ICW: Adele James, star of African Queens: Cleopatra

Last month it was announced that the second season of African Queens on Netflix would be headed up by Adele James, and she would be playing perhaps the most iconic queen in history - Cleopatra. The announcement was met with more backlash than anyone had expected, but I got to sit down with Adele to talk about the show, navigating such intense public scrutiny, identity, the need for well-rounded historical figures, and much more. Give it a read or a listen below!

Brianna (TBP)
Hey! Congratulations on the role, and the show how

Adele James
Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, what a crazy time. I can't believe it. People keep calling me Pharoh and I don't know what to do. It's hilarious and so surreal. Also, I think because we shot it so long ago, you know that it's like God, I can’t believe that it’s actually out now, like pretty much.

Brianna (TBP)
How long ago did you actually film it?

Adele James
This time last year we were pretty much wrapping up so. Yeah, it's the longest I've ever waited for a TV show to come out. I'm used to things happening quite quickly with like, Casualty and stuff. Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
So I figured let's talk about the elephant in the room first, get that out of the way. And then we can relax and just enjoy the rest of the interview. So there has been a tiny little bit of backlash to your casting as Cleopatra. Just the teensiest tiniest, and one of them that really stuck out to me, because I just thought it seemed interesting, shall we say, was someone said - I think his name is Zahi Hawass - said that Cleopatra was Greek and therefore blonde, not black, which sat weirdly with me because I've seen Greek people. And not many of them have been blonde, first of all. But second of all, and most interesting from what he said, and also what many people have said is that it kind of ignores Cleopatra was eighth generation, by the time we get to Cleopatra, she's like, 250 ish years removed from her family ever being in Greece. So at that point, it feels to me fair to assume she might have a little bit of African blood running through those veins. They've been in Egypt the entire time. I'd love to know kind of how it's been for you to sort of navigate, what should be a really exciting time in your life, that has been kind of overshadowed a little bit by this kind of backlash, and having had time to sit with the feedback, what are your thoughts on it?

Adele James
I'll address the first part of that first. Navigating it has been really difficult because I don’t think anybody was prepared for the level of it. We all knew what we were doing. You know, we all knew that there was a precedent to this. It's unprecedented in a way, which seems kind of ridiculous because race as a construct is something that we understand very differently to anybody pre the transatlantic slave trade. Let alone going back 1000s of years to ancient Egypt. There's that. But it's been difficult to navigate, because I'm just one person, you know, and I'm not the only person who's received the backlash. I'm probably the person who's received most of it. At least since the announcement, I know the director and some crew members have been getting it since they were announced as even just being attached to the project. So we're talking about like, back when we were filming last April. For me, I know since its’ come out as the face of the show, most of it’s come this way right? And for one person to receive 1000s of messages in such a short span of time of death threats and wishing me harm and calling me uneducated you know and it’s, there's a real range here. And you know, telling me that I'm no better than, you know, a slave and that I must be playing Cleopatra’s slave and then just kind of attacking me personally, when people don't know me? That's the weirdest thing about it, you don't know anything about me. That's, that's been hard to navigate. Because with the best will in the world and with all the lovely messages that have come to counteract that and you know, despite that, you can't help but focus on the negative. And I would say in the beginning the first three hours were like, so exciting. And then for a few days there it really did take over my whole kind of psyche around the show and I thought, not that I thought we'd done anything wrong, but it was hard to be excited about it. And that felt really sad.

Brianna (TBP)
That is really sad. Yeah, this is the biggest thing that you've done, like this is going to showcase you to an international audience for probably the first time, you should be excited. And I'm really genuinely sorry that that hasn't happened. Like, it's horrible. I'm really sorry.

Adele James
Thank you. That's so sweet. And you know what people, sane people, kind, compassionate humans have all said the same thing, you know, don't let that get you down. And you know, this is such a wonderful thing that you should be so excited about. And I know all of those things. And I have worked very hard to get back to a place where I'm just so excited about it. And like, I’ve had the time to process it a bit more, I think initially, it was just overwhelming. And now I'm to kind of go to the second part of what you were asking. I've kind of had the time to formulate the response that I want to give, which is truly if you don't want to watch the show, you don't agree with the casting, go watch any of the other versions that exist, go make your own version, that's not my business, that's fine. However, I would charge people to remember that this is a docu drama. You know, this is not something that Netflix independently or Nutopia independently, or Westbrook or Jada independently, have just pulled out of their hat, you know, because they felt like it. There is viable, credible academic research across the board, on both sides of the debate, that support that we don't know who her parentage is, we don't know who her mother was. We don't know who paternal grandmother was, either. And there is every possibility that she might not have been purely Greek, you know, purely European. But also, of course, that ancient Egypt in and of itself was a very multicultural place. And yes, she is eight generations deep, you know. It seems to me almost ludicrous, especially given that like modern day and I know - I'm sure not every message that came through, even though a lot of them were posed as if they were from Egyptians, I'm sure not all of them were from Egyptians. Some of them were just some nasty trolls, you know, wherever the hell. But um, you know, even modern-day Egypt isn't white.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, exactly.

