You’re never too old to be a cover girl and Cicely Tyson is proving that with her placement on the front of Elle magazine‘s November 2017 issue. At 92, Tyson is one of eight women to cover the mag’s “Women in Hollywood” issue, in which she discusses the women who’ve influenced her career over the past six decades.
“At the very beginning of my career, I had a teacher whose name was Vinnette Carroll,” the iconic actress explained. “She directed a number of Broadway shows. She kept saying to me, ‘You know the problem with beautiful women? They tend to rely on their beauty.’ And I said, How wrong she is! I never think of myself as being beautiful. I thought, What are you talking about? I work so hard. And I did. But I learned from her how important it is to learn your craft. When all else fails, you will land on that, and that alone.”
Tessa Thompson is the second Black woman featured on a cover. The 34-year-old multi-ethnic actress spoke about her desire to break stereotypes as a woman of Afro-Panamanian, European, and Mexican descent.
“I think our ideas about what a young black person or a young Mexican person or a young white person should be like weren’t as expansive then as they are now,” she said. “It made me think I had to fit into a box. The one-dimensional girlfriend or the sassy black friend—those weren’t going to work for me.”
Elle’s Women in Hollywood issue hits newsstands October 17. Other cover ladies include Jennifer Lawrence, Laura Dern, Jessica Chastain, Margot Robbie, Riley Keough, and Kathleen Kennedy.
