In choosing roles, “Underground” star Aisha Hinds sometimes thinks about the words of poet Audre Lorde: “Sometimes we are blessed with being able to choose the time, and the arena, and the manner of our revolution, but more usually we must do battle where we are standing.”
Hinds ruled one of the most revolutionary episodes of television this year — a stellar hour of WGN’s “Underground” in which Hinds, as Harriet Tubman, delivers her aching life story and unstoppable manifesto to free former slaves from bondage.
The actress, who also plays Pastor Janae James on Fox’s “Shots Fired,” said she realized the influence a role could contain when she played a homeless woman named Isabelle on the TNT show “Hawthorne.”
“It hit me at home, because I have a very close family member who was homeless at that time,” she said. “And I knew that’s where I was supposed to do battle because that’s where I was standing.”
Hinds spoke Thursday at TheWrap’s Emmy Season Screening Series alongside “Fargo” star Mary Elizabeth Winstead, “Timeless” star Abigail Spencer and “Better Call Saul” star Jonathan Banks.
Hinds said their platforms as performers allow them to encourage others to fight injustices anywhere they see them. “Wherever we are standing, whether it’s in our communities, whether it’s our children’s school yards, wherever we are standing, we can do battle right there,” she said.
One battle viewers need to fight: WGN has canceled “Underground,” and the show needs a new network to survive. One highlight of the panel was Spencer, whose “Timeless” was canceled and then revived by NBC, telling Hinds not to give up.
Watch the video above for the complete panel featuring Hinds, Banks, Winstead and Spencer. Hinds’ remarks about injustice begin around 25:25 minutes in.
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