Best Of: Colman Domingo / Writer Leïla Slimani

Murder, robbery, assault, all-down in big cities and small towns.

“We're going to dig into the numbers and unpack whether this is really as simple as the President claims it is.”

On the MPR Politics podcast, listen on the MPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. W-H-Y-Y in Philadelphia, this is Fresh Air Weekend, I'm Tanya Mosley in Los Angeles. Today, Coleman Domingo, he's nominated for two Emmy Awards this year for two very different roles in the Netflix comedy, the Four Seasons, and in the final season of HBO's Euphoria. Also, we hear from French Moroccan writer Layla Slymanee. She writes from her dual perspective, as biracial, with members of her family representing the countries of the colonized and the colonizer.

Plus, Rock-Critic Kindtucker looks back at the soundtrack of the 1976 film Sparkle sung by A Reath of Franklin. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend.

For the first time, a U.S. government debt has surpassed $40 trillion, a massive number that affects your bottom line.

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“Go inside the stories from then that shape the world we live in now.”

Find NPR's through line wherever you get your podcasts. This is Fresh Air Weekend, I'm Tonya Mosley. My guest today, Coleman Domingo, is nominated for two Emmy Awards this year, for two very different performances. In the Netflix comedy The Four Seasons, he plays Danny, one half of a long married couple who vacation each year with their oldest friends.

Danny is funny, vain, and peckably dressed, and now in his fifties, confronting a question he thought he'd settled long ago, whether he wants to become a father. And in the final season of HBO's Euphoria, Domingo returns as Ali, a man in long-term recovery, who has spent the series trying to help Rue, played by Zendaya, stay alive. Domingo won an Emmy for that role in 2022, and this year he's nominated again for

his performance in the series finale. It's the latest chapter and a remarkable stretch for Domingo, whose rise in Hollywood came after decades in the theater. He started in regional productions in San Francisco, then moved to New York where he performed on Broadway, one in Obey, was nominated for a Tony and an Olivier, and wrote and directed his own plays. In his 40s, Hollywood caught up with him, and since then he's had a steady run of roles, an Emmy,

and back to back Oscar nominations for the film Rustin and Sing Sing. Just this year, he played Joe Jackson in the biopic Michael, and had a role in Steven Spielberg's disclosure day, and hosted Saturday Night Live, in just last month, Jimmy Kimmel. Welcome to Jimmy Kimmel Live. I'm your guest host, Coleman Domingo. I'm so happy to be here with all of you. We're going to have some fun this week. Just think of me

as Jimmy, if he had better clothes in Zendaya's phone number. Coleman Domingo, welcome back to fresh air. Thank you so much, Tanya. Appreciate it. That was such a delight to see you on Jimmy Kimmel every summer. He has guest hosts who come in, and you were in the rotation, and you're in the rotation for just about a whole week. Yeah, for a whole week, and it was great. It was like the week of a lifetime. It was so much fun.

And, you know, I love that things are coming to me right now, like opportunities to do things

I've never done before. Like I'm never hosted a late night show, but I love the idea of looking

at myself the way someone else sees me. And if Jimmy thought that I could do it, I thought,

at old Jack Parshow. Oh, you did, you went away. Oh yeah, Johnny Carson. I looked at the greats,

“and I wanted to figure out how did they do it and what was their style and what would my style be?”

Yeah. Well, congratulations on your Emmy nominations, and on being able to host Jimmy Kimmel live. Thank you. The four seasons is such a fun watch. And it's about three couples, old friends who vacation together for decades, and what happens to the group when those marriages start to shift, which happens with everyone's relationship. This season, your character, Danny, he's dealing with several issues within his own marriage. And he and his husband, Claude,

have been talking about having a child. And Claude is, he's basically having second thoughts.

And so I actually want to play a scene. And this scene, Danny has just come from one of those conversations with his partner. And he's confiding in his best friend Kate, played by Tina Fey, while they look at a beach home that is for sale. Let's listen. Okay, six, five, five, ocean lane. Oh, I mean, the wallpapers Midwest funeral home, but the house. If we were smart, we were fired and turned into a bed and breakfast. Oh, I mean, I will retire early and run it,

and then when our husband's died. Claude, watch Facebook, Jack, perforate a rectum from Tumania, and this is our colonoscopies. Yeah, we'll live here together.

