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Extraction, The Series with Terrah Bennett Smith and Shelley Robertson
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Aug 26, 2020
On this episode of Caren Glasser LIVE! meet Terrah Bennett Smith and Shelley Robertson, newly empty-nester moms, who are reinventing themselves. We go behind the scenes with the co-directors of Extraction, a Mission Impossible Meets Desperate Housewives web TV show about four mature imperfect Black Women on a quest to dismantle a ring of abusive men. Their quest is an irreverent, funny, action-oriented, and emotional journey ... which hovers over their individual need to extract the darkness from their own lives and past. Check out more shows here: http://www.carenglasser.live. Follow us on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/carenglasser Follow us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/carenglasserlive Follow us on Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/carenglasser Visit The Super Boomer Lifestyle store: https://thesuperboomerlifestyle.com/ #carenglasserlive #Extraction #terrahbennettsmith #Shelleyrobertson My Direct Links, Programs and Equipment I use for my Shows and Promotion: BeLive: http://bit.ly/3p7E0DB Get Your Book In Front Of Thousands of Potential Buyers! https://bit.ly/2HJ38Qu Logitech HD Pro Webcam: https://amzn.to/362BuXP Wired Earbuds with Microphone: http://amzn.to/3p1pmOi Lavalier Lapel Microphone: http://amzn.to/3p9EFVo
View Video Transcript
0:00
hello everyone karen glassy here and welcome to the show i welcome guests from all across the
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globe who entertain wow and excite us and today is no exception
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my guests are the co-directors and stars of extraction the series tara bennett smith and shelly robertson so whether
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you're here live or on replay make sure you say hi in the comments and we'll comment right
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back so a little bit of an introduction about our guests tara is a native new yorker and has enjoyed a rich and multi-faceted career
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in the entertainment industry having worked as a director producer actress singer songwriter and
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screenwriter she recently returned to her first love acting and singing and is currently scheduled to star in a
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new television series my suite life and is recurring on the umc series stuck
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with you tara is tara is also the founder and ceo of royal one entertainment a management and
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production company and serves as network production supervisor for gwen studios and my favorite her claim to
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fame is being the proud mother of three exceptional young adults shelley
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her television credits are extensive and most recently include guest starring on swat the rookie this
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is us and lucifer to name a few by the way i love lucifer she can also be seen on apple
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tv's the morning show he received an la weekly nomination for
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best actress for joe lewis blues and an naacp theater award
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nomination for long time since yesterday with a great run at the national black theater festival
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in north carolina and again my favorite thing is watching her two kids pursue their
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artistic passions is the wind beneath her wings welcome to the show
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hi thank you thanks for having us oh i am so excited that you're here and
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truly i the best part of what who you guys are is how much you love your kids and i i totally resonate with that
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i i am i'm so excited that you're here so guys if you're on live or in replay regardless of whatever
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it is make sure you say hello and if you're just tuning in we are talking with tara bennett smith and shelly robertson
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so let's jump right in you guys are the co-directors of the new show extraction series so
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what the heck is extraction the series what is it about well i'll let shelley take that who's
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the creator and writer of it so shelley i think shelby just dropped out so we're gonna have you go ahead first
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well i'll talk a little bit about it uh we were brought together by a friend of ours nikki crawford who wanted to do
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some projects and shelly had this idea for this series about four women who uh
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well three of us who are abstract we're looking to extract uh i'm trying to put it the best way
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without giving away everything to extract um women out of situations or
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people out of six situations of abuse and what we end up finding out is that we end up extracting
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our own demons and looking within to find our own dark demons because we all have demons
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and um it's oh there she is okay she is uh one of the things that i when
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in your description of the show you make a point of saying it's mission impossible meets desperate housewives
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i love that shelly can you hear us i can't i can't can you hear me so we
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just yeah we're starting to talk about the show and what it was and i know that tara wanted you to jump right in and
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talk about the show itself um you should talk about the show itself
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uh extraction it's extraction is really i don't know what tara told you but um
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it's about a lot of things you know the underlying theme obviously is um uh about
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uh domestic abuse and what of what women can go through but it's primarily a very
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character-driven um drama with comedy um and some of the
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comedy is is is broad but so it's a it'll be interesting to see how the audience takes to that especially because the
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subject is so serious and so it's really about these characters and how they decide they've come from
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um some really interesting and heavy lives and they come together
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to kind of conquer the world and and destroy all these people that are taking
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advantage and abusing these women um and they do it in a very it's very farcical
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um it's very irreverent um it's funny it's emotional it's a little bit of
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everything so they can't really fit into a particular genre and so
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what i like about how shelley wrote it yeah well yes what i what i love about how shelley
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wrote is she told the stories from various she told stories from various sides from the sides of a male too because they're men
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who are dealing with issues as well you know who you know it's it's touched upon so it's not just
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women it's it's people in general who are dealing with you know a lot sometimes abuse or being in abusive situations and how
