Written By: Jayme Face
You can see Angela Lewis as Aunt Louise Saint on FX’s Snowfall and we caught up with her about that, her other projects, and what advice she would give us!
Photo Credit: Bobby Quillard
upfrontNY: Can you tell us about Snowfalland your character, Aunt Louise Saint?
Angela Lewis: Yeah. So, Snowfall at the beginning of season one it is 1983 and season 2 it is 1984. At the beginning of the series it’s before crack so it’s all about how crack began; how it came to L.A. what happened, the truth of what happened. Season 2, Franklin Saint, who is the main character managed to begin his business as a coke dealer in southern L.A. He owned a recipe which essentially turns cocaine to crack. At the beginning, he is a young kingpin. My character Aunt Louise Saint is a wildcat. She kind of facilitates the beginning of Franklin’s business, she hooks him up to his first buyer. Character wise Aunt Louise Saint is a boss, but nobody knows it. So, we are watching her fight her way up the ladder. She wants Franklin to succeed because he’s her nephew, but also because she wants a piece of that pie. She wants to put herself in a better position in life, she wants life to open up to her in ways that it never has before.
upfrontNY: Snowfall just finished its second season, where do we leave your character, how has she evolved, and where is she going next season?
Angela Lewis: In season one when we met her crack hasn’t started yet so she is not high on crack yet. but people think that she is. I always like to say she’s in a dream differed space. She knows she can be much more than life has given her. We are kind of seeing her in a place almost giving up on life and on herself. Through this new opportunity she sees with Franklin we watch her not only navigate, but help him build the beginning of what hopefully will be an empire. Then in season 2 we see that. So, in the end of season 1 we see her make some power moves. We’re kind of on the cliffs edge to find out whether or not she’s successful or not with these power moves or have they backfired in her face. In the beginning of season 2 she has been relegated to the kitchen. So, she learned the recipe to cook the crack which no one else has at this point or very few people have, at least nobody out side of the Saint business. She learns how to cook crack, but she definitely did not learn in order to be cooking all the time. That’s kind of what her responsibility is and she doesn’t like it. She wants to be a boss and she wants to have more power within the business. By the end of season 2 she has made her value known and I think she is undeniably part of the Saint family business.
upfrontNY: You and your character are obviously very different from each other, but do you have any similarities?
Angela Lewis: Oh, yeah. There are tons of similarities. I think Aunt Louise has some serious drive and she is not about to let anything get in her way. She does not like to be underestimated and disrespected and family is first for her. So, in all of those I think we relate. We might go about things a little differently, but we certainly are triggered and kind of move through life with those three things in common
upfrontNY: Speaking of family your husband is also an actor, have you been able to work together, do give each other tips or do you keep work life and home life separate?
Angela Lewis: We totally help each other all the time. We help each other with auditions, running ideas past each other, proofreading each other’s pitches and emails. We actually met doing a play. He was in the play and I had gone to see the play. We knew each other in passing in New York. We got a play together and that’s how we got to know each other. And as much as we do like to keep home and work separate, it definitely blurs over. We would love to do something together. As a matter of fact, we have a few projects that we’re working on; eventually we’ll make our on-screen debut together.
upfrontNY: Speaking of you having lived in New York what is something about it that you miss?
Angela Lewis: Yeah, of course, I was in New York for 13 years and loved every minute of it. Even when I hated it I loved it. I miss the energy of New York. It was always such a balancing of moods. Being in New York I was definitely a struggling artist and so if you walk outside of your house in New York you’re going to spend 50 dollars easily. So, there were many days when I was like I am just going to stay inside, but if you stay inside you are cut off from all of the life that is happening outside. Then you get depressed and literally as soon as you walk outside your door there is just a resurgence. This is what is happening! Life is happening! You walk outside your stoop and it just sucks you into the current of life and motivation. You are just rejuvenated. That is part of the wonder that is New York. I have a lot of friends in New York. I miss my friends.
upfrontNY: You’ve always known you wanted to be a performer, but if you couldn’t be what job do you think you would have?
Angela Lewis: That’s a hard one. I guess maybe a teacher. I think ultimately I am a teacher at heart. I’ve learned a lot and I think of myself as a lifelong student. As I’m learning I’d like to pass on the information to others because if I can help someone move onto avoid some of the pitfalls and snags that I went through. I am happy to share. Just out of school I was teaching, I taught dance. I started teaching dance when I was fifteen. I would teach on the weekends and summer programs. Then when I got to college I would teach drama in summer programs and in after school programs. Then my first job in New York was teaching. So, I would probably be teaching.
upfrontNY: So, what is one of those pitfalls you would teach someone to avoid?
Angela Lewis: So many. I would say the overarching lesson is to trust your gut. If it doesn’t feel right, it’s not right. You don’t have to do everything for the experience because there are a lot of people out there who mean well, but just because they mean well it doesn’t mean it’s the right project for you. If it feels like this is not going to be the quality that I would like to keep for myself and my career, then don’t do it. Sometimes especially when you first get to New York you just want to work, you just want to be in something, but then that something that you are in is something that you don’t want to share with anybody. If you wouldn’t want anyone to see it, but you knew that when you went in for the audition and it feels like it’s not going to be good and you feel bad then you shouldn’t do it. So, yeah trust your gut.
upfrontNY: You’re on an amazing television show, what television show from the past would you love to have been able to be a part of?
Angela Lewis: Girlfriends comes to mind. I would have loved to have been on Girlfriends so bad. I think probably A Different World. I wish I was old enough to have been on that show. That show was everything. I’m sure there are many more.
upfrontNY: You are also involved in several charities; can you tell us more about your work with that?
Angela Lewis: Yeah. There’s an organization called Black and Missing. Right now, I am a financial donor. I just feel strongly that people of color are not looked after in the same way as others. So, it’s important for me to do whatever I can to aid this particular organization with resources so when people of color do go missing, and we do at alarming rates, that even if our pictures are not posted and our names are not said on the evening news and other well-known places we can still be found. We can still be rescued because our lives are just as important.
upfrontNY: Do you have any other upcoming projects?
Angela Lewis: Yeah! I have a short film that’s out doing the festival circuit. It’s called Let Them Die Like Lovers. You can actually stream it on Lush Streaming. It’s a Sci- Fi thriller and I would love for more people to see it and check it out. It’s written and directed my Jesse Atlas who has an amazing brain. I’m hoping we can get this made into a feature. The more people who see it and look for it hopefully it can get some funding and we can go ahead and do it. It was just at the Urban World Film Festival.
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