“Ah, can we do it now? Claude's pissing me off. Oh, is it because of his bonnet?”

The surrogate asks where it's still interested. But now all of a sudden, Claude thinks that we're too old. Oh, I mean, I get it. No, he's supposed to say you're not too old. And how dare he? I'm sorry, you are very young. You told me who scissor was. Do I know for sure for sure? It wish you do it. No, but I do know we can't keep talking about it.

Why are they never going to do it? Or we're going to come to Tony Randall's who feed our baby

applesauce that we also eat. Okay, if you're really having trouble making a decision, my therapist. No. Has it both? Absolutely not. All the three magic questions. I'll tell you in your sleep. It really helped me decide whether I should do in viseline for a third time. I decided, possibly at a later date. There's nothing to decide. At this point, we just need to push through. Yes, you could push through or you could

seriously consider Claude's concerns. Look, is this right for both of you? Hi, Brenda. We are definitely still interested. What are you doing? I'm pushing through. That was my guest Coleman Domingo in the Netflix series The Four Seasons. Throughout that entire clip, you kept laughing at all the different points. Oh my god, Danny is so acirbic. I'm like, gosh, he's like an altered universe me.

“I think that was in one way. Yeah, I don't know. He's just really”

pointed in funny. He's really a Christian that I really, really love. I love it the way the writers write for him. Did you have a hand in it though? The funny thing is, no, I was saying

the thing that I have a hand in, I will, when I first met with Tina Fey to talk about this character,

because she's the creator. Yes, she's the creator of this. Yeah, she and Langfisher and Traci Wakefield. They wanted to bring together a group of people that they understood. You know, based on the 1981 Allen All the Film. But to really make it modern and fun and warm and make sure that this couple in particular, it's one of the, you know, central couples as well. This couple should feel like a couple that I understand and I knew the thing that I told Tina was,

there's a same sex loving couple that are really in very heteronormative environments. Like these couples are having issues like everyone else, but they're also very spirited and very much who they are. This is an ensemble of comedy veterans. Tina Fey and Will Forte, they came up through SNL as we know Steve Correll through Second City, Carrie Kenny Silver through Reno 911, and that is largely improvised. And you have done some comedy, but you have come from some serious places. You come from

the theater, you know? I did that make for any interesting dynamics on the set. Well, the thing is, when I first got, um, got the invitation to be a part of it, I thought for a second I thought, well, why me? In particular, like I'm not really known for comedy, but I think that what Tina in the rest of the game could tell is that I'm willing and I'm game, but I hadn't relied on those comedic chops in a long time. So to lean into that was something, I felt new and fresh again

for me, especially the slate in my career, where the idea of doing a half-hour comedy was a challenge. Yeah, I wanted to see if I could do it more than anything. You can just imagine, though, being with

You know, you know, it does, but the funny thing is about funny people and I tell you this, they will, and I wonder if they would see this by themselves. They don't naturally laugh when something's funny, because they're like mad scientists. They almost look at the math of it. Oh, they're dissecting it. That's good. I wonder how that happened. You did this, you turned on the slide. You probably won't give a pause, you're the beat. Most comedians, I know, are very serious

“people, and also they're also a bit shy. I think my, I would say this, Tina's very shy. I would say”

Steve Correll's very shy, um, but they know how to get the thing done, um, like mathematicians. They, they, they look at it in that framework, which I think is fascinating. You actually directed an episode. Yeah, this season is season two last season. Lang Fisher, uh, one of the three co-creators of the show said that when you directed, uh, the episode, Ultimate Frisbee, she watched you cry in a scene you were in while directing

another actor through his own tears, going back into that character you were in to keep, to keep crying all while still watching whether the background performer meets his steps. And that seems like an extraordinary amount of work. To hold all I want. It is, and I don't know if everyone's brain is meant for that, but I feel like I have one of those brains. I can manage a lot,

which is why I've always, I've always been a director since I started in the theater,

because I can handle, uh, a lot of Frisbee's up in the air at same time. Where does that come from? I know you're hyper organized. I'm hyper organized, but also maybe that's it. I'm well prepared and planned, so I can be loose and free, but my mind has always been on everything. I think it starts with the way I came to this industry, which was learning by going to rehearsals, I wasn't even in. I would go and sit into rehearsals like when I was 21 years old in San Francisco,

and I would watch, and I would watch all departments and what was going on. So I had a handle of everything, so I'm never just focused, um, I don't know, solely as an actor or as a writer or a director. I'm looking for whole picture at all times, so I know I can manage that, so I think that

“that's what my brain naturally does. What make you want to do that? I'm thinking about a young”

Coleman, you could just been focused on, I want to act. I want to be on the stage, or I want to write. I want to be a screenplay writer, but for you to say, I'm going to, on my free time, step into someone else's rehearsal and dissect it. I'm just very curious about all of it.