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sometimes the abuse feeds itself you know down the line those who've been abused to enter abuse
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and so i i'm also very excited to see how um how it's taken and and how people uh
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gravitate towards it in that way because like you said abuse is a very serious subject right
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um and i'm fascinated by the fact that that um you guys have
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collaborated together that's a really big part of what this is all about not just with you as the actresses and
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and the talent but your kids are involved as well um let's talk a little bit about that let's talk about uh the collaboration
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women working with women i i don't know about you but we hear horror stories i hear horror stories how women can't work
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with women you know we're the worst to each other but clearly that's not the case you guys
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um are collaborating with each other you're working with each other how is that experience been
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you know i think anybody collaboration is challenging i don't care who you are i don't care if you're doing it with
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family i don't care if you're doing it with your mate collaboration can be challenging and especially creative
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collaboration i think women kind of get um a a bad rap but you know you know the the men
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have a hard time with collaborating in partnerships as well so i you know i won't claim that you know you know we
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we've had this like heaven on earth experience tara and i have worked really really well together
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you know we we kind of have and maybe it's because we we too were the mothers right you know
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so we we understood and understand how you know no means really nothing um
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how you know you you know you you go to bed when you're done and you get up when you need to
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um there's certain things that come with producing a project that i think um really you know that correlate
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with producing chipping apparently yes absolutely it's like it's like you got to do
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there's no it has a butts about it you know so and i and like you're saying shelly i think
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and karen i think the thing about being a mother especially mother multiples you know not just one child
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right and one child is fun you know but when you add that two in the equation my friends who first had their first
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child and they're like oh they're so much fun girl when they have to put when they had to pull two car seats out the car
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the game it was a game changer this is so much work and i got to carry two car seats so
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it i think the thing is that when you're a parent you you remove the like you were saying
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shall you move the no and i can't get this done to how do i get this i
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have to get it done and the stopping of it and so it no longer becomes a personal thing
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it's technically business we we get down to business and as a parent you get down to business
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and if these kids need to eat what do i need to do to make sure they can eat today or if they need to get
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here and i need to get there what do i need so it's no it's not about a personal thing it's about this is my business is running this
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household with these children partner or no partner you are a mom you are a multitasker
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and you will have to do 50 things at once and so you're wired that way we're wired when we're
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pregnant that we're not going to get any sleep it happened exactly and you're not just acting in this in the show you are
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co-directing this this and co and producers on it and wrote it um and and like you know at
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the fifth hour we've raised i mean i hate to say it but i love to say i'll keep it to saw him like my son
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showed up and we needed guys to lift the furniture and they you know helped with the truck and lifting the furniture then shelley's
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daughter showed up she was the first state gee phenomenal she's a little tiny petite little thing and she had me scared she
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had me scared some days because he wasn't playing and then when we had we had some challenges getting
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the music finished she's like let me check with my son he did the music he took the music over and then
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recently we went we needed another another edit on the trailer and then my son was like i'll give you an
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edit on the trailer so five hours he put together an edit on a trailer we're gonna show that trailer in just a
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little bit no you're not showing his trailer you're showing the first one yeah we have two but anyway i'm just
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saying all that to say is that part of our conditioning as parents
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helping to be guiding and and being parents that were very that were very nurturing plus guiding
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plus allowing our kids and following their creativity and helping them to uh
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broaden and enhance that paper it kind of paid for us back to us in the end when we needed them
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memory producing two these are memories that you couldn't possibly make in any other way so you
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are creating these lasting memories with your kids with the show itself
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um and i think that that to me is is very very very powerful very powerful
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what what made you do this particular show did you just wake up one day and said i
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think we're going to do a show about five four black women who are going to talk about abuse and this is what we're going to do
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what made you decide to do this actually um when we when the
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at the time it was five of us when we all sat around the table and we're deciding okay what is what is it
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that we want to do um you know it was okay well why don't you i i said i let's do a web series and
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primarily because i had already begun one it was an action but i had already begun one and so i thought okay well let's do
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this and then i thought well okay well i i wrote it i just come off of a project that uh i needed that that didn't fuel
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me and so i thought okay well you know i'll write it and i had had an idea based off of
