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Bianca Lawson is an instantly recognizable face whether it’s from the teen shows of your childhood such as Sister Sister, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dawson’s Creek, The Vampire Diaries, Teen Wolf, and Pretty Little Liars or hit movies such as Save the Last Dance, the list goes on and on. Bianca has very much created a cult fan following from those iconic and memorable roles.

Her most recent role in Ava Duvernay’s Queen Sugar, now in its sixth season, truly got everyone talking. Her powerful and affecting portrayal of Darla Sutton is what catapulted her career to a whole new level and has had the country captivated for the last 5 years.

Bianca herself is a well-grounded individual who has grown up in a music heritage that many would find intimidating and yet she is constantly evolving and carving new paths for herself. She is the grand niece of the Motown founder and legend Berry Gordy and through her father’s second marriage to Tina Knowles, now has Beyonce and Solange as close family members.

In her latest cover of Hello Beautiful, styled in Charles & Ron, she displays that she is a fashion trendsetter with a striking sense of self confidence that radiates. From a young age in the industry, she learned that, “You have to trust your intuition, your own vision of yourself.’ In a world full of haters and those trying to bring you down through projections of their own Bianca reminds herself everyday that this cannot define you and that you need to let it go and move.”

Bianca playing Darla Sutton has allowed her to heal through some of her own issues and pouring herself in her Darla character, her longest role in her career, has been a rewarding and therapeutic. Bianca says “None of my other characters in my life have I really put myself into. Those episodes where Darla was depressed. I have struggled with that my whole life, but it was never something I would ever talk about or express. Through Darla and portraying her struggles, I was able to let my guard down and release these things I had been holding on to for so long in silence.”

It’s not easy when you grow up in a world where everyone has expectations of you, once you break onto screen, there are some out there that feel everything is fair game and that you are now a commodity rather than an actor playing a role on a show. That can be a tough environment to grow in, to find yourself and live your life. Emotions are hidden in public and everything that is normal in life can become much more difficult.

Bianca comments “You get really good at coping and pushing through things, it can be a good thing, but it can also be bad. Maybe we should stop normalizing things that should not be normalized just because it’s easier to push through rather than acknowledge. I have never been anyone that was ever emotional or cried openly, so it was very new to be as Darla feels so deeply – it has given me some sort of subconscious permission to say how I really feel, to open up something inside me that has been closed off for so long.”

There have been a few incidences for Bianca whilst playing Darla that have become consequential with one another. For instance, she opened up in the Hello Beautiful article about a time in her life where she thought she might be pregnant and then she wasn’t, but then Darla was. Lawson went on to say, “I’m going to be brave here. I was sad about that. And I didn’t even think I wanted a child. But then when I thought it might possibly be, I was happy about it. And then when I wasn’t and then Darla was suddenly pregnant— the timing was interesting for me.”

 

Featured Image by  Beast Williams