It's always been that way for me, and I think that's just been a very cute,

I was very curious kid, and um, I knew that, listen, I come from a very humble place, I come from West Philadelphia, where you know a lot of blue-collar folks, of course, the first my family to the college, and I knew that my power was in learning and education, and learn as much as you can, and get as much as you can from every, every situation. So you name it, whatever show them on, I can't just go in there just as an actor, I will always end up as a director and a

producer. You name it because I have that interest, not everyone has that, there's some people very singular, and that's also fine. But I know that like when I did the show, free of the walking dead, I started as number nine of a call shade, ended in number two, and a director, and a producer. You know, so for me, even with four seasons, I love the fact that I'm a director in that show, because I feel like I understand it and I can give something to it, you know,

I understand the actors that I'm working with, mostly comedians, who I sort of help usher them to go to the, you know, more dramatic places, and it surprises them where they're able to go, and I love that. I love that, you know, because I know I have that facility to do that and help bring the best out of my cast. Let's take a short break. If you're just joining us, my guest is award-winning actor Coleman Domingo. I'm Tanya Mosley, and this is fresh air weekend.

Fall is right around the corner. That means the midterms. Hey, it's Miles Parks from the Empire Politics podcast. Now is the perfect time to calibrate your news diet for the fall.

Follow our show for short daily episodes that will help you stay ahead of the most important midterms

“storylines that you need to follow. Find the Empire Politics podcast on the Empire app,”

or wherever you get your podcasts. It's hard to refine your taste when everything in your algorithm is vying for your attention. Is that influenced or you follow giving you the right advice? Which should we actually pay attention to in our social media feeds? This week on it's been a minute, culture, critic, and host of the new podcast feedback. I remember it's in the third, takes our hand and shows us the way. Watch the full, it's been a minute episode on YouTube,

or listen in the Empire app, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is fresh air weekend. I'm Tanya Mosley. Let's get back to my conversation with Coleman Domingo. He's up for two

euphoria. He's also been nominated for Back to Back Academy Awards for Rustin and for Sing Sing.

“In 2024, you play Divine G in the film Sing Sing for which you were nominated for an Academy”

Award, and it is about a group of men incarcerated at Sing Sing Prison, who put together a play, and it's based on a real program they're called rehabilitation through the arts. In your company, Edith Productions, which is named after your mother, helped finance and produce this film. What was it that made you say, I've got to go all in. I've got to put my whole self

in it, my money, my time, everything, and act in it. I got this really incredible

opportunity from Greg Quedar and Clint Bentley, the director and producer of Sing Sing. They were putting together something that really, there was no script, and it was just an article, an old article they had about this program. They sent me that and they said, we've been trying to make a film about this program in some way, but not about the program that it should just be about people. And then the idea of inviting former incarcerated men to be a part of it, who went through this

program called rehabilitation through the arts that started in Sing Sing, where you have theater professionals, they come in and they teach the incarcerated men theater games and put them in place.

And they found that doing that, and it was all organized by the inmates. They find by doing that,

it helped these guys get more touch with their feelings, exhibit a bit more empathy, and it became a tool to help them in process while they were on the inside. And then the recidivism rate was less than 6% of those who had come through the program, which I thought was extraordinary. So based on all of that, I thought I would love to be a part of this. Divine G, your character who's a real person, in running this theater program,

it's his entire world. And I want to play a scene where he's at his clemency hearing, because he's at a moment where he's up for potentially being released from prison. And he's trying to explain what the program has meant to him. And one of the commissioners isn't buying it. She wants to know whether she's watching a performance. Let's listen. You've been involved in numerous programs, so it's too long a list for me to go through. But I

do have a question about the theater program. You've been involved in that many years, have you known? Yes, yes ma'am. I am a founding member of this program. It's something I'm very proud of.

