How Sheryl Lee Ralph Is Reshaping Hollywood

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Politics, Arts, News, Wnyc, Books, David, Storytelling, Society & Culture, Yorker, New, Remnick

4.2 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 13 September 2022

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Sheryl Lee Ralph has been a staple of Black entertainment for decades. She played Deena Jones in the original Broadway production of “Dreamgirls,” and was in “Sister Act 2” alongside Lauryn Hill and Whoopi Goldberg. She’s currently starring in the new ABC sitcom “Abbott Elementary,” for which she just won her first Emmy Award. Her decades-long career gives her a unique perspective on how the industry has changed since she started—and how it hasn’t. “I think that, sometimes in order for institutions like Broadway to truly make room for others, you’ve got to break it down,” she tells The New Yorker’s Vinson Cunningham. “Because you’ve got to help people see things differently, outside of their own vision. And, even if it’s 20/20, it’s not perfect.” This segment was originally aired on February 25, 2022.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is the New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
0:08.7	This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm Gauphin, and put you boile.
0:14.1	Last night, the actor Cheryl Lee Ralph clinched her first Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy
0:23.8	series for her role on the show Abbott Elementary.
0:28.0	That's the ABC sitcom created and written by Quinta Brunson.
0:32.4	On the show, Ralph plays a no-nonsense kindergarten teacher, but at the Emmys, she radiated genuine surprise
0:40.8	and gratitude as she accepted her award.
0:46.2	I am here to tell you that this is what believing looks like. This is what striving looks like.
0:55.1	And don't you ever, ever give up on you.
1:00.0	She even broke out into song.
1:02.0	I am an endangered species.
1:16.6	But I sing no victim song I am a woman
1:19.6	I am an artist
1:22.6	and I know where my voice be lost
1:36.3	Belores.
1:39.3	Be lords.
1:50.0	Staff writer, Vincent Cunningham spoke with Ralph earlier this year.
1:54.7	They talked about her career, what it takes to change Broadway, and her fight to gain recognition in the field as a black woman.
1:57.6	Here's Vincent.
1:59.2	So even if you think that you don't know, Cheryl Lee Ralph, I would
2:02.9	bet that you do. She has been a staple of black television and movies for decades, and she's
2:09.6	been president at some amazing moments of American entertainment. She played Dina Jones
	...

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