- [Kelly] So listen, this dates back to 2017 for me y'all
I had never,
I've lived under a rock and I had tuned in to hear
my friend John Legend perform,
and you are performing with him and it was like 2017,
and I was like, who the hell is this?
You are so talented. I tweeted about it.
We will show it.
I literally tweeted it. This is from years ago.
And it's everything is true.
You, that's from years ago. And I just think you're,
I mean, and then since then,
I've just seen you in so many you're so gifted.
- Thank you.
I mean, your voice is insane!!!
- Says she.
- No, I am like,
not today ma'am.
I'm shredding mind today, but, but I just,
I had to say that you're just, it's, it's a true gift.
Like a lot of people can sing,
but not a lot of people move me and you move me in like the
best way ever.
- Thank you, thank you very much, thank you.
- So I have to ask you about this picture that you posted.
So, so why take a trip to the last blockbuster?
And also we had the owner of that blockbuster on this show.
- What !!
- We did.
- See now I'm excited. Okay.
So I'm, I'm a geek. I really love documentaries.
And there is a documentary
that is just about the lost blockbusters.
- And I was curious,
so I called up some of my friends
and we took the trip for like a couple of days
to see the last blockbuster
and we bought some things and...
- So where did you go to Blockbuster
that when you were younger, like did yet ?
- Yeah we have, so we have blockbuster in London.
- I was going to say, did they did?
- They did. They bought card and everything
- [Kelly] Me too.
- Always was late with the things always late
with returning things.
- [Kelly] Oh I get it right in slot just in time.
- See, You were better at that than I was,
cause I could never...
- [Kelly] I think my mom was like you're going to pay it
if we miss it.
And I was like, woo my money ? Wait!!!
Then she would say this is your money ? Okay.
No, I loved it.
And we actually had our own randomly
and I thought it was so funny that you got to visit that.
- This is cause you know, I love film
and I love the way it's moved forward
and we can watch it now,
but there's something really special
about being able to grab a DVD or a video and like
keep it with you and watch it and rewind and all of this.
- [Kelly] Absolutely. It reminded me too like,
cause I lived in a public library. We used to check it,
that's how I got books. See I check them out,
just like blockbuster. So I love, I love that.
- Did they have the little cards where it was was...
- Yes ! And my daughter started at her school and I'm like,
oh my God, it's stamped.
I'm like, I'm so excited.
- It's so good.
- [Kelly] I'm such a child, I'm a kid too.
But it's fun to me
but you're always in such great shape. So God bless you.
And also I hate you, but you ... you
this has always been a thing for you.
I hear you compete in marathons.
- Yes.
- [Kelly] So its just always just since you were young ?
- Well, I started getting into fitness
once I was about 14 or 15.
- [Kelly] Gaaaa
(someone laughs amidst the crowd)
- [Kelly] I'm like I got into like music.
I was like, Good Lord ! Oh my God, my God !
- They asked if they could put this photo up.
And I said, sure. I don't know what was different.
- Well, I'm going to put it up in my gym as inspiration.
Cause I don't look like that in shorts, but okay.
- I've been running, so yes
that is because I was training for America marathon
and I'm training for a marathon right now.
Everyone's thinking is she had gotten for punishment
or is she a little bit unhinged? What's wrong with her?
- [Kelly] Is it therapeutic though?
- It is.
I, I love the way you can sort of zone out
when you're running.
For me, it's like meditation and I sort of use it to process
thing and things and you're, you're
sort of having to join mind, body and soul together
when you're doing all of that running.
- [Kelly] Yeah
- Especially if you're like doing distance running.
And I think anyone can do it.
I think people get daunted by how much you can run
but actually you just start with bits,
you start with a mile, you start with half,
and you build up, yeah.
- [Kelly] Here's the thing I get about being therapeutic.
Like in my 20s,
I was so sad and I was so surrounded by people
and it was just like a lot for me in this industry.
And it was my only time alone.
- Yeah.
- And, and a label loves you to work out, right?
So like they were, yeah,
so I was like cool, this is my workout time.
And so I would run for like two hours
just so I could just stay busy
and do just have me time. So yeah.
- It works.
- I love that.
It's inspiring because it is so good for you
to like stay healthy. And I, I feel like in my 20s,
I, I only did it to escape
and I've never really done it to like be healthy.
Honestly, It's always just been for escape.
So, yeah.
- But it works. If it works , it works.
- [Kelly] Maybe I'll escape from something now.
I can think of a couple of things.
I love this about you though, as well.
At the end of last year,
you said that you wanted to write a kid's book.
- Yes.
- So why a kid's book?
- Well, I, at first I was asked to do this kids book.
Someone had seen how I sort of,
I was writing like pros on my Instagram
and this was like stories and whatnot.
