I believe there are some great things that I've taken from the Bible in terms of loving the world and trying to be kind. There are a lot of good things to take from the Bible, and I like to think I try to apply them to my life.
— Michaela Coel
I've always liked using humor, but what I had to with 'Chewing Gum' was take out a lot of darkness so it would be a bit more feel-good.
'Chewing Gum' is the London that I know.
The environment on the 'Chewing Gum' set is where everyone can work to the best of their abilities and everyone is happy. So, if I'm not happy with something, I've learnt that you don't start flailing about; you go in quietly, and there's a conversation.
I love Jeremy Corbyn, definitely.
I actually thank God for television... it's not technology, it's storytelling. Technology is saying, 'Do less, do less, do less.' And I don't think it's healthy, no.
I went to drama school, where you learn to clown around a bit. You're walking around in leotards every day for three years, and you're taught clowning and mask work.
What dominates my life isn't the fact that I started off doing theatre. It's probably to do with Christianity, my race, the class I was born into. These are the things that make my work. They make who I am as well.
I'm massively open-minded to pretty much anything.
Now I'm steeped in this world, I keep thinking going to the theatre every week is normal, but there's a whole world of people who don't go at all. I wrote 'Chewing Gum Dreams' for them - I'd love them to come.
I'm way too honest. It can backfire.
When I was 18, I suddenly became very, very religious. I became an evangelical Christian; I was celibate for five years.
I took what I was given in Christianity and put it into my secular, hedonistic life.
I don't write with this thing in the back of my head about carrying the weight of young black women on my shoulders.
'Moesha' is very strong in my brain. The black women on 'The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air' are very strong in my brain.
Inequality starts in the womb.
'Chewing Gum' is a sitcom set on an estate in east London. Its central character is a girl from a Pentecostal background who decides to embark on a more worldly lifestyle - it's about adolescence 10 years too late. In my dreams, everybody is watching it, finding out about my world and realising it's not what they imagined. That it's not terrifying.
I definitely believe in spirituality. I like to pray, but I'm not praying to something that I can define; I'm just speaking because I know it does have an effect.
The acting world is tough. It's competitive - and even more so for women - but actually, for black female actresses, the issue isn't really that it's competitive: it's that there just aren't enough roles for them in film and TV.
When I grew up, my race was not a thing. My identity was in my class. It was not about colour on my estate.
I do like making people feel uncomfortable - it's separating the wheat from the chaff.
We live in a world where if you're white, an upper-class male of extreme privilege, and able-bodied, and you're nothing that takes you away from that norm, then you're going to have - then the world will not assign you problems because of what you are. That is actually the world we live in.
'Chewing Gum' ages me 15 years every time I do it - it's insane.
Men are trained to like this version of womanhood, and when someone comes along smashing the table and messing up the party, it's a bit like, 'Get out; why are you disturbing the peace?'
I didn't know I was going to write for TV until I was suddenly writing for TV, so that kind of stuff can bewilder you.
There's Psalms that tell you things that nobody tells you - that you're fearfully and wonderfully made, that you're beautiful, that you have worth, basically.
'Chewing Gum Dreams' should make you look twice at the girl shouting on the bus and not just cuss her off from your life.
Being fetishized because of my skin? I've definitely encountered that wall of people.
I don't think we should be presentable or present ourselves for the sake of others.
I wanted to write a show about an estate that wasn't sad or morbid, like a lot of shows portray working class life to be.
We need to encourage black women to know that they are authors of their own destiny, that they have important stories to tell, and that they are capable, so magically capable, of writing them and creating important pieces of work that will live forever in history.
I love Issa Rae. I adore her.
I was very unhappy at one point and dealt with my unhappiness by hitting people.
Where I grew up, in Aldgate, east London, one of the poorest boroughs in the country, I saw lots that was real - the bankers with their briefcases, the man next door with five wives, the illegal immigrants in Flat 5. I'm from a world you rarely see on screen, and I want to show it off.
I became a very passionate Christian when I was 17. I started writing and performing poetry at different venues across the U.K. I started performing from then, really.
I feel angry with myself the way I handled the Bible and Christianity. A lot more people are more normal with Christianity. I was crazy... telling people you will go to hell. I lost all my friends because of my militant faith.
I don't really go with the crowd. I'm the kind of person that if I heard some girls were bullying my friend in another school, I would go to that school by myself and try to have a fight with a hundred girls.
I don't actually believe in the genre of comedy. Sometimes when I watch comedies, I can't see the soul of the show. I want to be able to laugh and cry. That is where the magic is. I'm trying to get to that place.
Twitter is just full of silly little people enjoying being sarcastic and rude and mocking.
You have to be true to your instinctive way of writing. You have to find your identity.
Women are tired of 'presenting' themselves; we just want to be who we are.
I've been bullied about my appearance since forever.
I want to make sure I'm climbing because there's no back-up. No one in my family has a house, and, regardless of your background, if someone has a house, that means you can always come back home. When you don't have that, it's like there isn't anywhere to stand, so you have to keep jumping.
One thing I am quite passionate about is the absence of dark-skinned women in the media, so I have a passion to show dark-skinned women as beautiful, as vulnerable, as people who can be sexually desired and loving people, because it is never really seen on TV.
I wrote a play at drama school, which was a dark comedy - people laughed and cried. And then my script of one of the shows was picked up by a comedy sketch company... so then I had to write comedy.
The idea of wanting to do something that's completely natural and then having to repress it is something that I find fascinating.
Black isn't something I became after a car crash that I've been dealing with ever since. I'd like the colour of my skin to not be a factor in my life at all.
In Britain, we need to start presenting the option of being a writer in front of black women. We need to present the idea of being a writer into poorer communities because the majority of black people in this country are working class. We need to let working-class people know that their voices are important.
I am really weird.
My sets are not peaceful. It's a beautiful catastrophe. I am running around like a headless chicken. I don't sleep because I am writing. It's manic.
