Owning the Room: Nia DaCosta Is In Charge!

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Welcome to Karen Hodges. Awesome. I'm Karen Hunter and this is Women's History

Month. Every day I want to highlight a woman who is doing some things. Okay. So I

want to introduce you and you may know her already. Her name is Nia DeCosta.

Nia DeCosta. So I was, you know, I scroll on Instagram from time to time and

my, as I mentioned before, my Instagram scrolling is really inspirational.

Actually, I get a lot of greatness. I freak my algorithm and I suggest you do

the same meaning that you only get filtered in things that motivate,

inspire, and also inform. I came across this clip from Nia DeCosta. She was

being interviewed and she was talking about her mom on vacation. I'm gonna get to

that in a second. But if you don't know who she is, she is Brooklyn born director

and writer. Her first film feature film is called Little Woods. I have not watched

that. Okay. I didn't watch Candyman either, which she was also tapped to direct.

It actually became the number one top-grossing film by black woman in the

history of films. So you should know her, right? Nia DeCosta. I did watch top

boy 2019, one of the best series. If you have not watched top boy in summer house,

get your life, all right? If you like the wire or snowfall, top boy takes you

into London, into England, and all of the, oh my goodness, it's just amazing.

Okay. Chef's kiss to you. She did one episode or a couple episodes of top boy.

But the Marvels in 2023, which again, for her, this film, they call it a bomb. They

said it was a box office bomb for the Marvel franchise, but this film, which

featured all women, different backgrounds, kicking ass. I thought was really

well done. I think in many ways, it's quote unquote failure at the box office

speaks more about society than it does about the actual film. But I'm gonna say

less about it. But I was really caught up with her when I saw this clip that

I'm gonna play for you. And by the way, 28 years later, the bone temple, which

is out this year, chef's kiss. Okay, the whole 28 days, her ascension speaks to

just being excellent and getting the opportunity to direct, she's directing 28

years later, the bone temple, she wrote and directed and produced Heta, starring

her buddy, Tessa Thompson, which is so eclectic. And I actually watched that. You

should check out Heta as well. The Marvel, she wrote and directed Candyman, she

wrote and directed Little Wood, she wrote and directed and just quietly, by the way,

the Marvels made 46 million at the box office, which is nothing. This needs

that. No, it's not Black Panther, but it's not nothing. Okay. And when we think

about, you know, these successful women, her name is not a household name near

the Costa, born in Brooklyn. But I just wanted to uplift her today, want to

teach school of arts in NYU, 2011, graduated, went on to a degree from London's

Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. So in many ways, she has the pedigree,

she's gone through the paces, you know, to become what she is. She earned her

right to be there. But when I came across this clip, I said, man, this is

somebody I want you to know. So take a listen. So once my mom and I and my little

sister were in the Adirondack, she was on a business trip. She brought us with

her and we were leaving our hotel room and the people across the hall came out.

And they were like, oh, are you the maid to my mom? We're in bathing suits. We're

like half towels over our, like, we don't, like, we're not in, like, there's no

cart of linens in front of us. Yeah. Also, like, why are these children here if she's

the maid at a resort? Um, and my mom was like, no, and she smiles

just very gracious. And they were like, oh, my God, I'm so sorry that I remember

being like, whoa, like, that's what it is actually. It's less like someone like calling

you the N word or like, you know, it's more like an assumption of where you

belong. So as a director, what's been interesting is having crew who work for me,

saying crazy things to me, like one person said, um, I was like, oh, yeah, you

have dreads. He's like, oh, that's gross. And then one time I was on the corner

waiting for my assistant to pick me up. And he made it same person, of course,

I said, oh, you're like, hooking on the side for, you know, whenever I'm the

director of the film, I hired him. I could fire him. There you go. And and I was

just like, and this is like my second film. And I'm like, oh, right, that's what

it is. Are you hooking on the side? Oh, you have dreads? That's disgusting. The

fact that the crew member did not recognize the power dynamic is wild. But it

is also very, very typical, typical. I actually, sometimes I live in

delusion. Actually, a lot of times, I think you have to be a little delusional or