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an old childhood friend that um uh that part of what she does
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part of her passion is um helping women get out of abusive
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relationships and i have been watching her journey for years
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on on on social media and you know and you just you know watching you know
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her talk about okay you know i forget what she calls it but it's like you know another butterfly wants to
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leave the nest and so around what we have to just it's just watching her it just inspired me
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and um so i decided to to write that and now when i wrote it um
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i had already written something else and my daughter is a writer so she's a great first ad but she's a
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writer and she's a great writer and so i gave it to her to read
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and she loved the other one and so we when we came together again we ended
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up reading them both and the ladies loved the other one too as well as wow um so i then i incorporated them
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both into one um and so that's kind of how it you know how it came to be i'd like to
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play the trailer i'd like people to see what this is all about i'm gonna pop the show right into our uh screen that we're in right now um
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and let's take a watch
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what happened happened i have to live with that it's time doc time for me to open my
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eyes and you want to know something else i'm horny doc
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i've highlighted some of the patients from the files that you just recently downloaded so we need to be ready for them
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[Music] let's review this file [ __ ] we are not [ __ ]
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damn it oh hell no we're closed what are you doing here dwp baby dwp it's not a coffee shop
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well then what can i get there it's bigger than we thought doctors politicians crazy [ __ ] she's not a
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[ __ ] i think you should just get over get over it only half of you is black
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the other half cracks i hate these [ __ ]
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well i i chuckle every time i see that i think we lost shelley she'll be back i
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chuckle every time we see that i watched it over and over and over again especially the the phrase we're not [ __ ]
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i i love that because again going back to the whole
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woman thing you know we we tend to be called [ __ ] you know when when we're assertive and doing what
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we're doing and i think shelley is going to join us in a second and she's back
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my dearest friends she oh am i muted still no you're good you're good okay um
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she that's one is she that's her word [ __ ] that she loves to call people [ __ ] and and
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so with her you don't even she's been doing this for a hundred years yeah [ __ ] that's my [ __ ] so that's her
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thing so it's kind of me when i when i was talking to her the other day i started laughing i was like that's renee's
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character for sure you know um but you wanted to ask shelly about it about the term about her
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carol no i'm just i i was saying that i i really enjoyed the trailer it made me chuckle i watched it multiple times as i was
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getting ready for the show and i just love the whole idea that you know we call each other they we're not [ __ ] and
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and that is that is several times in that trailer is is the word comes up and and it's how as how as women
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sometimes we are perceived maybe not just sometimes uh but as assertive and and aggressive
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and all that other we must be a [ __ ] um but then of course it's not it's not always a negative
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it's almost it can almost be endearing right yeah yeah yeah yeah but my girlfriend is
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definitely here yeah that's how that's how uh renee means it
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at the same time um at the same time she doesn't because when she's you know you know she
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she's she's calling everybody a [ __ ] you know the people that she like the people she doesn't so it's it's um
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um it's interesting because i know people that you utilize that word
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a lot too but every time i hear it at me it affects me and not in a good way
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right right i agree i agree and when i hear it i hear it negatively even though i know
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that sometimes it is not said as a negative but i hear it negative and i don't know i
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don't know why that is exactly but definitely if you're just tuning in guys we're lis we are talking with
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tara bennett smith and shelly robertson about their new web tv series that is going to be
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launching and coming live on friday we'll talk a little bit about that in a second um so the next question i really want to
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ask you guys is why do you do what you do why did why did you become actors and actresses and
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why did you decide to sing and why did you decide to become a director and a producer why do you do what you do tara you want
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to go first yeah you know mine i think mine was
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kind of a trajectory of following just because my mother wanted to keep us busy am i is it am i the only one here you
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are the only one there oh oh okay i thought everyone went away um one of the reasons was growing up in
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new york we were always involved in the arts as a way to keep us busy and off the streets so one thing kind of followed
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the other you know you went from just doing it because it was important to keep you busy then
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you do it because you start to oh i really love this then you do it because you move from
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just doing small theater to television that become exciting then it's a career then for me the
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career became i love acting and singing but i also want to kind of feel like what is behind
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behind the camera and my behind the camera happened because i wanted a little more control over my life
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yeah and not to have to be at the mercy of whenever other producers decide that i am or am
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not right for something and um and it changed who i became as a person
