4.
In earlier interviews, you’ve spoken about how rising up as a combined Samoan girl in California, away from most of your loved ones, impacted your confidence. As a fellow combined Samoan girl who grew up the identical means, I used to be questioning the place you discovered that confidence to have the ability to write and direct these motion pictures as a result of I feel typically we really feel like, “Oh no, I am not Samoan sufficient.”
That could be a sentence I’m very conversant in: “I am not Samoan sufficient.” Half my dad’s household lived in Northern California — I am in Southern California — or again in Samoa, and so there was actually a disconnect. A part of that truthfully was due to my dad, too, and him coping with a few of his personal id points as I used to be rising up. And so, I felt numerous insecurity about that. I’d say being Samoan is all the time one thing I have been actually pleased with, however it’s one thing I all the time talked about with caveats, to attempt to make different folks really feel higher about it, but additionally to make myself really feel higher. Like, “I am Samoan, however yeah, I do know I do not look so Samoan,” to make it really feel okay for everyone else. I am not joking, I used to have an image of my grandparents in my bag after I was actually younger.
BuzzFeed: So you may whip it out as proof?
Yeah, as if I wanted it! No person’s even asking me for proof. However I felt so insecure about it. I do not know that I am a fully-recovered insecure afakasi [mixed Samoan] girl, however I’ve come a great distance. Even taking the job on the Moana live-action, which was my first Moana challenge, my first thought after getting that job was: “Am I Samoan sufficient? Is our neighborhood going to be upset that I am the individual doing this? Will they suppose I am not sufficient to do that?” And it was very daunting. I used to be so excited as a result of I really like Moana, and I felt like I could not consider I get to be part of telling her story. However it’s been a course of to take possession of even simply with the ability to be say, “I am Samoan. I am not gonna clarify to you what meaning as a result of it is none of your enterprise, and I do know who I’m.” That I’d say has been a two-year course of. It is nonetheless new to me. It is nonetheless recent.
However a part of that’s as a result of I took some possibilities I wasn’t able to take. I took the job on the live-action movie regardless that I felt that insecurity. I began PEAK [Pasifika Entertainment Advancement Komiti] after I was like, “Am I sufficient to do that? Am I the precise individual?” I additionally had a Pacific Islander writers room for this small present that did not find yourself going, and I set to work with Pacific Islanders in a room, creating, for the primary time. All of these items got here collectively directly, and I began to really feel like I used to be part of an even bigger neighborhood. And it wasn’t a neighborhood that was asking me to qualify myself however of different individuals who felt very equally. We had been coming collectively, and we had been taking a look at one another, and we’re like, “Oh, I see you. I see you. I see you.” And since we had been seeing ourselves in one another, it gave me extra confidence to be daring about taking possession of who I’m. It has been a journey, however I’m proud to be Samoan.