“And what part do you play in this program? Actor, director?”

Well, we all do a few things. I'm one, what is called the steering committee. We make a lot of decisions for how it operates. And from time to time I do act, like we all do. And it's been a program that was established to help the population with management skills. And it's turned into something a bit more, I don't know, wonderful, because it helps people get more in touch with the feelings and able to process and actually move through and truly get some rehabilitation.

So are you acting at all during this interview? Absolutely not. I truly hope that you can understand that I've been very sincere.

I know how meaningful this is. I would never actually, that's not the intention of acting.

Acting is just a process. I read about the program. It's a good program. That is my guest Coleman Domingo as Divine G in the film, Sing Sing. Yeah, the clemency officers play by the great Sharon Washington, who is one of my dearest friends. And so I was able to populate the film with just a couple actors who are actually professional actors who can help anchor these moments. And so when this scene comes up, I thought we need that

“voice of someone who is the system. In a particular, I think it was written as sort of a white male.”

And I brought the idea of great queer art, but I'm like, I think it should be a black woman. Because no one knows that a black woman, when she's in a position of authority in a way, she's going to be more system because she's more eyes on her. So she almost had to be a bit more removed and be the system. And I thought that's also a complicated story. That's a story with within a story of the demands put on black women. You know, one of the things also about that

performance that came up for me is like, "Okay, it's you in front of you're having to display yourself in the same way. It's not the same thing, but similar to the audition process,

early in your career, you did this so much. You... Oh, the time. I think I read here

that you were auditioning in your 40s as many as eight times a week. Yeah. Still bartending and you weren't working. And there's one day when you received a phone call where you decided that like, "I'm done." I was exhausted from the output that I've been putting in for years in the industry. And the gains that I've had many, many gains. By the time I went to the West End and London, and I was performing the Scottsboro Boys, and I had an Olivier nomination,

“and I was doing work that I thought was impactful and important. And then I would go back to New York.”

And then I was just like pounding the pavement again, almost like getting roles that I felt like didn't match what I can give. I didn't have a lot of access or real agency. So, and then I had

like countless auditions that were sort of meaningless, or I felt like just going into the void,

no one was seeing my tapes. And I was just like, I was just really exhausted to the point where I just sort of broke down. I was at the gym, and I'm nervous because I just started sobbing. After this one, other huge no. You received a phone call, yes. Yeah, I received a phone call from my agent about, you know, everybody need to, yes. And I was like, well, this is my yes. I had like eight auditions this week. I need a yes. My finances need a yes. My husband needs a yes.

And my soul needs a yes. And literally she called me up and says, said, everyone loved you. Producer loved you. Directors loved you. It was an audition for Boardwork Empire. Boardwork Empire. Boardwork Empire. And it was the play, I made for a day or something. I hoped a show host or something at Chalky's bar. Played by Michael K Williams. But it was a bar. And I thought, well, this, this has to be the one. I can see myself in this world.

This is great. They need a song and dance man. I sang a dance. I wore the Tuxedo in the audition. They all loved me. And then she said, but, but a researcher raised his hand and said, well, you know, all, make sure he's in hosts at that time. We're like, skinned. And it wasn't even about the lightskin part of it. That's not what I was angry about. I literally yelled into the phone. I said, they knew what I looked like before I got there.

And I feel like everyone's acting with me. And people didn't respect the time and energy that an artist put into something. I thought, like, well, this business is going to kill me. It's going to break my heart. And my heart was getting very broken. So I was making steps to leave. And then, my angel, one of my best friends, Daniel Breaker, he says, who's an extraordinary actor in his own right. We started in passing strange together in Broadway. He said, you know,

my manager has been wanting to meet with you for years. I'm like, oh, no, I don't want that anymore. I'm good. I'm good. He said, just think of it. Just meet with them. I was like, fine. And I went to this meeting and I was as begrudging as possible. I have my arms folded. I know it. I was not the effervescent me. I was like, this is what I do. This is what I've done. I could do this. I don't know. You tell me. I said, oh, we loved to work with you. I said, well, okay, well,

how about this? Why don't we give us six months and we'll see if we can go. Within six months, I booked for the Walking Dead and another series. And when I chose for the Walking Dead in that show, gave me a new footing in my career at a steady job on television and gave me some more financial stability, gave me a character that has poem itself into how he came a director on that show and a producer on that show and I had more footing and I had more, um, I had that yes to keep going.

