Sujata Day, Actor, Writer/Director: Issa Rae just taught me to
be true to my point of view and get it out there no matter what,
no matter how many rejections you get, no matter how many no's you get.
Film Courage: How did you meet Issa Rae?
Sujata Day: I met Issa Rae on Twitter this was 10 years plus a couple months ago and I had just left
Facebook because I just thought Facebook was so dramatic and there was just too much going on with
having your elementary school friends on there with your middle school friends with your high
school friends with your college friends with your family. I was like I need to not
be part of this chatter so I left Facebook before it was even cool to leave Facebook
and as I left it I said to myself I was panicking a little bit and I said well I need some kind of
social media what's it gonna be and then I saw that Twitter was happening and not happening like
today but it was it was a newish platform so I was like okay I'm gonna make a Twitter
and then I got on Twitter and I started following this this person Joshua at Film TV Diversity and
he would tweet out different writers and producers and directors and creators to follow so I would
just click follow on every single one of them because I didn't know what I was doing on Twitter
and and there was always really great advice coming from Twitter from the people I follow
in terms of filmmaking and then she had tweeted out follow Issa Rae she makes web series and I
said great followed her she followed me right back and then a couple days later she Tweeted
out I'm looking for a mixed looking girl to play my best friend in my next web series
and I dm'ed her and I said hey I'm not mixed but this is what I look like here's a picture of me
can I audition anyway and she said yeah of course come on down and she gave me the address and I
pull up to the house this is a house in a nice neighborhood but regardless a house and for any
actors watching out there I don't recommend you go to a house for an audition that's super shady
you want to drive away I did not drive away I was about to drive away but then I saw Issa come
out and she was talking on her cell phone and I was like oh it's fine it's a girl it's a woman
still not the right attitude to have so I went into the house did the audition it was super chill
I was there for about five minutes and then I left and then a couple hours later she said
you booked the roll and I said okay cool and then a couple weeks later I went to Issa's
dad's doctor's office in Inglewood which where we would be shooting Awkward Black girl and we
just shot a very quick 20-minute hallway scene that I believe is in episode three of awkward
black girl where my character is introduced and it was just me isa and her brother and her
brother was running the camera and the sound was definitely attached to the microphone was attached
to the camera so there was no separate sound system we had to come hair and makeup ready and
like I said it took 20 minutes and then she isa said thank you so much and then I left and
I asked myself what did I get myself into what is this web series like nobody knew what web
series was at the time and that's how I met Issa Rae that's a great story you'd been acting what
eight years prior to doing Awkward Black Girl well I've I would say I've been acting since I was like
five or six just from back home just putting on my own shows putting on my own performances and then
doing plays in elementary middle school and then doing
musicals and being in the chorus in middle school and high school and so I've been acting
I would say pretty much my whole life yeah you did the web series for free correct yes I did
and that's an interesting decision which I think at the time I was doing a lot of stuff for free so
like I said I was auditioning for AFI films I was auditioning for USC
films and ucla films and most of the time those films didn't even get finished and and that was
the tragedy of it all because I didn't mind doing working for free because it was always really fun
but I believe that a lot of the time the filmmakers came up against wanting
their project to be perfect and then going through the post-production process and realizing
that it wasn't what they had envisioned and then completely throwing it out and I believe that is
the wrong attitude to have as a filmmaker as a creator I truly believe that you should
finish stuff and also put it out there and also submit it to festivals and even if it's not what
you thought it was going to be it could still be accepted as something else and so that's the
exciting part of it even if you have something that may not have the best production quality
or the best acting or the best sound just put it out there and guess what you're gonna
learn from that mistake and you're not gonna make that mistake again and your next
thing or project will be ten times better oh and then you just keep working you just gotta keep
making stuff and putting it out and then make the next thing so something that I
like to point out is if you watch the first two or so episodes of Awkward Black Girl on youtube
the production quality isn't great the sound isn't great but there's something there
there's something there that makes you keep coming back and then you notice
as those season one episodes go on oh they I think they got lighting I think they might have gotten
a microphone they might have gotten a sound person oh their their wardrobe looks a little bit better
so I love Awkward Black Girl in that it it is on Youtube and you can watch the progression
of how it just keeps getting better and better and and I think that was you know when I was
doing free projects I was just excited to be meeting people and working with new people
and once again just be surrounded by creativity what do you think made that show so popular
what made Awkward Black Girl popular was that it reached an audience that was being ignored
by Hollywood and it was black women that were not used to seeing themselves on screen
and that's that's what was really exciting about being a part of that journey and watching as
the episodes came out one by one watching the the view count keep growing and it turned into a
snowball and and we were getting comments we were getting dms we were getting messages from people
oh my god I've never seen myself on screen before this is me or do you have a camera in my home
are you watching my life are you watching my relationships are you watching my friendships
