I started acting almost on a whim to help my music career.

I grew up studying music. I went to conservatory.

You don't see a lot of black rock stars. The music industry tends to be segregated stylistically. It's hard for a black artist to cross over to rock music.

As I got further into my career, as a character of color, if I was going to have the types of opportunities I felt I deserved, and continue to have them, I was going to have to start creating those opportunities for myself.

It's funny, because in drama school, my greatest strength was my range. So my early career was like that: I played all kinds of different characters.

'Pigeonholed' isn't the right word, because I feel like I've had a very wide range of characters that I've been allowed to play.