Yara Shahidi
speaker
547 appearances
4 recordings
2 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard 10 Apr
Yara Shahidi’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Apr 2026 with 1.
Appearances
And also simultaneously in school, reading all of these theorists and people, I was in this year-long course for my major in which you have to read everyone from like Hobbes to Marx and every social theorist in between.
Some dark stuff. But more than the dark content in their books, it was like you all live dark lives. The amount of people that wrote a book and then became recluses or ended up separating from family, I think it meant top of mind success. for me was, oh, if this is something that I want to continue to study, what does that mean for me to prioritize quality of life?
And so I was that annoying person in all of our discussion classes, like, but were they happy? But were they happy? And what does it mean if they weren't? And why are we taking this so seriously if they weren't happy?
It's a good question. Today, yeah. Today, yeah.
That's a good question. I feel like I'm a solid 7. Okay. Because I think the difference between even... my life last year to this year was in knowing that there are natural ebbs and flows of emotions. Because I think last year, as much as I could go through something and be really sad for an extended period of time, I always felt like that feeling was going to be permanent.
And then I would snap out of it. And then, you know, I'd forget like, oh yeah, everything is kind of temporary. I think this year I carry a knowledge that it's all temporary, which allows me to float through it a little more. But I think it's also, kind of aligned with a lot of self-work of prioritizing what it means to take care of myself in a way that I wasn't. a year ago, two years ago.
And so I think that also helps because for the first time I'm like, oh, I took seriously the idea of having tools to manage stress and challenges. Yeah.
Honestly, yeah, and COVID hit. That was crazy. I think starting a career early... The beginning, I didn't have to think about it much because I think the way my parents had set it up was like, oh, this is a hobby. This is something that you tap in and out of. But, you know, I was full-time enrolled in school. I had so many hobbies outside of acting. And, you know, people would laugh.
Casting directors would laugh because they knew if they wanted me or my brother to audition during... the school week, like they just kind of have to reconfigure some things. Because if I had a test or my brother had an important basketball game, life came first.
But by the time Black-ish came, that was the first time where I really had to re-anchor my life around being on TV in a way that I never had to before. And I think that was the first set of stresses and challenges. It was a great set to be on. But, you know, I'm number five on the call sheet. I'm not working every day.
And so the idea that this was the first time I wasn't in school full time in person, but I'm also not acting as much as I necessarily want to be on set. So you're just kind of in a trailer. Yeah. For hours at a time.
And I, like, love my castmates dearly, but having had such a full life beforehand, I think that was the first moment where we were like, okay, we have to do a little reconfiguring. And I think that was when Mommy and I looked at each other, and she was like, it's time for you to live your whole life again. So what else is interesting you?
I think that's when I became more publicly politically engaged and started doing voting work, started, you know... going to concerts, seeing my favorite artists, just really pursuing other things. So my free time became a little more well-rounded. And then by the time Grown-ish hit, once again, it was kind of a level up in terms of what the commitment was because...
I had turned the industry term legal 18 over the summer because I'd graduated from high school a year early. And so I forgot when I was getting my little high school diploma that this meant that I could work endless amount of hours. I may have been like, wait, I forgot to take a class. I still got to be in high school. So by the time Groner started, I went from working 10 hours to 17 hours a day.
A day? Yeah. And given, we finessed and fine-tuned that. You're in a trailer a lot of the time. But also, I mean, I wasn't even in a trailer a lot for season one because my character was in both storylines. Wow. Where typically, you know, you have A storyline, B storyline, and actors kind of trade off between what the storyline is. Sure. And so you always have a break.
First season, I was in every scene all the time.
17-hour days, which I think it is what it is to be like a new show. We're on cable. We're just trying to prove ourselves. But I came from Black-ish where we got a juice truck. We have great trailers. We're on broadcast. And so it was funny because we would even sneak over to their craft services because they had it made. And we were just kind of like the little cousin trying to carve its own path.
But, yeah, I think that also was another moment. where I had to learn how to take care of myself and what that looked like. Because it was my first real challenge of being like, oh, a lot is being expected of me.
And I think there were a lot of conversations, luckily, coming from such a tight-knit family, but also coming from the line producer and Kenya and other people coming from Black-ish and having seen me since I was young. They were definitely able to approach it from, okay, she's a human first and foremost, But we had to have those conversations.
And my mother had to have those conversations with a first AD that would be like, she doesn't need to eat right now. She's good. We've got to film this. To be like, no, we've got to see her as a human being first, and then an actor second. And so I think adjustments were made along the way to then figure that out and what that rhythm looked like. And I'd go into the writer's room every day.
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