Teyana Taylor is no stranger to the hustle and grind of treading through the hills and valleys of a career in entertainment. Since the early 2000s (whoa, crazy typing that) I've been a huge fan of what she's always brought to the table, especially representing Harlem, a borough I hold dear to my heart from early childhood memories of spending summers there.
With her unique style, powerful presence, and bold way of approaching anything she does, no one can deny that Taylor ain't nothing to play with.
Her recent collab with Jordan---an Air Jordan 1 Zoom CMFT 2 “A Rose From Harlem” sneaker---broke records and sold out within minutes of its June 1st release. She also directed a fairytale-inspired video, giving a nod to Bridgerton, Cinderella, and Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing for the launch, co-starring her daughters, Junie and Rue Rose, Philadelphia Eagles' Jalen Hurts, and DJ Khaled, and featuring cameos from hip-hop stars Maino, Fabolous, and Remy Ma.
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She's proven her creative tenacity, talent, and wit time and time again, from her early 2000s self-affirming anthem, "Google Me," to landing deals with music labels including Pharell's Star Trak and Kanye's G.O.O.D. Music, to her iconic Internet-breaking role in Kanye West's "Fade" video, to dominating stages giving sultry, authentic, and rousing within rock, hip-hop, soul, and funk-infused experiences for fans. (You really can't just call her shows "concerts" because Ms. Teyana is truly a divine performer who offers her all from the soul and gut.)
Many of us who have been following her journey are well aware of the chart-topping albums filled with collabs with legends including Lauryn Hill and Erykah Badu, and her stand-out supporting roles in comic cult classics. I mean, let's really put some respect on her fabulous portrayal of Bopoto Izzi---a reimagining of the '80s classic Imani Izzi character played by Black Hollywood royalty Vanessa Bell Calloway---in the 2021 sequel, Coming 2 America, which came in at No. 1 in streams its opening weekend. Or how about the $25 million hitMadea's Big Happy Family that wouldn't have been the same without the unforgettable, "Byyyyyyroooonnnn!.
And let's not forget how she always un-alives the game with any fashion runway or brand collaboration she touches. From the Met Gala to global fashion weeks, she always adds a touch of glamourous urban spin to haute couture, representing all that is multifaceted and golden about being a Black woman.
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Confidence And Resilience Leading To Longevity And Growth
After more than a decade, the wife and mother of two has faced her fair share of challenges, snubs, and obstacles in her music and film career. There were those infamous reports of the online feud with Rihanna and the subsequent news of Adidas dropping her from a sneaker deal back in 2013. There was also her public acknowledgement of the impact of career disappointments when, citing feelings of being "unappreciated," she announced her retirement from music in 2020.
She reemerged on stages in 2021 with "The Last Rose Petal" tour and in 2022 with "The Last Rose Petal 2" run. The shows sold out and Janet Jackson surprised her with an appearance at the London stop.
Taylor also shifted to honing her acting craft and working on other creative projects after giving music a break."When I retired, I really wanted to focus on directing and acting, so this is the first project that I did since stepping into that world, " she told Elleof her renewed focus and work with A Thousand And One.
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She's clearly pushed through, not letting anything or anyone stop her from thriving in the journey, setting her career goals, being intentional, and making her business dreams a reality. The results of that are as clear as day: her work via The Aunties production team, the recent collab with Jordan (a brand that has reportedly earned Nike $19 billion by the way), her recent creative direction gigs with top artists including Latto, Summer Walker, and Lola Brooke, and her recent breakout role in a Sundance grand jury prize-wowing film helmed by two powerful Black women (A.V. Rockwell as writer and director, and Lena Waithe as co-producer), and the continued slaying of red carpets prove that she's in it to win it.
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Those rumors were more than laid to rest when Jodie and Joshua went to the 2023 Oscars together earlier this year, and even more recently, when they celebrated her birthday together last month during the September unveiling of the Lotus Emeya.
Jodie Turner-Smith celebrates her birthday with husband Joshua Jackson at the unveiling of the new fully-electric Lotus Emeya on September 07, 2023 in New York City.
