Stylist: Violetta Malakhova
Makeup: Virginia Martin for Angelo David
Hair: Billy Dee Williams for Angelo David
FWM: You are known as the “Rising Queen of Indie.” What inspired you to act?
I was born an Actor. I always got a thrill of jumping into a character and discovering what happened to them through creation, the intricacies of their lives, and feeling their reactions. Growing up, myself and my dear next door neighbors would create short films. I always loved being the protagonist. Keep in mind, I was not yet trained. Acting was always a what if as I ventured towards one of my other passions, namely the sciences and taking care of people. I just knew I could have gone down that path as I had contemplated it before going full force to medical school. During my time training initially in neurosurgery, I started to attend community theater when my day off and class would link up. We mostly performed monologues and discussed acting. I was always intrigued by how certain actors developed their characters, and although not bound by one technique, I found that I really identified with and understood actors who used the method. Through fate, I found myself stuck in NYC. I put together an application for the Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute and was accepted a day after my interview. It felt like home there honestly, and finally was living out my what if dream. Acting is one of the top ways I feel most alive honestly. Most excited and able to channel my expressions. From there I wanted to understand Meisner as well, so I started classes with Jim Brill at the Neighborhood Playhouse. Some of my happiest memories in acting to date was going to method classes Monday and Wednesday and Meisner Tuesday and Thursday. I felt good immersing myself as I did feel I had a lot of lost time to make up for. I still do. Acting allows one to live out many different exciting realities and experiences using what is in your mind along with creation and imagination. Those are some of the things that inspire me honestly. Also, I hope to make people feel the truth of what I am feeling, and what the story is. Often, art in this country gets a little downplayed in my opinion as career choices compared to more let’s say, straightforward professions (not that anything is really straightforward, but maybe the better word is stable, stable in terms of income, set hours, set trajectories etc… although given what we have seen with COVID is anything really ever fully stable? Off-topic but back to the question), but remember listening to a friend speak at a film festival describe how people make decisions on going into different professions based on what they see on screen. Screen or theater is really a way, in my opinion, to give people a taste of what something would be like that they may not have directly experienced. To move them. Although for me, I do always feel there is some way, even if smaller, we can find in parallel with anyone. Art and acting makes life more fascinating for me. It’s all about the truth, discovering it and feeling it gives me a rush and satisfaction. Yet I still have so much more to develop and learn.
FWM: Tell us about your award-winning film, “Sienna’s Choice.”
Sienna’s Choice was the first film I created and produced. It was a passion project in that I had an idea to bring a concept to life, played around with it for a little bit, and then tried to figure out what I would need to make it happen. I can honestly say the team and connections made through that project were such a gift. Sienna’s Choice can be looked at several different ways, but ultimately it is a film about life. What life really means, and how we fight for it. Also, how one chooses to honor it. It looks at the ethics and decision-making surrounding the end of life care. It looks at the quality of life while dealing with a potentially terminal illness (without giving too much away). It follows a young woman’s unfortunate mental and physical decline she grapples with when dealing with a life-threatening diagnosis. It mostly looks at it through the eyes of the character, Siennas, but also from the point of view of her loved ones and the medical team. Initially, I had this concept and brainstormed, eventually putting pen to paper. I was able to recruit a few friends I made along the way that had written screenplays in the past, Azucena and Elisa and we made a really great team. Such special moments creating that piece, I won’t ever forget it. I also wanted it to be told through a female lens, that was important to me. I sought out through several recommendations Linda Palmer. I was enticed by her reputation and her amazing work, in particular Our Father. It took some persistence as she likes to put it, and eventually she agreed and put her foot down, “let’s set a date.” I also had a lot of both moral and production support from my roommate at the time, and fellow producer Gaby. She really helped push me. As an actress, I knew I wanted to create something very deep and layered, with nonverbal intensity as well. I feel I was able to challenge myself as an actress and producer. Initially, I wanted to make Sienna’s Choice to get a piece of art out, but also to establish myself as a filmmaker because I had plans for a bigger scale feature film. That said, we actually ended up using a fairly rough cut with an usual time (56 minutes) but ended up gratefully being well received at several festivals both in the United States and internationally. Wow, just thinking back now during COVID, what amazing memories we all created. That’s one thing to learn from all this even better is to cherish each special memory that much more. Off topic, but that said, Sienna’s Choice will be available soon on several streaming platforms including amazon so stay tuned. It is an interesting thing, during creation I was very new to filmmaking. I didn’t make it with the intention of distribution and there are of course many things I would do a little different in terms of acting or production and post. It gets a little tricky I think, as people will compare your film to very big budget films which can be difficult. However, this is a story that needs to be told and I am happy for everyone to get it out there. Everyone, cast and crew did a fantastic job and I could not be more pleased with all of their work, talents, and friendships. Sienna’s Choice got a lot of feedback at various festivals, and people would approach us in various ways it affected them. To be able to move someone or make them feel, that means a lot. I won’t reveal their personal stories they shared but know it touched me, and it was very different ways the story reached them.
