“There isn’t anyone you couldn’t love once you’ve heard their story.” This quote has been my mother’s favorite for as long as I can remember. As a social worker, my mother raised me to value and understand the power of storytelling, and its capacities to build bridges through empathy and listening. My father, on the other hand, instilled in me an appreciation for the classics, from Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust to There Will Be Blood. In my family, art brings us closer together and storytelling is a conduit to loving — to truly seeing one another.

I believe stories have the power to move, to awaken, to inspire change in people and the world. At a young age, I was called an observer; a deep thinker and feeler, curious about others and the life around me, yet unsure of what to do with all I thought and felt. When I started acting, beginning with a sincere, riveting performance of Cruella DeVil by 11-year-old Sofia, everything fell into place for me. I realized I could use the qualities that made me me to serve stories that have the power to inspire change. Nothing brings me more hope in this terrifying, complex, ever-evolving world than this. Especially when it comes to representing experiences of girlhood and queerness, either through acting or writing, I aim to do so through radical play, humor, rage— and, crucially, hope.

Some less-substantial-but-equally-important things about me: I was named after my parents saw Sofia Coppola’s credit during a screening of Lost in Translation, my favorite food is a raw oyster, my favorite place in the world is Gloucester, Massachusetts, I believe the word “myriad” has brought me good luck and fortune throughout my life, and my favorite thing to get to do as an actor on stage is scream.