‘Trying to make things work’
The pandemic has hit moms hard. In her latest TV role, Danielle Brooks records the toll.
Danielle Brooks wanted to find a way to stay creative during lockdown. So she’s starring in a TV show about it.
Set in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, “Social Distance” is an anthology series — focusing on one person or family each episode — about navigating the uncertainty and unexpected circumstances of this singular moment in history. In the third installment, the former “Orange Is the New Black” star plays Imani, a single mom trying to figure out how to care for her daughter while also keeping her job.
Now streaming on Netflix, “Social Distance” was shot remotely under various stay-at-home orders designed to limit the spread of the coronavirus. That meant Brooks, a new mom to daughter Freeya, filmed her episode from her parents’ home in South Carolina — and shared the screen with her mother, Larita Brooks, who plays a patient with ALS that Brooks cares for at a nursing home.
This interview with Brooks has been edited for clarity and length.
Q: In those early days of the pandemic, it became something of a joke guessing how long before this time would be the basis of a TV show or movie. “Social Distance” was the first to be announced back in April. Why was this project
appealing to you?
A: Part of the sanity is getting to continue to do things that you love. And keeping creative, for me, is a part of what keeps me out of spiraling into depression and sadness. I actually did a little Instagram show, or Instagram short film, with my friend Jordan E.
Cooper. We did “Mama Got a Cough.” We did that just out of purely wanting to get our creative juices flowing because we’re artists, we can’t stop. And so, when Jenji (Kohan) and Tara (Herrmann, who are executive producers on the series) hit me up about “Social Distance,” I was completely into it because I love to learn. I was like: This is a cool way for me to be exposed to the other side of the table, and see how things work with the lighting, the sound, picking locations — even if they are in your mom’s house.
And then the other layer of it was when they asked if my mom would be involved. First of all, my mom is a fantastic actress. Unfortunately, they didn’t give her any lines because she would have slayed them. She played a woman with ALS, and she has a lot of ’tude. I just wanted to make memories with her. And my brother is in it as well, he has a very small cameo. I just wanted to create things that we can look back on and say, “We did that together during a pandemic.”
Q: You play Imani, a single mom trying to figure out how to keep her job while making sure
her child is taken care of — a situation so many parents find themselves in.
A: I think Imani is a number of women who are single mothers, or even not single mothers, and trying to support their children as best they can in a pandemic. And are trying to do it in the most safe way possible. I say that because we watch her watch her child through video on her phone. There’s no one physically there to be there for her child. There’s a lot of people trying to make ends meet. I definitely know a few Imanis, for sure, trying to make things work during this time when there’s just, financially, no support. And there are a lot of people who have to live paycheck to paycheck. I’m glad they allowed room for this woman’s story to be told.
The same with the character Marsha (that) Stephanie Blake plays. She’s trying to figure things out as well — teaching and trying to figure out how to maneuver and make lesson plans online. It’s just a whole new world that people are having to step into and navigate. What I think we find through this episode is that we’re all in it together. And how can we really look out for our neighbors and be there for each other during this time.
Q: Do you think the child care issues get enough attention?
A: This is a new topic for me. It’s not something that was even on my radar until I had a baby. I didn’t even
think about why we haven’t spent time talking about it more. But now that I am in it, I definitely think it’s worth people talking about it and sharing their stories. Art reflects life and life reflects art and the more we see it, the more we talk about it.
I’ve been blessed to be financially stable, but it’s not cheap to have someone look after your child and to continue trying to reach for the dreams that you have; trying to continue to work at the level that you want to work at. I think that’s why women start to lose themselves, is because you might not have the resources to help you continue to be yourself. I think the part that is left out of the conver
sation is the sacrifice that women make being mothers, and a part of that is giving up the things that you enjoy and love and that bring you happiness. Some of that comes from not being able to afford child care. That’s something that, when we first had Freeya, we were definitely debating on, like, “What do we do?” And I knew I wasn’t not going to work. But that light bulb does kind of flicker. Do I just sit out for a year? Do I sit out until she can go to preschool, just to save money? And I’m not willing to sacrifice that. So she is coming with me everywhere I go. Everyone has different situations. But speaking for myself, it’s taught me to advocate more
for myself, and to advocate for what I need. So I definitely try to add that into contracts: “You want me, I come with a baby and a nanny.”
Q: And I would assume it puts things in perspective, in terms of even have the ability to make a choice, because a lot of people can’t make the choice.
A: That is the crazy thing. A lot of people don’t have the choice. That is why we have to continue to talk about it. It’s hard to even encourage women to tell your boss what you need, because every situation is different. Some people can’t. They don’t have the luxury to say that.