Well, you're definitely in your harvest stage right now and you're so busy. You have so many projects

“and you have so many projects ahead. Do you feel like you're on a rush to get as much done as possible?”

You brought up your age many times during our conversation. You know, I bring up my age to the

result of a lovely marker because I really love being in my 50s and never knew that that would be

the case. That you would love it because we were told. I love it. Yeah, you know what people told me? Oh, you can older whatever. And I feel like it's so cool and it's so good. You know, so I think that I'm not rushing. The funny thing is I feel like, listen, I've told people this and they don't believe it. I said I'm going to do a lot more between now and about I'm saying to I'm just 61 62 and then I'm going to live a bit softer in a way because I feel like I've been building

so much. I think that maybe I'm curious about evolving. So I don't feel like that I'm rushing anything. I feel like if anything right now I'm taking more time and being really, um, I mean very conscious about time with people. Sometimes I have to rethink because I will say yes first

“and then I will have to reset and say, do I really want to do that? That's what you can do when”

you're in your 50s. When you're 50s, you're like, I can do that because I'm fine with myself.

very cool. But she was 60 and she told me that she said, she was taking me around this plantation

act to in Georgia and we're talking about life. And she says, you know, how would he? I said, I'm 15, whatever it was. And she's, oh, she said, you're in your storytelling season. I said, oh yeah, she said, yeah, when you turn about 60, like me, you move into your truth telling season. I said, what's that? She says, what if you don't want to do something, you're just saying, no. I said, just no, she's it. You don't have a qualifier, no, but she doesn't know because not my

responsibility, but when I'm making another person feel, if I say it with love, but I'm honoring

“myself with love and grace, I say no. And that's it. So I think I decided to move into that chapter”

little earlier. So it's now the new 60 is the new 54 and to be in the truth telling season. Well, Coleman Domingo, this has been such a pleasure. Thank you so much. You're so very welcome, Daniel. This has really been wonderful. Thank you. Coleman Domingo is nominated for two Emmys for his performance in euphoria and the four seasons.

Sparkle is a movie from 1976 about a girl group based loosely on the screens.

The film wasn't a huge hit, but it had a devoted cult following. And rock critic Ken Tucker

“says, it's soundtrack is an neglected classic. Arita Franklin sings all of the songs on the album,”

which was written and produced by Curtis Mayfield. Ken thinks it includes some of Franklin's finest performances. And now on its 50th anniversary he offers a fresh appreciation of Sparkle. The movie Sparkle follows the troubles and triumphs of a trio of singers trying to make it in the soul music world of the 1960s. Released in 1976, Sparkle was the film debut of Irene Cara, who'd become a big star four years later in the movie fame. The movie was only a modest success,

and what now seems most impressive about Sparkle are Curtis Mayfield's songs as sung by

“A Reath of Franklin. If you look into your heart with a positive mind, chase after the story of your woman and your”

glory, leave the bad things behind. Everybody's got a story, just to do about a love and a good thing. But for the spices of your life, you have got to be the price, if you're no one to be. Got it after that, I love you, I got to go so dry, and I thought that there was nothing less, I'd do believe I found myself, and I won't get it to you baby. That's looking to your heart, a dreamy ballad powered by a Reath as passionate singing,

as is true of every song here, Franklin is holding nothing back. She's pouring as much of herself into these Curtis Mayfield compositions, as she did in the staggeringly great series of hit singles she made for Atlantic Records in the late 60s. For me, Sparkle's high point is Mayfield's five minute production of "Hooked On Your Love." It begins as a smooth, medium-tempo tune, with a Reath as vocal gliding a top of glittering string section and backup vocals by the Kitty Haywood Singers.

