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FILE PHOTO: Actress Zoe Saldana To Play Nina Simone In Biopic Role

Zoe Saldana has received a lot of scrutiny ever since she was chosen to play Nina Simone in the legendary singer’s recent biopic.

After being told she wasn’t black enough or that she was too pretty, now the mom of two is speaking out against all of the naysayers and defending herself as a black Dominican woman. She told Allure magazine:

There’s no one way to be black. I’m black the way I know how to be. You have no idea who I am. I am black. I’m raising black men. Don’t you ever think you can look at me and address me with such disdain.”

FILE PHOTO: Actress Zoe Saldana To Play Nina Simone In Biopic Role

Saldana, who gave birth to twin boys with her Italian husband Marco Perego in 2014, also spoke about being told she was “too pretty” to play the iconic songstress. She revealed:

“I never saw her as unattractive. Nina looks like half my family! But if you think the [prosthetic] nose I wore was unattractive, then maybe you need to ask yourself, ‘What do you consider beautiful? Do you consider a thinner nose beautiful, so the wider you get, the more insulted you become?’”

She continued, “If you think you can do it better, then by all means. Let ours be version number one of 10 stories in the next 10 years about the [f–king] iconic person that was Nina Simone.”

The 37-year-old then really dropped the mic:

“I made a choice. Do I continue passing on the script and hope that the ‘right’ black person will do it, or do I say, ‘You know what? Whatever consequences this may bring about, my casting is nothing in comparison to the fact that this story must be told.’

“The fact that we’re talking about her, that Nina Simone is trending? We [f–king] won,” Saldana stated. “For so many years, nobody knew who the [f–k] she was. She is essential to our American history. As a woman first, and only then as everything else.”

The Nina Simone biopic was released in April to mediocre reviews.

SOURCE: The RootAllure | PHOTO CREDIT: Getty

Zoe Saldana Defends Her ‘Blackness’ And Says What About Nina Simone?  was originally published on globalgrind.com