Da’Vine Joy Randolph on Alexander Payne Teaching Her to Smoke Cigarettes for ‘The Holdovers’: ‘We Redid Takes Because He Said It Doesn’t Look Right’
variety.comClayton Davis Senior Awards Editor It could have been easy for Da’Vine Joy Randolph’s role in “The Holdovers” to be yet another stereotypical trope for Black women that Hollywood has lazily thrown out throughout history.
If that had been the case, the actress tells Variety that would have passed. “When I meet with these studio execs and they ask ‘What is it you would like to do next?’ she says. “I straight up say I would like to tell the same stories as a white straight male in this body.
I’m challenging you. Figure it out.” The industry needs to figure it out because the Philadelphia-born actress is an outstanding and vibrant talent, as seen by her invigorating turn in director Alexander Payne’s latest dramedy.
She plays Mary Lamb, a cafeteria worker who, in the midst of dealing with the children left at an elite boarding school during the holiday break, is grieving the loss of her son (who died in the Vietnam War).
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