and that was the most exciting part of it because like I said Hollywood has a way
of taking a group of people and making the same story about them over and over and over again and
and this was such a specific story from a specific point of view that had never been told before that
had never been on screen and that was that was part of why it became the success that it became
season one episode seven after we ended that season we did a Kickstarter and we were looking
for thirty thousand dollars to make the last I believe four or five episodes and
we didn't know how much money we were going to raise and you know even the no I remember we were
having we were all kind of hanging out talking about oh how much should we ask for should we
ask for 10,000 should we ask for 12-15 and they decided on 30 and we ended up making 54,000 and
once again that was proof that there were people out there that needed to see this that
wanted to see this and wanted to see how the season was going to end what was going to happen
with Jay and Jay and what was going to happen with Jay at work and with her friends and so
that's what was really fun and exciting to see that oh there is the possibility
of creating something that appeals to a certain group of people that have never seen themselves
on screen before so that's what makes me so excited about creating my work sure and you think
too because the characters were it just wasn't about a stereotype it was about these are real
people not okay this person fits this stereotype or demographic for this one role we need this like
character relief kind of thing yeah I think it was successful because each character was a
well-rounded individual and a lot of the time the the audience when they would message us they would
be like oh my best friend is exactly like that or the guy that I'm dating is exactly like that so
so we were tapping into something real and and non-stereotypical for sure
what did Issa Rae teach you about the business what did you learn just by watching her
isa ray just taught me to be true to my point of view and
get it out there no matter what no matter how many rejections you get no matter how many no's you get
every person has a unique story to tell and each story is important and generally not out there
yet and there are audiences today that are not being served by what Hollywood is offering so
I'm just excited to fill that void of content how did you end up on Felicia Day as The Guild after
that oh I don't get asked about the guild too much so this is exciting okay so I believe it was
season two of awkward black girl the guild was also I believe one of the only other
web series that had been happening at the same time so we were aware of the guild
the Awkward Black Girl scott squad was aware of The Guild and and I believe it was just an
audition so I had gotten an email through my reps oh Felicia Day's web series they're casting
for certain roles in their sixth and last season and would you be down to audition and
I had known of Felicia Day I had not been watching the guild but but I kind of crash coursed it when
I went in for the audition and and it was really cool because as soon as I walked in it felt like
oh we're we're like the two web series that are happening right now this is really exciting and
they're both created by women which was also an exciting thing and so I went in and I auditioned
it was really fun and I also booked that job and that was awesome to do I believe it was happening
at the same time when we were shooting Awkward Black Girls season two so I was working on both
of them at the same time and just had a blast and Felicia's great and it was it was it was really
awesome to watch because they they were in their sixth season so to watch to go from one web series
to another that was so much ahead like like the there were extras and there were big sets and and
it was it was fun it was fun to be a part of that and to see where a web series could go if it went
on for a couple more seasons I'm curious why you didn't do Definition Please as a web series did
you feel like it was better served as a feature or or would you want to continue it on through
many seasons because you could go many places with things yeah yeah Definition Please to me
was always a feature and I'm not quite sure why I decided on that I have projects that are
specifically tv projects that are specifically film and and for Definition Please I didn't even
really think of the idea until about 2015 when I was in my UCB sketch writing class and I wrote a
four-page sketch about spelling bee winners which served as the basic premise for Definition Please
and then I had started going to Sundance in 2017 and that really inspired me to
create a film to be honest and and this was also post cowboy and Indian where I had made a short
film and once again it was really fun taking it around to film festivals so for me Definition
Please was never a web series and it was always a feature film you think it could be at some point
I think my journey with Definition Please is over okay I want to see like high school
reunions different things you know right right different dramas yeah yeah I think I think there
is a world that I created that could it could keep going and people want to know what happens
after Monica moves to Cleveland but I truly believe that once I'm done with the story
I'm pretty much finished with the story and and and I have 10 or so other projects that
i'd love to get off the ground and shoot so I'm excited to move on to the next thing
were you protective of monica as a character you know how they they write like you know
have horrible things happen to your character I realize you know you weren't making that exact
kind of film even though there were family dramas but was it hard to let Monica go
no no I i have a way of detaching from my stories and characters and so I want them to
be real and be grounded and pursue the path that their character would take and and I don't
take it personally as a writer or a filmmaker and so I'm always excited I think with Monica
I love that she is unlikable in the beginning of the film and and you
are kind of trying to figure out why she's so mean to her brother who seems really nice
and and and I love writing flawed characters as well so so it was just fun to write a character
that had all these different things going on and wasn't fully good or fully bad.
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