A Quote by Samira Wiley

I remember when I got into Juilliard - which was just crazy to me, that I would be studying at a school like that - the choice to cut all my hair off was really symbolic for me.
I would straighten and dye my hair. I'd wear blue contacts to school. I got to a point when I was 16 and I realised this isn't me and this isn't who I am and I just cut that all out. I really owned myself and who I was.
When you're young, and you have long hair, it's just really long hair. And then you get to a certain point where you start to look after it, and then people will tell you that you have to cut a little bit off so it grows quicker. And it just doesn't. It just has more cut off. And I think I just got really annoyed with it.
I wanted long hair my whole life. When I was a little kid, my mom would be like, 'We get our hair cut once a month.' So I just always got my hair cut.
I always had short hair, and I hated my short hair. I was always mistaken for a boy, but my mom wouldn't let me change my hair because she was always chasing me around with a hairbrush, and it was always tangled, so she just would cut it off, and she's right: short hair did suit me.
One of the things that really does annoy me is just comments on my hair. Like 'your hair's not tidy,' or 'Ooh, what's this?' Just little comments that I just think are so inappropriate. Sometimes I'm just like, 'Is it really necessary?' But you know, as a black female, you do learn to just brush these things off, which isn't the way it should be.
I actually was a good student, but I never applied myself 'cause I was always like, 'I don't love doing this.' I wasn't passionate about school. I always got a B just to pass. But what's crazy is I got a 29 on my ACT test without even studying. So I was always, like, just smart - but never really cared.
People who work with me think I should cut my hair. They say casting directors are less likely to hire me with long hair - that they don't have imaginations and can't picture me looking normal. People literally have conference calls about my head when I'm not around. I mean, obviously I would cut my hair for an amazing part.
I played for Miami, with LeBron. They cut me. I got drafted by the Lakers, they traded me to Miami. Bron got there, they cut me. I remember it like it was yesterday. So yeah, it's a chip on my shoulder.
There was a time when I was studying in school when one of my coaches clearly told me I shouldn't be bowling at selection trials. We had a couple of off spinners from our own school and he said that if I bowled off spin, their chances would get affected. So, I didn't really bowl at the trials till I was in my late teens.
I made a mask out of my face because I didn't realize I was quite beautiful. God blessed me so. I practically destroyed it. I had to wear heavy black eyelashes like bat wings, and dark lines under my eyes, and cut all my hair off, my long dark hair. Cut it off and strip it silver and blonde. All those little maneuvers I did out of things that were happening in my life that upset me.
So I'm not crazy after all! I thought it looked good myself once I cut it all off. Not one guy likes it, though. They all tell me I look like a first grader or a concentration camp survivor. What's this thing that guys have for girls with long hair? Fascists, the whole bunch of them! Why do guys all think girls with long hair are the classiest, the sweetest, the most feminine? I mean, I myself know at least two hundred and fifty unclassy girls with long hair. Really.
Believe it or not, I loved my Jheri curl and thought it was beautiful on me. It actually made my hair grow like crazy. What they didn't tell you back then was that once you get the Jheri curl, there's no way of getting rid of it, so when I was over it, I ended up having to cut off all my hair and start all over again.
Some friends of mine in the class ahead of me in college were auditioning for graduate school in New York, and then a few of them got into Juilliard, and it sort of opened my eyes. I didn't really know anything about it, but it opened my eyes to a possible next step after school, where I could just deepen my knowledge and also not be responsible for life and stay in school.
When I was Elvira, it was probably the phase of my hair getting too high. I thought that if really high hair was good, then really higher hair was even better. So I just started having my hair get higher and higher. In some of the pictures, we had to cut off the picture because it was like Marge Simpson. So that was embarrassing. The wig phase.
When I was like sixteen, I was a total chick I had big hair. I was seen as this attractive girl, and I would get all this attention. And then I just cut off my hair, and I quit playing that game.
I think the seed was planted when I was a teenager, and it took me until I got out of Juilliard. At Juilliard I was just learning to be a composer, but I was also learning how to manipulate computers.
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