Samira Wiley on horrifying moment she was outed by Orange Is the New Black castmate
Samira Wiley visits the Build Series to discuss The Handmaid’s Tale. (Gary Gershoff/Getty)
Samira Wiley has opened up about what it was like to be outed by one of her Orange Is the New Black castmates.
The actress, who rose to fame playing Poussey Washington on the hit Netflix show, wasn’t publicly out when the first season was airing – which is why it hit so hard when one of her castmates said she was gay in an interview.
In an interview with The Guardian, Wiley said she “burst into tears” the second she saw the interview.
“My publicist got it off the internet in 30 minutes, but what’s 30 minutes on the internet? A lifetime,” Wiley said.
“Obviously, no one cared. Everyone already assumed it.”
The experience was upsetting for Wiley because it stopped her from coming out on her own terms.
“It was mine. It’s not yours to give someone. I felt like they took something from me,” she said.
Samira Wiley’s wife convinced her to join The Handmaid’s Tale
Elsewhere in the interview, Wiley revealed she was worried about being typecast if she took on a gay role in The Handmaid’s Tale.
In the end, her wife Lauren Morelli convinced her that she should play Moira on the hit Hulu series.
Samira Wiley speaks onstage at the 2019 Glamour Women Of The Year Awards at Alice Tully Hall on November 11, 2019. (Bryan Bedder/Getty)
“I was like, we’ve seen me do this, I know I can do this, I want to do something else,” Wiley said.
“My wife was like, if you do gay for anything, you do gay for this. When I think about it now, it’s a little naive to say, I don’t want to play gay, because that’s the heteronormative idea that we’re all the same.
I wouldn’t have been able to see that ever, when I was a kid.
“Moira is a completely different, fully realised person to Poussey. For me, how powerful is it, to have a Black gay woman portray an actual Black gay woman on TV?
“I wouldn’t have been able to see that ever, when I was a kid.”
Wiley first opened up about being outed by a castmate on the WNYC Nancy podcast in 2018.
“That’s something that somebody took from me, you know?” she said at the time.
“You should be able to come out on your own terms, so that was probably a little deeper.”