And someone had noticed that
and they said, "Well, we really like the way
you write certain things.
Would you be interested in doing a kid's book
that might teach?".
And I was, I said, "No".
- Yeah ?
- I said no first,
just because I didn't think I had the time
and I didn't want to not do it.
I didn't want to do it if I couldn't do it properly.
So I said no.
And then one day I must've been getting ready for a meeting
and suddenly an idea, sort of like dropped into my head.
And it was, it was very clear.
And I was like, I wanted it write.
As we're talking about dreams,
I would wanted to write about teaching kids
to dream specifically.
Like when they dream big dreams,
don't be afraid to fill it with all the details.
Like fill it with all the colors and all the nuance
and keep going back and finding all of the things you want.
- [Kelly] And don't think. You're dreaming too big.
- No dream is too big at all.
And so that's the, that's the book that I ended up writing.
- [Kelly] that's great!!
- Yeah.
- Yeah. I love when that happens though,
when you're like, no, I'm not into it,
and then it's something just happens and you're like, oh,
I'm the vessel for this. Okay.
It was just mean to happen.
- I love when that happens. Cause it's organic,
it's natural.
Well, the book you wrote is called,
"Remember to Dream, Ebere".
- Ebere, yeah.
- Ebere ??
- Yeah.
- Ebere, what is Ebere?
- Ebere is my sister's middle name & means hope and mercy.
- Well, that's beautiful!
I mean, my name means like brave and strong, but whatever.
I was very happy to find that I was like, okay,
but a lot is in your name.
And it does give you like the confidence to be like,
I am brave. I's like, that's beautiful though.
All right. Well, did your mom encourage you to dream?
- Yes she did.
- [Kelly] Like mom in the book.
- Yeah she did. She, I,
whenever I would come up with an ...
- [Kelly] Is she the mother from the book?
- Yes yes ... I love this.
- [Kelly] Good these things. She liked this ?
- She look ahead. There, she is.
She would always,
I would tell her what I wanted to do
and she would never say, no, she would never say,
"Well, it might not. You might need a backup".
She would always be like, Okay, great.
Just make sure you work hard for it".
So which makes you work hard for it.
So every dream I had was never invalidated.
She was always like encouraging everything
that I wanted to do.
And, and she's probably my number one fan.
She's shown up at my pretty, be everything I've done.
- Oh, that's beautiful!
- From like drama school,
which was dicey sometimes because they weren't always great.
- [Kelly] Yeah but that's just so supportive.
- Yeah
- So you just released your first solo album,
which I actually find crazy
that you haven't had an album before.
(crowd cheering)
- So where, where did you record it? And why now?
Like why do it now ?
- I recorded it in many different houses around the world
because we had to do it during the pandemic.
So I recorded it
whilst I was shooting "My Theory", the series.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
Oh, just Like while killing a movie,
you are recording an album.
- That was not intentional, but that's what happened.
Again, things happen the way you need it,
because it really like helped me decide what I wanted to do
with my voice and how I wanted to use it. And, and why now?
Because I was given the chance
just cause I was given the chance,
I, I didn't have a label until maybe very recently.
And they said, well, here's, you have cop launch,
make whatever you want to make.
- [Kelly] That's beautiful.
- Yeah, there was no sort of like we needed
to make this kind of music.
I just, sort of, wrote from my heart.
- You see that's rare, when starting.
- I know.
- Yeah like, but I think that's the cool thing
about it is, right it was the perfect time for you
because they already knew you were as an artist.
- Yeah.
- So that's beautiful to the leverage of that as being a
reading of it.
- I'm really proud of it.
- [Kelly] Yeah. I love the title.
So it's chapter 1, verse 1?
- Because it's beginning.
- Yeah, I loved that.
- And, and whenever I, I always hear like,
how is this your first album? Cause I've never,
I really haven't made a full body of work before
and written a couple of things.
And obviously I did something for the movie,
the Harriet movie, but I haven't had a full body of work.
This is my first.
- [Kelly] It was crazy to me to find that out.
I was like, wait, what?
It was like, just your first album?
I was like, you're incredible.
Well, you're performing a song called "Glowing Up"
later in the show.
So is there a story behind that?
- Well, essentially it's sort of like reflecting on,
on the growth that I've had,
and how far I've come from where I was.
And I think it's, for everybody,
who's had a moment of movement and going forward,
whether it be managing to get out of bed today
because you've been tired the entire week.
When did you put your kids to sleep
when they've been fighting it the entire month
- Amen.
- Whether or not you've just managed
to like grow in the place of that, of my achievement.
Or you've done something you didn't think
you would be able to do, beaten the fear of yours.
I think all of that is part of glowing up.
- I love that it's not growing up, it's glowing up.
That's I think, that's so clever and cool
and above it, it's nice.