FWM: In just 4 or 5-years you’ve won or been nominated for 26 acting awards. What is it about characters that resonates with audiences? Which role was the most challenging and why?
I think the truth resonates with audiences and making them feel. Whether it is pain, joy, they love you or hate you. If you strike some sort of cord. I have been told I am very raw and open once in character, I will be honest I don’t hold back letting go and really feeling things. Some people say they are afraid or don’t like to go too deep whatever that exactly means to them. I welcome it and it gives me a thrill and it gives me my joy of acting. There is no right or wrong, but I find that is what works for me. I would say the most challenging role has been Sienna. It was intense, draining, difficult, and painful but extremely rewarding.
FWM: You graced the cover of Maxim in 2019, as well as being named to Maxim’s Hottest 100 women in the world. You were also on the cover of Resident Magazine last year and featured in several other entertainment and fashion publications. What did you enjoy most about this time?
2018 as well as 2019 was meaningful for many reasons. I remember making a sort of vision board in my mind in early 2018, certain things I wanted to accomplish or happen in my life in the near future. It really was a remarkable experience to be on the cover of Maxim and named to the HOT 100. I manifest certain things in my mind, daydream, and then work to make it happen. Shooting with Gilles and the team at Maxim was such a wonderful artistic moment. Gilles really is an artistic genius when envisioning and creating moments. We went with a film noir theme since I am an actor. Everyone on set was kind, fun, talented, and professional. Being named to the hot 100 was the icing on the cake and really a dream come true. I met so many wonderful people along the way and was a treat to attend the part in Miami. I got to meet some of the girls and fellow models some of which I still keep in touch with today. A true moment, like did that really happen, was seeing myself on a Billboard in Vegas while co-hosting Maxim’s big game weekend Vegas with Machine Gun Kelly. I was in my Uber from the airport and we were driving along the highway when I saw it and started saying to my driver, oh wow that’s me! That’s too funny. He was like “what that’s you?!” He was so kind, he got off the highway and looped back around so we could take pictures and videos. Shooting with Udo and the team for Resident was also remarkable. He is really exceptional and captures the best moments in someone. I look forward to working with him again, and in fact the cover photo for this wonderful publication is done by him as well.
FWM: In the dramatic short, “Intervention,” a woman faces depression and opioid addiction head on, encountering an unlikely source of help. How did you prepare for your role?
Like any role, I use a combination of things, not one specific thing. I feel inside what I need or what will work, to find the truth. Sometimes it is just intuitive, and some moments require more preparation. I am grateful to be trained in Method and Meisner and honestly, I use both as well as unique tweaks to get where I need to be. Really it comes down to immediate parallels I find in the character that I start creating a thinking being, I mesh my life with theirs. I create life moments and experiences that finally bring me to a state that I really feel them. I also do research depending on the role, which adds to what I pull from or my energy. In this case, I spent time with someone who suffered from addiction. I also (without giving things away) spent time with a few people suffering from certain mental illness. When I spend time with research, I go very deep into their mind. I like to feel and imagine everything they might have. I have been really lucky and forever grateful to those who allowed me in to better explore and create the work. I have so much more work to do of course and am still learning. I was also very lucky that Julia Silverman, who played my mom in Sienna’s Choice and plays my mom in Intervention, was the producer who created the idea of Intervention for a project and felt I was the woman to become Amy. Linda was also the Director, and Deon the writer.
FWM: How has your life allowed you to draw parallels with your characters?
I think everyone has unique experiences that make them who they are. I use both real experiences and imagination, meaning what would have happened in my life to get to where they are? I think I have experienced being around life, death, poverty, wealth, a very wide range of ways of life. I always feel an ability to find myself somehow in a character or even a patient, which makes empathy one of my better suits.
Photographer: Gilles Bensimon
Hair: Gianluca Mandelli
Makeup: Stephanie Peterson
Style: Rap Sarmiento
FWM: You have walked several seasons of Couture Fashion Week NYC, Paris, and NIFW. What do you enjoy most about fashion?
