Family is very important to me. People often ask me how I managed to stay grounded and sane, having started as a child star and growing up in the industry, and really, it's God. But it's also my family and God in my family.

God-willing and prayerfully, we are always growing and changing and developing personally and professionally.

I really enjoy theater. Performing live onstage is helping me to grow as an actress.

I'm not just considered a former child star. I'm not considered a black actress. I'm not considered an actress. I've done roles that were written for men. First and foremost is God: I definitely believe in Him having kind of mapped out what my destiny was going to be.

I wanted to keep that message of food and family alive, and how it brings people together and builds relationships and communication.

I started to write as a child as soon as I could read, or even before, when my mother read me Beatrix Potter at bedtime. Writing seemed to me to be the only sensible way to live and be happy.

What we're doing here in America is we're making women choose between the family they love and the job that they need. No other nation on the planet is making these choices. In other countries, they've put politics aside and looked at the facts. When women succeed, the world succeeds. We're losing sight of that here in the USA.

The exclusion of God automatically means the inclusion of evil.