Gabrielle Union Recalls the Moment She Decided to Stop Being a Mean Girl

By: Amanda Anderson-Niles

Actress Gabrielle Union has always been very vocal about how difficult it can be to find continuous work as a black actress in Hollywood, however she has managed to still land roles and retain her position as one of the most recognized black actresses. But with the lack of roles for African-American women, many have always speculated the intensity may cause tension amongst the working black actress as they compete for such a small number of roles.  In her upcoming appearance on Oprah’s Next Chapter, Gabrielle chats it up with Oprah, as well as Alfre Woodard, Viola Davis and Phylicia Rashad; about how difficult it can be being a black woman in Hollywood and keep the acting gigs lined up.

In fact, Gabrielle says although it’s hard, she had to learn how to give up her mean girl ways because they weren’t helping her advance in her acting career. She says:

“I think nowadays there is this celebration of as kids say ‘The Ratchet, The Ratchetness.’ You are supported in tearing other people down. There is a forum for it, there’s a huge spotlight on you to do that. People are like ‘How did you move from being a mean, vindictive, hateful person who couldn’t be happy for other people to embracing and truly being supportive?’ And really it came down to we were in a room, we were at a party and you know I was holding court because I could turn phrase and be a little slick myself. And I was trashing somebody. You know, just ripping them to shreds, head to toe. And A.J. (Johnson) pulls me to the side and says, ‘Ok, so how did your life change? Did you get the guy? Did you get the job? Is your house any bigger? Did money just magically get put in your pocket? What positive happened in your life after you just tore that woman down?”

There are some more interesting clips from this episode, and the black actresses tackle some tough topics such as the skin tone debate and competitiveness between black actresses. This episode of Oprah’s Next Chapter airs Sunday, June 23, at 9/8c, just an hour before the powerful ‘Dark Girls’ documentary.