The term “actress” doesn’t even scratch the surface when it comes to Tasha Smith. She is blazing her own trail – in career and love – while pulling others up along the way. She’s also a director, producer, comedian and acting coach who runs her own workshop in Los Angeles (having groomed Mary J. Blige for her Oscar-nominated role in Mudbound.
She is a walking testimony of
In addition to your current role on Empire on FOX, you’ve recently directed a couple of episodes of Star. You also have a highly sought after actor’s workshop called TSAW. How does it feel to spread your creative wings and nurture up-and-comers in the industry?
It has been extremely refreshing getting the opportunity to move into my lifelong dream to direct. I mean, it’s always been something I’ve wanted to do. Using my platform at TSAW has helped nurture me as a director. The almost 20 years I’ve been teaching acting and my master class has given me an opportunity to work through scenes to create characters, to work on blocking, to get me comfortable with directing actors. I really am grateful for my school TSAW because I get a chance to do what I’ve been cultivating for so many years and put visuals on it. It’s a blessing and an obsession. I am having the time of my life!
“You can’t think that every man you meet is the man that you’re supposed to marry.” – Tasha Smith
You’ve spoken very candidly about how important God and spirituality is to you. What has it been like dating as a single Christian woman?
Well, I’m not as religious as I used to be. I’ll put it to you like that. There was a time where I was so religious that I was no earthly good. With women, especially us Christian women, we think every guy we’re dating is supposed to be our husband. But there’s a process to success. There’s a process to relationships. Sometimes, we block the opportunity to learn ourselves and who we are in a
I was celibate for eight years, and then I got married to a very nice person, but it just didn’t work out. And then I met a con artist and that [marriage] ended up being annulled based on fraud. And now, I’m just enjoying my life as a woman and dating. I’m not putting pressure on myself when it comes to dating and I’m not putting pressure on anyone else. I may not necessarily say, ‘hey, you gotta stop dating other people’ because guess what? I don’t know if you and I are going to work out. So we can date loosely and we can get to know each other.
Would you be open to getting married again?
I’ll tell you what I ain’t gonna marry – a broke brother. I’m not trying to clean nobody up – you gotta be cleaned already. Listen
So many people remember you from your role as Angela on Why Did I Get Married and instantly think of your ‘Marcus’ line. Do men assume you’re like that character in real life?
That does sometimes come up. But when guys get to know me, they may realize there’s a much more vulnerable person behind the persona of Tasha Smith. I must admit that I do walk out with a mask on. My mask may be loud, funny and extremely confident. But then behind that mask is a much more vulnerable person that may be a little more insecure and introverted than what I put off. I’m that girl that’s at home cooking dinner every night with a glass of wine, reading a book or script.
Not everyone may know this, but you have an identical twin sister named Sidra who is
Well for one, I think that my sister is one of the smartest women I know. I always say she’s the smart twin. I’m like, ‘Sidra, we grew up in the same house. How did you get that and I didn’t?’ She’s brilliant and I feel we’re a great yin and yang to one another. I’m extremely creative and visual. Sidra is too, but she is very much a businesswoman. She works well within the corporate world of things and she’s an incredible producer and administrator. I feel like we’re each other’s cheerleaders – she motivates me and I motivate her. We’re on different paths but within the same industry. It’s a blessing to be able to have a soundboard.
What would you like your legacy to ultimately be?
I would like it to be that she cared about our artist community and she created a safe place for artists to grow and learn. I want to be a part of the narrative that we have and that’s where acting, directing and producing comes from. The images that are put out there creatively about us. I’m very, very committed and interested in that. I care about us as a people and a community. It breaks my heart when I see us in our community embracing violence against one another. I want to help unlock the dreams, courage