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and as an artist because when i was busy working on my own things when i walked into the room there was no longer this
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care whether you i care of course whether you hire me or not but i come in with a different energy because i knew that i had other things
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to do kind of like when you become a parent you know your your priorities shift a little bit
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and yeah i can stay here for this audition but not if my kids are really hungry and you're taking your time i got to go deal
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with them so it's kind of it became the same thing as far as um and then i can do projects that
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matter to me projects i like to do projects with a purpose that's what i call it you know projects that have a purpose
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that um whether it's just to make you laugh but within that very commercial comedy there's a message love that you
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know and roles that i can play that are not just whatever they give me half the time and
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sometimes they're great and sometimes they're not sometimes because i need some more money and sometimes it's just because well i
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haven't worked in a while this would be nice for the resume but that's life some you know
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sometimes it's great sometimes it's it's not as great as as the other time shelley why do you do
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what you do why do i do what i do i um
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you know my family actually i come from a performing family my father's my father all his
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brothers all my gran my grandmother my great aunts my aunts they all sang they all performed um it was you
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know it might be in church every sunday and then choir rehearsal twice a week and then but it was you know was
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i come from a very performing family they all they had gospel uh gospel groups and they went on tour
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when they were younger before i was born and so it was definitely in the blood but i wasn't really raised
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to think that i could do that that it was viable so you know i went to college i went to to emory university in atlanta i got a
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degree in political science i was working in um state government and um
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and uh i was working in city government in atlanta georgia and decided to do some
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modeling because i thought i could make some extra money and i was working on my master's degree at georgia state
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in public administration yeah and i ended up getting an agent that i didn't know
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was really a television and film agent and he started sending me out and i was booking my
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first job was like in the heath of the night with carol o'connor and harold rollins and i mean i just started booking and really union
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work union jobs georgia atlanta wasn't what it is now you know
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i was uh i was a big fish in a little pond when i decided to um to do to you know i eventually was
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making more money at that than i was in my job and so decided you know this is really what i want to do
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so wow yeah so i'm curious i want to ask both of you um do you have a favorite
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role that you were in but that you'd look back and you go that was my favorite thing that i've ever done
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yeah i i actually have a couple but i think mine i have a favorite role and favorite
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experience okay and i think the role this is very was when i did this musical
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in connecticut and it was nothing but it was i got to play tina turner and i realized
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how much we had in common because i didn't even have to study her at all and i just and so that for me
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was the best but i think my favorite favorite time was when was when i
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first did broadway well kimberly says you have done it well shelley you're believing
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him together he can yeah so i would say yeah and yeah and shelly
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has done one police anyway for me i think my first great experience was
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when i first did broadway that was like whoa and then i didn't really like it after
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that because it took up my whole week it's nothing it was just me i just was like you mean i got to do a show
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every day except monday so the idea was cute but the idea wasn't
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cute because i didn't do anything but a show like a good idea at the time and that the actual reality of it not
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not so much what is your favorite thing that you've done your favorite role your favorite thing
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that you've done you know it's interesting that this is my favorite because it was actually also my hardest um my daughter was 10 months old
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um i pretty much you know just got married um so it was in a new marriage with a 10
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month old i was breastfeeding breastfeeding was not the end thing at that time 25 years ago like it
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is now um and i got this gig you know we had just got the word that my husband's father had cancer
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terminal um i got my father had just passed away
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two months prior yes it was a home impressed me i got a baby i got an infant and i got you know a lead in
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um a movie of the week called the ditch diggers daughters starring carl lumbley victoria dillard
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it was right after uh set it off for kimberly elise i was playing the oldest sister kimberly elise was the youngest
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it was monica calhoun it you know it was a it was a cast of these uh you know of really really
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great artists and we were in north carolina for about three weeks doing this and i was
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literally my whole family went i was breastfeeding so there were times on set when i don't know if you breastfeed
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after 12 13 hour day when i would say to them i have to go and at that time
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i'm like i have to go you know what i mean so it was very it was the it was the
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hardest experience but it was an amazing experience because out of it i saw
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how all of it was ever all the everything that i was going through was so necessary for the role i didn't have i
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didn't have to work hard really i didn't have to everything was right you know it was a story about this father
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that had these five daughters and he was a ditch digger and he he he wanted them all to be
