ELLE Magazine launches its 6th annual ‘Women in TV’ Issue, starring some of the small screen’s brightest stars. The covers feature Empire’s Taraji P. Henson, Veep’s Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Quantico’s Priyanka Chopra, How to Get Away with Murder’s Viola Davis and Vinyl’s Olivia Wilde. In their interviews, the actresses get candid about roles for women in Hollywood, breaking stereotypes and more.
Recent Golden Globe winner Taraji P. Henson says about her role as Cookie Lyon on ‘Empire’: “It was very important to me that she not be sassy and neck-rollin’ and eye-bulgin’ and attitude all the time. Everything she does is coming from a place of fighting for her family. That’s why she’s not a caricature.”
Taraji P. Henson
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
“Go to the movies—how many good scripts are you really seeing out there? How many good, meaty roles are there for women within those scripts? Not tons of them. Right now there are so many [TV] shows on with strong, complicated, powerful, not-so-powerful, interesting human beings who are women. And I am thrilled to be playing one of them,” Julia tells the magazine.
Olvia Wilde
“One day all these people were bowing down to me and throwing free clothes at me and telling me I was the best thing since sliced bread, and the next day…all of that disappeared. That was great for an 18-year-old to learn, and I will never again take the BS seriously.” – Olivia Wilde
Priyanka Chopra
“Why should a woman have to pick between global domination and having the love of her life?” – Priyanka Chopra
Viola Davis
“We’ve been fed a whole slew of lies about women.” By TV standards, “if you are anywhere above a size 2, you’re not having sex. You don’t have sexual thoughts. You may not even have a vagina. And if you’re of a certain age, you’re off the table.” – Viola Davis
ELLE Photo Credits:
Priyanka Chopra: Cedric Buchet
Taraji P. Henson: Dan Martensen
Julia Louis-Dreyfus: David Bellemere
Olivia Wilde: David Bellemere
Viola Davis: David Bellemere
