d see a lot of fantasy films and I didn’t see a lot of people [who] looked like me. I was fortunate enough — it’s the way that my mother raised me — [that] I never felt less than anybody growing up. So I remember feeling like, “I don’t see anybody like me, but that’s OK, I’m still gonna watch it, [and] one day there’s gonna be people like me in these things.”
“Why not? Why not have magic? We all come from many different cultures, but if we’re gonna trace it all the way back, there’s a lot of magic, there’s a lot of mysticism, there’s a lot of things that are part of our history. I feel this strongly as a black American. I’ve done my ancestry DNA so I know where and what countries in Africa that my ancestors came from, but because of slavery, I do feel that culturally, there’s a disconnect. I feel like [we’ve lost] a sense of our own magic. What a pity. Why [is it that] other cultures can have all of these magical stories and we’re not allowed to have them?”
“Black Panther served me my life,” she continued. “I was living my full fantasy life, and I was just like, ‘Yes, yes, yes.’ Because now there’s a young child out there who can look at that and say, ‘I’m a superhero, I can be a superhero.’ As a kid, you know you have magic in you. That’s important.
Sisters Phylicia Rashad & Debbie Allen: “I Am My Sisters Keeper”
Debbie Allen and Phylicia Rashad have had a lot of success in their own right. Phylicia won a Tony on Broadway, Debbie was a choreographer to the stars. Phylicia landed an iconic role as Clair Huxtable on The Cosby Show and Debbie was executive producer on