As different as me and Sigourney look is as different as these two characters are. I'm not filling her shoes. I'm doing a part that has the same monsters, but it's a completely different movie.
Being strong can be also feminine. I don't think feminine equals being weak. Being strong is very sexy.
Blade was my first movie. I was just terrified. I didn't know what was going on.
Bringing people together despite prejudices, that's always been a theme in my work.
CGI is done after the film is done. It's through the computer. Most of the film is not computer-generated special effects. Most of it is that creature that is in the room with you.
I did work out every day. I needed it to have the endurance to do what needed to be done and not get hurt. I have such a new respect for action stars now.
I didn't get to see Predator until halfway through shooting. It was great to get an education while I was shooting because it made me excited to be part of this legacy.
I got nominated for a Tony, which was a complete surprise. It was an experience that I will always cherish.
I had never picked up a basketball before. I went through a grueling audition process. It was almost as if I was learning to walk. It would be like teaching somebody to dance ballet for a role.
I had seen a couple of the Alien films, but I didn't really remember them. Literally, within a week, I was in Prague shooting.
I liked the fact that there were so many different representations of black women and black men in the movie. It wasn't like we all had the same agenda.
I look forward to going to work. Everybody is at the top of their game. It was like we just got to play.
I love making movies. I love the fact that movies are forever. When I'm 80, my grandkids can see me in Love and Basketball and in Brown Sugar.
I started out in the theater and I grew up in this business, so being on Broadway was like a dream come true for me.
I started working professionally in '96 and I see an improvement in the amount of work given to my peers, whether it be in TV, theater, or film.
I wanted to do a project that dealt with character and humanness, and I found that.
I was working straight for nine months and I'm exhausted. I'm ready to relax for a little while and read. I don't want to work for work sake; I have to be excited about it.
I wouldn't want anyone to destroy the earth.
I'll eventually go back to theater because the feeling of being on stage where you have the audience right there, you can't replace that with anything.
I'm just a wimp when it comes to scary movies. I'm the kind of person that will be up all night wondering what's in my apartment.
I'm tired of being out of order. Everything's in pieces and it's very tedious. You have 14-hour days. I want to do a play.
If you're in love and there's that chemistry, that's what it's all about.
In 1979, Alien came out and Sigourney was in it with a bunch a guys. Nobody at that time expected the woman to be the hero, so that was a tradition that started.
Never before have I been in this position where there are so many strong, smart black women at the helm of a film.
People make jokes about how black people are the first ones to be killed off.
Some of us just have to work harder to stay in the game.
Sometimes when you don't care, people are attracted to that.
The Alien is gross, scary. There is something in a human being that looks at them and sees it as a cockroach. You can never feel nurturing towards the cockroach.
To make a movie is very grueling at times. Long, long hours and cold weather.
We all have ideas about who we are, and sometimes you do step outside of that box.
When you have a play, you have to be on every night.
When you're on a set it can be very tedious and slow. It's just not as big as when you see it on film.
You would never expect a black woman to be the hero.
Your heart is going to fall in love with who it's going to fall in love with, and it's not necessarily what's on paper.
I grew up in the business. My dad is a director/producer and my mom is a dancer, she performed with Alvin Ailey, but I didn't even think about becoming an actress.
Daughter of Stan Lathan.
Sanaa was raised partly in Beverly Hills with her father, director Stan Lathan. She lived the other part in New York with her mother, Eleanor McCoy, a Broadway stage actress.
Yale School of Drama graduate.
Her name is Swahili for "work of art".
Says her name is pronounced Sa-NA, "like Sinatra without the tra"
Voted one of Ebony magazine's 55 Most Beautiful People. [2000]
Daughter of actress/dancer Eleanor McCoy.
Gained twenty pounds for her role in "Disappearing Acts".
Was nominated for Broadway's 2004 Tony Award as Best Actress (Featured Role - Play) for her performance as Beneatha in a revival of Lorraine Hansberry's "A Raisin in the Sun."
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