Adele James
It's pretty odd. To me, the whole argument is really odd. But I just hope people can move on, because it's also not just about that, that’s such a small part in fact, of what we're talking about here, really, in terms of her life, and how she has been misrepresented. So yeah, I'm just kind of, I hope people can find it in them to just take a big step back from that political racial conversation, engage in it for what it is, and also embrace all the other things that she was, which is just a brilliant leader, you know, mother. Yeah, yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
Exactly. And that's what we are going to move on to, because it is incredibly exciting. This whole series that Jada, Nutopia, and Westbrook have created is incredibly exciting, because we don't actually know a whole lot about the Queen's of Africa. And we don't really know a whole lot about Cleopatra. So how was it for you to step into her shoes?

Adele James
It was so great. I've got goosebumps, just as you said that it was so crazy. And in such an exciting way. I mean, the thing is, we all have this idea of her right? Or at least we - I certainly had this idea of her from what I'd learned at school, from what I'd seen in the like Hollywood image of her and from what exists in the kind of, I would say quite male dominated literature that exists about her. There's, she's very much written from like a male perspective throughout history. And here I was engaging with this beautiful script, and this expert research that gave me an insight into the human being underneath that iconography. And it was just, you know, as an actor, you always want to play like big, challenging, complex roles, but this is like the mother of all. Like, I'm scared I've peaked too early!

Brianna (TBP)
No, you definitely haven’t!

Adele James
Thanks babe!

Brianna (TBP)
What was the most interesting thing that you learned about her as you were kind of figuring her out?

Adele James
I think for me, it wasn't necessarily that like, kind of like such or like events that I'd learned about her. It was just coming, being able to understand her on like a human level as like a mother, like the scenes that were worked in are just about her relationship with her children and her relationship with even Marc Antony and Caesar. But on like a more human level, rather than this, this kind of like, mysterious woman of the past who seduced all these men, you know. It was about how strategically these relationships worked for her, of course, but also how much it appears that she really, really loved both of them, particularly Marc Antony, you know, they say it's like the greatest love story of all time. But even still, I think most when most people think of it, it's this idea of love, not real love. And, you know, Craig and John, in equal measure, were just fabulous in their respective roles. But they really, I think, I'm hoping that what we've brought to the fore with what we've done with, will show the humanity behind these yeah, these these kind of big figureheads, and their interpersonal relationships with one another.

Brianna (TBP)
I love that, and weirdly kind of almost relevant to then the conversation we were having at the beginning of like, people thinking that they know you, and responding to what they think they know. And you're like, actually, there's a whole human behind this. Like, and obviously, her story ends incredibly, tragically, like she takes her own life. I think it's such an interesting position, then that you find yourself in the modern day, playing this figurehead and receiving so much attention. And you're like - weirdly, it mirrors, its kind of like the cycle of humanity. Like, the more things change, the more they stay the same almost.

Adele James
Absolutely, absolutely. And, you know, having to put yourself in the mind of somebody who is suicidal is, it's a lot, you know, as I'm sure anybody can understand. But, you know, you hear that, you hear about that kind of tragic ending, and it's, it's hard to really grasp, I think, but then having gone through the journey. Because we actually shot that scene quite late, which I was grateful for. It meant I was able to experience for myself, so many of these like big, iconic moments, and so many of the smaller moments that helped me make sense of it, you know, the weight of what she had gone through, the weight of all those eyes on her and there is a kind of mirror there - not to say in any way, shape, or form that I feel suicidal, but it's immense how much pressure is put on you, when you are seen as the leader of something, when you're seen as the face of something, and she was the face of an entire country, you know? Like, you know, it really was life and death all the time. So yeah, what an honour for me, truly,

Brianna (TBP)
I'm so excited to see it, like I've seen Njinga, and that's amazing. And as soon as I heard that it was going to be Cleopatra, and then I saw it was you. I was like, oh, it's gonna be good. It's gonna be so good. And I kind of want to talk a little bit, kind of going a little bit off topic. But I want to talk to you about your theatre experience, because there's a lot of kind of conversation about American producers love British talent, and Americans kind of get a little bit like, we've got our own talent, why do you keep casting Brits? I think the reason for that is that we're so- our actors on stage trained. I think it really adds a - it elevates the acting. And I wonder do you feel that your acting was elevated by the amount of stage experience that you've had? And if so, how?