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Despite seeming particularly happy and in love, perhaps the writing was already written on the wall even then. In the past, Jodie has been very celebratory publicly about her love for her estranged husband, even boldly recounting their love story for the books in a 2021 interview with Seth Meyers.
When Jodie and Joshua met, it was while at his birthday party in 2018. Their relationship was hot and heavy from the start, with Jodie openly noting that they began as a "one-night stand." During her 2021 interview with Seth Meyers, she jokingly referred to their love story as a "three-year one-night stand." She shared:
"First of all, I saw him before he saw me and when I saw him, I was like, 'I want that.' And then when he saw me, I just pretended like I didn't see him. He had to yell across the room to me, and I was wearing this T-shirt from a movie called Sorry to Bother You and [actress] Tessa Thompson plays a character called Detroit, and she has this T-shirt that says, 'The Future Is Female Ejaculation.'
"And so, he shouts across the room, 'Detroit!' He comes over and… does this really cute, charming thing that he does and just all night -- he just basically followed me around the party."
The couple were together from that moment forth, and even made things "Instagram official" less than two weeks later while on a dinner date. Joshua would later clarify to Insider that the night they met in 2018 was not a 'one-night stand' or a 'three-year one-night stand' like his then-wife joked but instead, it was "technically a three-night stand."
"It was sealed with a kiss that night and then we didn't leave each other's sides for, well, three years now," Joshua continued at the time.
In a July 2021 interview with Jimmy Fallon, Joshua dropped more details about the why behind getting married. He revealed that he didn't know he wanted to get married to Jodie until "the moment she asked me."
"She asked me on New Year's Eve. We were in Nicaragua. It was very beautiful, incredibly romantic, we were walking down the beach and she asked me to marry her."
He added, "I did not know [she would propose], but she was quite adamant and she was right. This is the best choice I ever made."
Joshua Jackson Reveals Jodie Turner-Smith Proposed To Him
Jodie received quite a bit of flack for proposing to Joshua because it goes against tradition and what society sees as acceptable for a woman to do to a man, and proposing isn't one of them. No matter how much time has passed, the viewpoints around who should do the proposing and who should be proposed to are still very traditional.
After being on the receiving end of such backlash, Joshua would later clarify to the media in a separate interview that it wasn't just Jodie's proposal to him that sealed the deal of them getting married, he proposed to her too. She might have initiated it, but Joshua followed through.
"I accidentally threw my wife under the bus because that story was told quickly and it didn't give the full context and holy Jesus, the internet is racist and misogynist," he explained to Refinery29 that same year. "We were in Nicaragua on a beautiful moonlit night, it could not possibly have been more romantic."
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He continued, "And yes, my wife did propose to me and yes, I did say yes, but what I didn't say in that interview was there was a caveat, which is that I'm still old school enough that I said, 'This is a yes, but you have to give me the opportunity [to do it too].'"
"She has a biological father and a stepdad, who's the man who raised her. [I said], 'You have to give me the opportunity to ask both of those men for your hand in marriage.' And then, 'I would like the opportunity to re-propose to you and do it the old-fashioned way down on bended knee.' So, that's actually how the story ended up."
Joshua and Jodie would eventually marry in December 2019. Shortly thereafter, Jodie gave birth to the couple's first child, Janie, in 2020.
In a recent interview with Elle UK, Jodie shared the ways becoming a mother to Juno helped to heal her of her wounds from colorism she experienced in the past. "It's interesting because I had a lot of resistance to becoming a mother and, throughout my life, I always said if I were to have children, I wanted to have Black, Black babies so that I could affirm them as children with the love that I felt I needed to have been affirmed with by the outside world," Jodie shared with the outlet.
She continued, "Then I fell in love with my husband and we talked about having kids. I did have this mini pause, where I was like, 'She's going to be walking through the world not only having an experience that I did not have, but looking like people that, in a way, I'd always felt a little bit tormented by.' Now that I've got this little, tiny, light-skinned boss, I feel like it’s the universe teaching me lessons. I've been given a daughter who looks this way to heal my own conversations around colorism."
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