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doctors it was a true true story he wanted them all to be doctors and they all so he was hard on them and
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they all became doctors to set me and uh and then the kimberly elise
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character they went ahead with some fascinating story and then he passes away and the story so with
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all this stuff that i was going on that was going on in my life um you know went into this piece
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and um so it was it i still look back on that as uh and granted it was you know was
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the lead so you know and it i've done a lot of guest stars um
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but that was my first lead and it was probably my only lead on television character building it sounds like it was
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character building as well it was amazing it was an amazing experience it truly was
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wow go ahead no i just want to think it's just a testament to you know
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the what when it's the decision to do what you love to do and pieces because sometimes people
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unfortunately i know people have put off having children because they feel like it's just something that they they
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want to wait until something happens with a career something happens with this right and and you you don't have to do
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that yeah will it be a little challenging as life is yes but i think that you know like shelley
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and myself and i'm sure you we found ways to manage and a whole lot of other ones we find ways to manage
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it absolutely you know so that we can continue on with what we're doing and i think it also teaches your
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children something you know it teaches it it services them in a way you know good role
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anyway we become role models and children they can do anything that they want to do if they if
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they just put their um their mind body and soul into it exactly
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exactly we've been talking about um the show that that's gonna go live on friday i want to put it
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up into the um the screen it premieres on friday at 6 00 p.m
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that's pacific standard time guys yes it is so um as as you're watching
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whether it is live or replay you're going to notice a link that just populated over in the
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comments all you have to do is click on that and it'll take you over to the show where you can watch it on friday and i'm
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going to go back out um and i want to let people know how they can get in touch with you guys and
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so i'm going to be giving some instagram and some facebook and twitter twitter things out so first for
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extraction for those who would like to and i encourage you to do this go check out
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the extraction the series on the instagram uh go check out on facebook again the
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link is sitting right in the comments right now extraction the series and i know you want to get to
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know our wonderful wonderful talent and so i'm going to go ahead and show you how to get in touch
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with uh shelly over on instagram i am shelley robertson um and on facebook you can also find her
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there at shelly robertson just type in her name and finally on twitter if you happen to
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be tweeters you can go over to our shell ray and find her there and tara not to forget you we
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love you we have instagram for you so go follow tara on instagram the tara bennett smith
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and on facebook at tara bennett smith and finally on twitter at tara
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b smith i like to say you guys are everywhere you are everywhere
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it was a good place to be everywhere any 11 minute thoughts you want to share with our audience before we say goodbye
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we they know where to go they know how to go find the movie i encourage everyone to be watching i'm
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going to be watching i hope that all of our viewers would be watching any last minute thoughts
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uh my last minute's thought is thank you again for having us and we really you know as women we would
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really just as people in general but we really would appreciate your support and you know to support us and go out
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there and share and the message in the series the series is great it's it's it looks beautiful uh and we
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could use all the support that you are willing to offer share the page and share with your friends and
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it's also on youtube right it's also going to yeah it'll be on youtube yes well i don't have that link here
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where he's on youtube as well okay and i don't want that link here so after the show we'll grab that link and i'll put that in the comments as well so people
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can go watch it there as well if that's where they choose to go play um shelly any last-minute thoughts you
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know again like tara said thank you so much karen thank you everybody that everybody that
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supported this project you know for the you know the cast and the crew and you know people that have answered
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late night calls people that have had this on the back people that have given us all kind of advice you know
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it's not it takes a village to um to filmmaking is not easy and it takes a village to really kind of do it and to
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bring something to life and um i you know i hope people are entertained by it i want people to
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remember that part of the the foundation of this project is that nobody's perfect nobody's perfect
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no not not villains not victims not no none of us and so you know uh
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uh there will be times when you're watching this when you know you you're gonna be a little uncomfortable
29:24
and so i i'd appreciate it if you sit in it for a minute
29:29
and um and allow whatever perspective to kind of you know take over you and then share
29:34
that share that with us because we want to know what that is but thank you so much i love that michael says he's looking forward to it
29:41
thank you michael thank you michael we appreciate it michael's got a couple great songs in
29:46
the project oh my goodness yeah that's awesome okay well i definitely will be listening
29:51
for that we want to thank our audience we know that you have a choice as to how you spend your time and you chose to spend it with us today
29:58
and for that we are eternally grateful we'll see you next week on the next karen glasser live have a great day everyone
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