Adele James
Definitely, I think theatrical training, and by which I mean really like performing on stage. So I didn't go to drama school, I don't have a formal drama school education. I might have been the only person in that cast who didn't actually. But yeah, I didn't, I didn't go to drama school. I've always trained though, part time, because I think training and technique is very, very important, I wouldn't have been able to do that role, or any of the roles that I've done without it. But performing on stages is a baptism of fire like no other because there are no do overs. If something goes wrong in the moment, you guys have just got to figure that out, you know, for want of a better expression. It's just you, the tech team, and the other actors if you're doing a show with more than one person in it. I remember I did a show once years ago, where there were other people in it, but it was a lot of monologuing on my part, it was called #Lightie and we did it at the Arcola and I was playing this 16 year old on stage, who was like a YouTube blogger. So I'm on stage, I'm doing my makeup, talking, talking, talking. And then I just went blank. I was like, Oh…my God. And all I had thank goodness, I had this iPad, which was projecting my real, in real time image onto a screen at the back of the theatre of the auditorium. And I'm doing my makeup in it, and I'm sure everybody can see the terror in my eyes. It's probably only about 30 seconds, but for me it felt like about 10 minutes, but I didn't know what to do. So I just kept doing my makeup for ages until I could figure out where I was. But that's the kind of beauty and the thrill of theatre! You’ve got to make it work somehow someway. So yeah, I mean, I can't really speak to the training of American actors because I didn't grow up there, and that's not my background. But I definitely think it bodes well for us that we have such a strong, such a strong theatrical scene, I think every actor should do theatre personally.

Brianna (TBP)
Because I mean, if that was a film that you were doing you, they literally just said cut, you’d have gone and looked at your script. You're not developing those kinds of like, improv skills of like, think on your feet. What do I have to do now? And yeah, I love seeing actors, my favorite actors are actors that have done theatre, and you can see it, you can so see it. So I'd love to know, you say you filmed this last year. So that's post - well, not really post pandemic kind of as we're coming out of it?

Adele James
Right on the cusp. A lot of masks going on. We were still being, you know, having our temperature taken and doing regular testing and stuff. Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
Where did the filming happen? Were you filming here in the UK? Or were you somewhere else?

Adele James
No, we were in Morocco. You don't get that kind of desert in the UK, I wish. I wish we had that heat. And you know, and those beautiful scenes, but no, we went out to Morocco.

Brianna (TBP)
Oh how gorgeous. So what was the filming experience actually like for you guys? A lot of fun?

Adele James
It was, it was insane in like, a really, really great way but also in like a really, really tiring way. You know, I think the thing I would say is that all of us had a very different experience. I don't think anybody shared the experience that I had just because just for the fact that given it's a documentary about this woman's life, you know, a docu-series sorry, about about this woman's life, I was in 90% of what we shot. So there was very little downtime. But I was very conscious that I wanted to spend a lot of time with the rest of the cast, that I wanted to socialize. So we did, we had a lot of fun. We, you know, as I said, it was still quite strict, COVID wise, so we weren't like, and we wouldn't have had the resources or the time to go out like partying or anything like that. But we went for dinners. And, you know, we hung out, you know, at the hotel together. And we really did try and kind of stay together as a unit. But the actual filming was crazy. I mean, the hours were - we had a lot to shoot in a very short amount of time. But if you've ever spent any time on a film set, you know, it's very like go go go go go. Long days, but everything moves very fast. But there's some of the locations we shot at. I mean, I've never seen anything like it in my life. Epic

Brianna (TBP)
Really! I was gonna ask, my next question was going to be is there any like, moment or day that is like 50 years from now, when you think back, that's the day you're gonna remember from shooting this.