Then, deeper into it, Franklin gives the demonstration of the song's title, how being "hooked" addicted to love becomes an intense craving. A Reath as gospel-rooted passionate shouting turns out to be the perfect way to convey this ecstatic obsession.

ecstatic obsession. A Reath that gives another fantastic performance on the album's first single,

“a moody sexy number called "Something He Can Feel." The song went to number one on the R&B chart,”

but stalled at 28 on the Billboard Pop Chart. The album itself barely cracked the top 20 and only briefly at that. This is what I mean about Sparkle being such an underrated achievement for both Franklin and Mayfield. [Music] As I said earlier, Sparkle wasn't a smash in 1976, but it developed an intense cult following

that has reverberations. I don't think it's a coincidence, for instance, that dream girls a

far bigger success in 1981 bears a striking resemblance to Sparkle. Sparkle was remade in 2012,

“starring Jordan Sparks and Whitney Houston, and was a modest hit. But the collaboration between”

a Reath of Franklin and Curtis Mayfield transcends the movie. It stands on its own as a rich, risk-taking collection that deserves a re-evaluation in 20th century pop music history. Can Tucker look back at the 50th anniversary of the Sparkle soundtrack sung by a Reath of Franklin. Coming up, we hear from French Moroccan novelist Layla Slymanee. She writes from her dual perspective as biracial with members of her family representing the countries of the colonized and the colonizer.

This is Fresh Air Weekend. [Music] This week on sources and methods 260 days at sea. We're learning more about the conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, which President Trump says hasn't been deployed long enough.

I was talking to one retired animal who said, you know, the problem is they didn't plan this.

That and more of the week's big national security news on sources and methods,

“you can listen on the NPR app or wherever you get podcasts. How did we get here?”

That's a question we have been trying to answer a lot here at NPR. We are exploring global histories on throughline, where hearing from national security experts on sources and methods we're watching the markets with planet money. You can support this work across all our podcasts with NPR+. Find out more at plus.npr.org. An executive order from the Trump administration made English the official language of the United States.

Then the administration moved to cut funding for classes that teach it. Do we matter? Do we matter? Listen to NPR's codes which podcasts in the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Tonya Mosley. Terry has our next interview. Here she is. You probably won't recognize the name of my guest, novelist Layles Lee Money,

so I'll start by telling you about her place in the literary world. She won France's highest literary award, The Gone Core Prize. She was the chair of the judges for the International Booker Prize. That's Britain's highest literary award for fiction written in the English language. The International version is for fiction translated into English. When Emmanuel Macron was the French president, he wanted to appoint Slymanee Minister of Culture.

She declined, but accepted the position as is representative to French-speaking countries. Slymanee is Moroccan, but completed her education in France where she continues to live. She's written a trilogy of novels inspired by three generations of her family. Her father served as Morocco's Minister of Economics in the late 70s and became a bank president.

issues of colonial and post-colonial Morocco, like government oppression, women's rights, the tensions between Muslims and Christians, and sexual criminalization. You risk imprisonment if you have sex and your single, gay or lesbian, or engage in adultery. Slymanee wrote a non-fiction book exploring the impact of that law on women's lives, and it figures into her new novel, too. The complete trilogy is now published in English in

the U.S., the final volume her latest book is titled "I'll Take the Fire." Laila Slymanee, welcome to Fresh Air. I'm guessing that you wrote a trilogy based in part in your family because the generations of your family reveal so much about colonialism, race, gender, religion, sexuality, parenthood, siblings. Is that right?

Yes, it is, of course. And I think I decided to write this trilogy also because I've always

“had the feeling that literature was maybe the only way of doing justice to people like”

people from my family, people with a mixed race heritage and with a very complex identity. Because I found it very difficult for me to explain to others who I was. When I was in France, and I was explaining that I was Moroccan, but also French, that I was raised in a very complex and multilingual family. People would not really understand my identity, and it was the same in Morocco where people would look at me as very francophone or very Western. And I was always frustrated

about that. I wanted to do justice to them, and I thought that the only way was to write a novel and to write a trilogy, because I really needed also to understand where all this comes from, and for me all this comes from the relationship between my grandmother, who was French,

and my grandfather, who was Moroccan. In the third novel of the trilogy, the parents believe in

free speech and the rights of women, but they warn their daughters. That's not true here in Morocco.

“You have to be careful about what you say. Don't reveal who's had sex outside of marriage.”

