Sex scenes are liberating! Nafessa Williams on Rivals, racism, and self-belief
5/11/202648 min
Sex scenes involve a lot more padding and tape than you might expect! Rivals actress Nafessa Williams has found being at the centre of one of TV’s sexiest shows both nerve-wracking and incredibly liberating.
In this chat with Fearne, Nafessa explores what it means to play the only black woman in a white man's world in 1980s Britain, and why she sees her acting as her contribution to activism and representation.
Do you consider yourself to be ambitious and driven? Nafessa wonders if you rest as hard as you work... because you should! Plus, how to manifest the life you want, without forgetting the key component: action!
Watch Rivals series 2 on Disney+ from May 15th.
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsFearne Cotton· Host0:00
[gentle music] Hello, and welcome to Happy Place. I'm Fern Cotton, and this is the show that builds real resilience. Today, I'm chatting to Nafessa Williams.
Nafessa Williams· Guest0:10
I remember telling myself, "It's gonna be hard. You're gonna hear no, and you gotta get comfortable with it." So I remember being like, "Even if it takes me 20 years, like, I'm gonna do"... You know, you just have to build up that mindset of longevity and shaking it off and getting back up. Like, I wake up, and I be like, "Okay, God, show me how good today is gonna get."
Fearne Cotton· Host0:31
Oh, should we head back to the '80s with Rivals? I think we should. I am in my mid-40s, so I remember the '80s. Obviously, I was born in 1981, uh, which to my kids sounds like the Tudor era. Um, and the '80s were a mixed bag, but what I would say is that there were some real treats in the '80s. One of them, big hair. You know we, like, circle back in fashion to different decades. I don't think we've actually really done the '80s. Like, we'll do a bit of a shoulder pad here and there, but it's not been, like, a full '80s deep dive. Like, when you see pictures or video footage of pop stars or actors or whatever, or the news from the '80s, everybody, men, women, dogs and cats, everyone had massive hair. I reckon... [laughs] I think we need to start bringing this back. I'd be really up for it, like sleeping in rollers kinda thing. My mum in the '80s, I've got a brilliant picture, I've got to dig