“The game is different for women.”
The stinging quotes above were lifted from a recent interview with legendary Tony Award-nominated star Sheryl Lee Ralph. The actress, best known for her roles on Broadway’s ‘Dreamgirls’ and later TV’s ‘Moesha,’ recently took to Access Hollywood Live to dish on the ever-controversial report that Academy Award-winning actress Mo’Nique had been “blackballed” by Hollywood since nabbing the 2010 Oscar for Best Supporting Actress (for ‘Precious’).
Ralph, 58, briefly shared TV time with Mo’Nique aboard the Urban family comedy ‘Moesha’ and is now sharing some harsh advice for her friend regarding the matter. Hear her stance below:
“What’s interesting about that is, she didn’t campaign. I wonder, do you think that they would blackball Tom Hanks for not campaigning for a movie? The game is different for women.”
“We don’t know what was going on with that person,” Ralph said. “She might have been in a state of her mind where she said, ‘I cannot go out there and do this with all these people without causing harm to myself.’ We don’t know what was going on in her mind.”
“A whole lot of actors are difficult. And there’s a whole lot of actors who are mean and terrible, but they work all the time,” Ralph said. “It goes back to who likes you, who wants to be in your kind of crazy company. Who wants to give you money in hopes they’ll get something back on the return on your madness. And sometimes you just need to shut up, sit there and look pretty … But I think this is a setup for a comeback.”
“Now, when she comes back she better be as tiny as you…She don’t need to be Mo’Nique anymore, because obviously what she was did not work. So she better come back brand new. That’s what they’re waiting for. And if a big-time producer says to you, ‘You have been blackballed,’ what he is really doing is looking at you and saying, ‘You ain’t never working with me again.’”