a lot delusional to be successful in a world that will beat you down and tell you

what your place is. Her mom, by the way, Charmaine de Costa was a founding vocalist

for the band, World of Girl, back in the day. Check that out. So for Nia, watching

her mom be successful and they're out on vacation. She's on a business trip, a

business trip, right, with her daughters at a resort and to have some person in the

hotel, look at her and ask her, she's the maid. I can't tell you how many times I've been

in the store. And somebody's come up to me and asked me where something was. Like, I

don't work here, you know, and I'm going to be indignant. I don't work here. Why are

you assuming I work here? So now I'm, you want a confrontation? We're going to have

it. That's me. But I feel like in many ways, some of us walk through life, you know,

we just swallow that. We recently talked about the BAFTA, you know, Tourette Syndrome

issue with Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo and how they had to just stand there and take

that. Yes, the man has Tourette's, but they could have BAFTA edited it out. So we wouldn't

have to see the indignity. And I'm not saying that they weren't humiliated because those

two men are powerhouses and unto themselves. But they have to endure that anywhere. And

as women in particular in places where we aren't supposed to be so called, aren't supposed

to be, I'm in the throes of working on a project with a famous singer. And, you know, she's

taking me through the paces of her career and all of the different rooms that she's been

in where she has been made to feel invisible or had to be invisible or had to navigate uncomfortable

situations like men watching her dress in the dress of Roman, all of these things. And

she didn't even have a really horrific story, but the micro-aggressions of just having

to endure the sexual advances that, you know, didn't fortunately turn into forced sexual

encounters, but so many women have had that as well. So is the, do you work here? Where

the, you know, it's those dreads are discussing, but you work. Well, you're saying that to the

person that can fire you? What? But you don't even think about it because there's no way that

this black woman's in charge. I get that all the time. I recently had somebody call up my radio show.

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Mutual Life Insurance Company Milwaukee, Wisconsin. By the way, you were just listening to me on

for the first time. Hi, I'm Karen Hunter and I host a radio show on Sirius XM called the Karen

Hunter Show. I've been in that seat since 2014 and somebody had to nerve to tell me I'm only in

that seat because a man put me on and he was arguing. This guy was arguing I was trying. It was

such a weird experience because I'm trying to, for a live radio, figure out like what is your

purpose? It absolutely is not true. This man that you're saying put me on this program is not true.

And I'm not saying I didn't have help. I'm not saying that there wasn't a way made for me.

The channel that I'm on was actually foundationally created or bolstered by Joe Madison.

And so yeah, I sit in that seat every day, understanding that there's a legacy that I've come

before. I'm on the radio primarily because Kathy Hughes paved the way and so many women before me,

PD Green, you know, like there's been ways made but this narrative that this guy was stuck on and

what he was saying to me was that you don't belong here or you're only here because of this. No,

no, no, no. I had a vision for what I wanted to do when I got on the radio. And part of that vision

was to create a community that was larger than anything that I could do on my own. So I wanted

collaboration. I wanted to give other people platforms so that the hall wouldn't be so heavy as

we serve as audience. But what I had to sit and process this man was man that I'm winning. And by

winning, I mean, I'm actually doing everything that I've set out to do on the radio airwaves and

something about that bothers him. That's weird. So I had to call and then he followed me on YouTube

and said, I'm the guy that you hung up. Why didn't hang up on you? But I'm not going to let you lie

about something you don't know why you invested in this. But I realized that this is a world

where there are places that people are supposed to be. And if you step outside of that place where

you're supposed to be, you are upsetting the very spirit of too so many people that they want to make

you sit in that. I'm shared in the space about Dorothy Counts, the young girl who had to integrate

a school in North Carolina. The very presence, her very presence, the spit, the shoving, the inward

hurling, her very presence, so upset, one 15 year old, upset people that they wanted to make sure that

she knew her place wasn't there. But here's what I want to say today. And I want to thank me at

the cost of sharing this story, personal story of her mom's journey and how she has had to navigate

these spaces that they don't think that she belongs in. She's still showing up every day. And she's

not just showing up every day. She is showing up and killing it. And that is the message in the

lesson. You don't shrink in those times. No, people are not going to want you to be in places because

here's the real truth. You're a success. And this is how you know how other people are feeling.