Adele James
I mean, honestly, kind of all of it is the first time I've ever been flown out to do anything. You know, one day that really stands out in my mind, and I don't think it happens in the trailer, I was looking at the video of it on my phone the other day, I don't think it's in the trailer. There's a scene with myself, and another character where we're on horseback. And we're kind of trotting down this like lake, this like river or lake. And it's supposed to be like Egypt when things are going better again, so the beginning, they're going through this big drought and it's like a nightmare, and then somewhere towards the middle things are a bit better. And they're going to visit their people basically, Cleopatra did a lot of visits to the Egyptian people to integrate herself. And it's just the most I mean, I’d never sat on a horse before I went to Morocco for the show, number one. But just the experience of being in those beautiful garments with the amazing hair and makeup, with all of these background artists and in this incredible location on a horse! I just kept thinking about that - its so silly. You know that old spice advert where he's like “I’m on a horse.”

Brianna (TBP)
Did you have like on your CV where it's like a list of things that I can do, did you have horse riding down even though you'd like you've never ridden a horse?

Adele James
No, because I was so scared that someone was gonna be like “Okay, if you go then!” and I would like, die. Or fall off and seriously injure myself. No, it wasn't on there. But they had mentioned, I was in my taxi on the way to the airport and I got a call from one of the producers and they were like, by the way we think we want you to ride a horse, would you be okay learning when you get to Morocco? And I was like, Yeah. And I kind of thought about on the plane and I was like, Oh my God, that's a big thing actually, I didn't realise. But no, I was so excited. And they you know, they have really great kind of handlers and stuff, animal handlers on the other side who who are very well versed at training people very quickly.

Brianna (TBP)
So what do you hope that people take away from the show? When they finally get to see it? Next week, the week after?

Adele James
Almost next week? Yeah, it's just - it's two weeks today!

Brianna (TBP)
Two weeks today yes! (Dear readers, it is not two weeks today as you read this, it’s in fact two days from now)

Adele James
What do I hope people get from it? I really hope that people have a new appreciation for how brilliant she was, how very much the odds were stacked against her in a lot of respects, as they are for maybe all women all the way throughout history.

Brianna (TBP)
A bit of common theme!

Adele James
For many reasons, you know, but um, you know, it's not easy out here. But I hope people have an appreciation for her brilliance, her mind, you know, she spoke something like, seven or nine languages. And she's the only person I think she might be the only Ptolemy who, who spoke Egyptian, who spoke the native language as well. She really was interested in integrating I think, I hope people will have an appreciation for the softness as much as you know, for her love, the love that she was able to give to her people and to her romantic partners and her children as much as her kind of diplomatic skill and political skill. And just kind of stop seeing her as this like temptress. Yeah, because I don't think that that's a helpful representation of her.

Brianna (TBP)
It's so one dimensional. I hope this gives people a really like, whole view of her. Because I think pretty much everything that I've seen of her, even till now, even like the iconic Elizabeth Taylor version, it's still very, 1D.

Adele James
It is, it's quite, you know, and no disrespect to Lizzy, but it just feels and it's partly to do with the way that these things have been written and directed as well. So it's not just about, or ever about the actor, but it just feels like the modern world needs a more well rounded version of this hugely influential leader, you know, she impacted everything that came thereafter. So yeah, I'm really excited for people to see it.

Brianna (TBP)
Me too. I'm really excited that it's kind of the whole thing is done from a woman's perspective. Like, it's written by women, it's directed by a woman, it's obviously acted by a woman like it's the first time kind of seeing that which is just really exciting.

Adele James
It is exciting. Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
My last question, and I ask everyone this is what does being black mean to you?

Adele James
That's a really good question. I think it means so many things, all of which are wonderful. But I must caveat it by saying - what I'm about to say - by saying that I don't identify solely as black and I think that's really important, because, partly because of this role that I've taken on, but also because I very much recognize that as a biracial woman, you know, a whole half of who I am, I don't really like to say it that way, but you know, there's a whole half of my heritage that isn't black. Yeah. And that means so many things kind of socially and politically, and you know, all the rest of it, I don’t have to preach it to you, I'm sure. I think when I think about what it means to be black, to have black heritage and to have black friends and family, it's always this kind of thing that's so deep within the soul, you know, that celebration of colour, and music and movement and flavour. And, you know, it just for me feels like such a vibrant thing to be just, like on like a molecular level. You know, it's, I'm so grateful that that's part of my heritage, and I'm so proud of it. And yeah, I just think it's awesome. I think it's awesome.

Brianna (TBP)
It is isn’t it, it’s so good! Thank you for your time and good luck with the show!

African Queens: Cleopatra is out on Netflix from May 10th.