I am so grateful I had the experience of walking the runway for several fashion weeks. What a real treat when I look back. Honestly, I have met some exceptional human beings. From the designers, the other models, makeup artists, hair stylists, photographers. It is like its own community of wonderful artistic souls. I really love all of the fashion family, and will never forget them and hope there are more to come. I love seeing the designer’s new visions and line, love the reunions with my photographer and model friends, getting to be a part of everything and the sense of community and creation. Though I am not a full-time model, many of my friends are, and you get to see a lot of the same faces around the world. The same wonderful women I see in New York, I would see in Paris, etc. I also won’t ever forget Paris, walking the shows and spending time around the city with some amazing people. I also like that modeling or doing a shoot honestly gives me some extra fitness motivation. They are mini goals for me, I will get excited and motivated about a shoot and try my best to get some extra workouts in.
FWM: What would be your dream role, what do you feel you bring to it? Also, any dream modeling roles?
Oh, wow there are so many! Some are a secret. I still need to manifest them. One obvious one to me would be Kill Bill Three. I guess getting or two roles where I am at a place in life that I can devote a significant amount of time to them, like some of the acting greats I like are able to. I like to be all encompassing for a role now, and I do the work given I feel I need to, but to have the luxury of let’s say focusing on a role for 6- months. Being able to live and breathe it without having to worry about other work at that time. For modeling, I would love to be in Sports Illustrated. I love what the brand has done over the last few years and feel it is a tribute to diverse women in many aspects.
FWM: You used your medical background to write and create, “Sienna’s Choice. Besides acting and the arts, you also have a medical degree and I believe graduated summa cum laude. During the Coronavirus, how has this experience changed your viewpoint? Do you have any plans for writing another film?
I think anything in one’s life shapes how they see the world and allows for their experiences to be used in their art, at least energetically as that is who one is. Sienna was definitely created in part thanks to my medical background, which came in handy not just for the concept and understanding of medical and scientific knowledge, but also emotionally and cognitively how a person might feel and struggle physically and mentally. I initially went into neurosurgery from medical school, and there I gained extremely valuable and unique true life and death experiences at least through the provider’s eyes. Being an empath, I tend to connect emotionally to how someone is feeling or what they are experiencing from that aspect. For people who see Sienna’s Choice, they will get to understand her disease process and some physical and emotional manifestations. After solely focusing on acting for a block of time which is something I needed to do for both my development as an actor and soul, coming back to medicine to train in psychiatry has also further opened my experiences. I love the brain, not just the anatomy and physiology but also how the brain manifests itself in behavior or thoughts. Behavior and thoughts, and feelings being a combination of inherent biology but also as important is life experiences and trauma one might face, especially at an early age. A lot of characters are created from a dramatic place, and we all have trauma of various degrees. Sometimes through that, I can also get a feel for the creation of characters when I imagine what they might have gone through to become the person either in real life or someone I am reading on the page. Coronavirus has definitely affected us all. It’s a funny thing, in school you learn about pandemics and creations of vaccines, treatment of diseases that once wiped out entire populations. You know it can happen, but somewhere you don’t ever fully think it will, unfortunately, attended a few zoom funerals during this time. It does however really make you think back and appreciate all the little things you can take for granted, such as a tea or drink with friends, going to the museum, taking the train to do whatever, events. I decided I wanted to do at least something small to help with some of the shortages. I collaborated with my dear friend Aya, who started the Off Label. She was making nice scuba masks for the public with proceeds going towards healthcare worker supplies. I came up with an idea to collaborate along with her, and create a double-layered cloth mask with a pocket for the filter for a little extra protection to donate to the various healthcare workers, creating our frontliners fund. She loved it and we got to work, donating the masks to facilities in both Delaware and New York. Sure they are not N95s but they are nice to have especially in the time of shortages where everyone was scrambling. The appreciation from all the nurses and doctors made us appreciate helping even more. Yes, I have two projects I am working on writing. Stay tuned and hopefully, they will be ready sometime in the next two years,
FWM: Share your upcoming projects.
There are two films I have been cast in that will hopefully shoot when and if safe later in the year. I am really looking forward to them. I also have two of my own projects in the works, that I will be producing and acting in, which will hopefully come to fruition in 2021 or 2022. One, in particular, I have had on the back burner for a while, but I always knew I would do. It involves an important social issue that we have made significant gains in but still have a lot of room to grow of course and is still a struggle. As an actor, I will attempt to become just about anyone. I love the chameleon aspect of things. Because to me, they are just very alternate versions that developed differently along the line. When I produce and create, I tend to do films that can have a strong female lens, as well as films with some sort of important ethical or social issue while still being an artistically driven piece. happen now. And then it does.