Don't say who's had an abortion, or who's gay, or who isn't a good Muslim. Did you grow up with that contradiction in your family? Did your parents believe in free speech in the rights of women, but also warn you to be on your best behavior outside? Yeah, absolutely. I was raised like this. In my house, in the bubble of my family, we would say whatever we wanted to say, and my parents, they would even encourage us to be free

and to read whatever we wanted to read to watch any kind of movies. There would talk about the quality between men and women. There were not believers, and they would not follow the rules of Islam. There would not do Ramadan or things like this. There would drink alcohol. Some in the bubble of the house, we were very liberal, very free. But at the same time, as you said,

“they would always tell us, but outside, you have to shut up. Outside, you have to be afraid of”

the Islam is, because maybe if you talk about drinking alcohol, they can become violent. So you have to hide everything you are. You have to hide everything you think. And to be really honest, when I was a teenager, I hated my parents for that. I just them very harshly, because I thought that they were hypocrites, and I thought that they were cowards. And you know when I was writing the book, my own son is now 15 years old. And I put

myself in the shoes of my parents. And I thought, yeah, of course, if I was in the same situation, I think I would act the same. My mother was not a coward. She was a mother. So she was in a very difficult situation where claiming and defending what she thought and what she believed in could have very, very dangerous consequences. So now I can understand. And now, of course, I can forgive her and forgive them for that. In the novel, the mother is a kind of collegeist.

In real life, your mother was among the first women doctors, but she was an auto-laring

collegeist. Basically, like a high level ear nose and throat doctor. Exactly. What was she up against as one of the first women doctors? My mother was an excellent doctor. You know when I go, it's very funny because when I go to Morocco and I walk in Rabat with her, she is the most famous

you and your famous there, but here it's me. She's an old woman now, but you can see how much respect people have for her. Because my mother, she would take everyone, every patient, the one who could pay and the one who could not pay. My mother had a very high vision of medicine for her. It was really like a moral duty. I remember as a child, she could stay very, very late to take care of people. And every night, she would come back and tell us, tell us about people, tell us about poverty, about injustice,

“and tell us also about the body, physicality. And I think that's why a body is so important in my work”

because at very young age, I understood that, of course, we are made of our mind, our voice, our values, and all this, and our social class. But first and at the end, we are just a body that is going to suffer and that is going to die. What does she teach you about women's equality? My mother is first of all, she told us at a very young age because I have two sisters. The first thing that she said and that she repeated years after years, after years, was that you have to be independent

financially, never depend on a man. So you have to study study study and you have to find a job

and make your own money and never have as a dream to marry someone who is rich and who is

“going to take care of you. And the second thing is knowledge. My mother always said the first”

weapon of a woman is knowledge. The more book you read, the freer you are. What did you see relating to women's rights in the world outside your home? Oh, horrible things, but even in my home, the first inequality that was absolutely horrible and I suppose it has a link with my job is the DNA quality of reading and writing. A lot of women around me when I was young, they couldn't read or write and they, in a way, I had the feeling when I was six, seven years old and I was

beginning to write my name and to read books and I would see my grandmother and I would see my nanny and women around me who were in the dark and it was difficult for them to understand their

rights. It was difficult for them to travel. So the first thing they were, yeah. And the second thing

was when I was a little bit older, when I was a teenager, I began to understand first that I didn't have exactly the same right as men because when I wanted to do something very often, people would answer to me, no, it's not for women. It's for men. You want to go in a cafe and sit on the terrace, no, it's not for women. If you wear a certain skirt, if you smoke outside, if you dress in a certain way, or put makeup, people will immediately judge you and say, oh, no, that behavior, it's the behavior of a

horror. So just having a body of a woman was giving at that time. I don't know the opportunity for other people to judge you and I was very frustrated about that and then also I witnessed a lot of injustice. Friends of my mother who would be repudiated by their husband, who would

“lost the custody of their children. The situation was very violent. I remember that my mother telling”

me, okay, if you go in front of a judge and you need someone for testimony, a woman would only value the half of a man. If you need two people to testify, you need two men or four women. So I was really outraged by that. That's me. I was only half of a man. So did you follow your parent's advice and not speak out in public against the second class status or the no status of women?

No, I always spoke out and my parents were always very, very afraid that something would happen to

me, but you know it's something that I always found very mysterious and something I'd like to write about the mystery of a freedom. Why, in a family, you have one person sometimes who is a rebel, someone who doesn't accept the norms, who doesn't accept the rules. And I was this kind of a young girl. And when I was maybe seven or eight years old, I had a fight with my father. I did something and he yelled at me and I answered him and he said, you don't answer your father and I said,

nickname for a very long time. My father used to call me Simabush because I was always speaking out

and it was impossible for me to shut up or to sign. And when I was feeling something or when I was really, I had a very strong feeling of injustice and it was something that really destroyed me.

