Rihanna

I didn't know why I was there.

He allowed me to pick a monologue from a different play that we then spliced into the play.

The monologue that I did was very focused on sexual abuse.

I have an experience of sexual abuse outside of Kato, and that was brought into the play.

The monologue that I did was about sexual abuse.

I am talking about my own sexual abuse experience, and a sexual abuser in front of me is directing me on how to make that performance better.

I don't even think now I can process how fucked up that is.

I was a 19 year old doing that.

I had recently gotten out of a mental hospital.

I checked myself in because I was processing sexual abuse that had happened to me as a child.

And immediately after getting out of that facility, I am then thrown into rehashing this sexual abuse trauma with someone that has contributed to that experience.

We hadn't been in like a full-length play together at that point.

I was really excited to work with her and I think that contributed to the confusion and awfulness that I was experiencing because I would get to hang out with my best friend and then it would be this incredibly triggering and traumatizing material that we're doing.

It was so uncomfortable.

I remember just constantly being in fight or flight and so terrified of messing up or saying the wrong thing.

Now, of course, that makes sense.

I had acknowledged in my brain that Cato was an abuser, that he was engaging in this inappropriate behavior, and then had somehow backtracked that in my mind.

Actually, he's a director that I want to work with, that I feel safe working with.

There was just like a disconnect there.

It was terrifying and awful.