You'll be unsuccessful in the mind of somebody who is mediocre, who doesn't have the talent or the

gift, who doesn't have the discipline or the way with all to get up and do something. You are

in a front to them. Your success makes them feel small. But that's how you know they're actually small

because big people don't spend time worrying about what success other people are having because

you're in your own bastion of success. You're in your own glow and flow of success. You ain't

worried about somebody else. That's how you know people are really small and they're inferior

that they feel insecure, that they are insecure. That's how you know because they waste time.

They're good time that they could be out there doing the thing that they want to do.

Weren't about what you're doing. And particularly with women, men have made a decision and this

is collectively and it's not anyone individual man. So if you feel threatened by this conversation

right now, you feel I'm hit. You are a dog hollering. Stop hollering. Get busy working and get

busy working on yourself more importantly because if you are satisfied unto yourself, you are not

worried about what a need to cost us doing or care and what you're doing because you're doing it.

So the message for everybody is to go out and do, get up and do, go out and do the thing that

you were put here to do. And if you haven't figured that out, figure it out and stop worrying about

what other people are doing it and move out the way because here's the other thing.

I always like it myself. Actually, somebody early on in my career in my 20s started a

women's magazine, a women's sports magazine called Women Next. And I've shared the story in this

space before but I remember having a consultant come in and as I was putting a team down,

putting a team together and again in my 20s, she called me a bullet train and I had never heard

of a bullet train before. I just had not. And so it sent me down a rabbit hole and I was so

lifted up by that description that it is something that drives me to this day. A bullet train,

you're going to get out the way of a bullet train. You are going to move from the path of a bullet

train. Not only would you be run over, you would be obliterated getting in the path of a bullet train.

So when she described me as a bullet train, I was like, yes, I am a bullet train. And every day,

I get up propelled by the notion that anything that I set my mind to doing, I may not do it at the

exact level that I imagine, but I'm going to bullet train. We're going to get there. And I'm really,

we're going to get there. We're going to get there fast. We're going to get their stream line.

We're going to get that the ride is going to be, oh my god, it's going to be glorious for anybody

on this train with me. And it is the thing that actually animates a lot of what I do is to remind

myself every day that I'm a bullet train near the costas of bullet train. Some of you listening

are bullet trains. And if you're not, get your bullet train on. So that's the message. This

woman's history month. And every day, I'm going to be highlighting somebody that's out there doing

it. And I just want to thank all of the people who are doing things in places that they were not

meant to. This woman is the highest grossing black filmmaker woman of all time,

highest grossing film directed by black woman was near the costas. I love it.

All right, let me know what you think. Follow me at Karen Hunter Show dot com hit the comments.

Y'all don't do that often enough because I would love to engage and answer questions. So

if you have them, ask them. If you got comments, comments, I will share some of that in this space

here as well. I love being in this space. And I thank you for listening. Share this with people

because it's free. And if you are at Series XM, tune in to 126 Monday through Friday,

3 to 6 PM Eastern. Actually, the whole channel all day, 126. We're talking powers and becomes

action. Urban View go do that. And you can also follow all of us on the Urban View channel,

Urban View Network on YouTube. And you can follow me directly at Karen Hunter Show on YouTube.

All right. Appreciate you. Till next time.

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Switched to Walmart and manage your prescriptions in the app. The Walmart you thought you knew

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Pick up a pack today. Angel Saft.