“And that's how I think I began to write because I was always telling my grandmother,”

it's so unfair, it's so unfair. And one day she said, you know, yeah, it's unfair. And life is unfair. And you will see and you will understand. So maybe write about this and maybe you can

resolve what you can try to correct this injustice through writing. One of the things you've written

about through your fiction and through a nonfiction book is the issue of being sexually active in Morocco where sex outside of marriage is illegal and comes along with a prison sentence. I mean, there's really serious consequences. So that means if you're single, if you're having sex outside of your marriage, if you're gay or lesbian, if the police discover you and you're not successful in paying them off or somebody kind of rats you out, you can go to jail. How long has

that law been on the books? Synapse colonization actually it's a law that was written by the French when they arrived in Morocco. Their idea was also to prevent any kind of sexuality between Arabs and French and Europeans. So there was really the desire to separate, to segregate the two

“population. And that's why people would look down at my grandparents because it was very scandalous”

at that time for a white woman to have sexual intercourse with an Arab. So that's why they decided to apply those laws. But then when they left, Moroccan kept the law. But I think that now they use it more to dominate people and when I see the people, it's the poor people. I spoke with a lot of students, 17, 18 years old, who tell you life is difficult, we don't have a lot of money. We don't have a lot of place to go to to have fun. And we don't have a lot of perspectives in terms of job.

But maybe the worst is that we can't even have a girlfriend. We can't go in the street with a girlfriend and taking her hand and kissing her in the street because we know that a cop is going to harass us and ask us for money and things like that. But when you are rich in in Morocco, you can do whatever you want. You have the same kind of sexuality that you have in the West. You can find your way to have abortion because you can pay. You can be homosexual and you can have relationship and big

parties in your house because no one will come into your house to look at what you're doing. So for me, the matter is really, it's a social class matter. You don't have the same sexuality depending on being poor or being rich. Our men frequently punishers at mostly women. No, it's mostly women, mostly women. Sometimes men are punished for homosexuality. Sometimes for adultery, but it's mostly women. Okay. I'm not shocked. Yeah. So growing up where sex was tied to fear

“and danger. What impacted that have on your sense of sexuality?”

For me, I think I had a very dark vision of sexuality. I was always worried. I was incapable of

abandoning myself to sexuality because from the moment I became a woman, my mother always told me about sex in a way that she was telling me about danger. The danger of getting pregnant, the danger of going to jail, the danger of being raped, all the dangers. So for me being a woman was dangerous and I was always afraid. I was always thinking that someone was judging me that I was not a good woman. I was not doing the right thing and I was thinking that for us women, it was

impossible to be innocent. That from the beginning we were guilty, guilty of something, but I couldn't

Yeah, they did, but the souvenir of all I faced and all I experienced because of those fears

“is still here. And I think that even in the West, being a woman is difficult when I arrived in”

France at the age of 18, I had a lot of fantasies about Paris. I thought that it was the city of glamour and city of love and city of freedom where I could do whatever I wanted, but it was not as

glamorous and easy as that because there was men following you in the subway and in the street at

night. So I think also I was very disappointed of discovering that, that my fantasy about the West and my

“fantasy about this world where women were totally free was a fantasy and was not totally true.”

Well, Laila Slima Nia, I want to thank you so much for talking with us. It's been really interesting

and I really appreciate your conversation and your writing. So thank you.

Thank you so much. Thank you. Laila Slima Nia's new novel is called "I'll Take the Fire." She spoke with Terry Gross. Fresh air weekend is produced by Theresa Madden. Fresh air is executive producer, is Sam Bricker. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our engineer this week is Adam Stana-Chevsky. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Philis Meyers, Roberta Shorak,

and Marie Baldenato, Lauren Crenzel, Monique Nazareth, They A Challenger, Susan Yacundee, and Abalman and Nico Gonzalez-Wisler. Our digital media producer is Molly C.V. Nesper. With Terry Gross, I'm Tanya Moosely. How will a historically unpopular president navigate a mid-term election season that may leave him with a lot less power? Stay caught up on the latest news with Trump's term, the podcast,

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