Most people would call her feminine, a women with a soft voice and a gracious, dimpled smile. With her hearty laugh, she lacks the hauteur of the high-profile Hollywood personalities; her politeness is real, not functional. At 37, actress Gabrielle Union has experience on her side – both in wins and defeats – and a sense of what really matters in life. “I’ve always had a large group of girlfriends,” says the actress now co-starring on ABC’s new sci-fi drama FlashForward. “I never knew how lucky I was until I started acting and being on location with no easy access to my friends. I never felt lonelier in my life. I hold a mirror up to myself a lot and I’m constantly asking myself if I’m providing the kind of friendship that I would want to have. Sometimes I have to pull it together and put someone else first. My friends are like my lifeline; they’re the oil and the gas that makes me go and move forward.”
Having emphatically stated that upfront, she continues. “I’ve been banned from playing Monopoly with them because I don’t make side deals. I’m a Scrabble shark, though, but I don’t like to put it out there because people will be nervous to play me. We have regular Taboo game nights where it’s guys against girls, and there’s some actors sprinkled in there.” Dulé Hill (Psyche), Hill Harper (CSI:NY) and others comprise this friendly, yet highly competitive, gathering. “The girls have been routinely kicking their [men’s] tails for years now.”
When it comes to the importance of family and relationships, the aspiring lawyer turned model tells it like it is when it comes to shielding loved ones from tabloid fodder. “What is written in the blogs about me stresses me out. If it’s something I’ve earned and I did it, God bless you, you caught me. But if it’s something that literally never happened, and I know my dad is going to go to work every day and will hear about it, that stresses me out. There’s nothing I can do except to call him and say I didn’t do it. I try to live a good life and put other people first, but there are still those who have to fill this need for gossip and make things up. They forget we’re real people and we have real families with real parents.” That said, Union offers up a few other things that stress her out. “Los Angeles traffic, the health of my family, career. I’m anxious about so many things.”
As she gets dolled up and even prettier – if that’s possible – with hair and makeup people fluttering about, Union’s BlackBerry is a flurry of activity with incoming messages – something that brings a big smile and perhaps a sigh of relief to her face. She admits the recession has hit her friends hard with many unemployed, losing their homes and looking for the light at the end of a dark tunnel. So, has she thought about her own Flash Forward scenario? The TV show, loosely based on the 1999 novel by Canadian writer Robert J. Sawyer, centres on a mysterious event where everyone on Earth simultaneously blacks out for 137 seconds during which they see what their own lives will be like six months in the future: unsettling, to say the least, right? “If it’s something I can address or fix or change, then I would definitely want my own flash forward,” says the Omaha, Neb., native, “but if it’s something that is going to happen anyway, then no. It might be nice to see if I am going to be working or if I’m going to keep my house. Wanting that emotional and financial security knowledge would be all right. But I don’t want a life due date. You would start to live your life based on what you know is going to happen. It would change your goals.”
Two of her main goals: to continue to learn more about living an eco-friendly lifestyle (“My sister and I finally have our showers down to under five minutes”) and to keep competitive by finding challenging work. Unless she is about to stage a one-woman show in her living room, the 5-foot-8 actress admits she is not always the first casting choice. She began her acting career in minor roles in teen flicks like Bring It On, 10 Things I Hate About You and Love & Basketball. Her first leading role came in 2003’s Deliver Us from Eva. The short-lived TV series Night Stalker brought her to the attention of production execs and she has gone on to roles in Ugly Betty, Cadillac Records and Daddy’s Little Girls, to name a few, but she still views the glass ceiling on her roles. “I can go in there and deliver a Meryl Streep audition and they’re like ‘Nah, I just don’t see it.’ Stepping out of the box is not as advantageous to filmmakers as it is for my own emotional and spiritual wellbeing.” As for diversity in female roles, it has gone from competitive auditions to casting battlegrounds. “Well, there just aren’t as many jobs,” begins Union on addressing the lack of roles for black women and other minority actresses. “Where it used to be more race-specific with them saying ‘We want an African-American woman between the ages of 25 and 35’ or an ‘older Asian woman,’ now it’s ‘we want a hot woman – period!’ So now all of us are competing for that
Union credits her competitive edge to her solid high-school athletic background where she played soccer, track and basketball. “If you’re on a team with 15 girls and everyone is clamouring for the starting position, it can get mean-spirited very quickly. My years in sports and on teams prepared me to sort of deal with rejection and prepared me to deal with losing with class and dignity, and not take down other people to elevate myself. Because at the end of the day, when a woman does well, it breeds more opportunities for other women.” Indeed, sophistication and class are evident in the way she projects herself on the small and big screen, at red carpet events and in person. She evokes a serene balance and grounded feeling that is often not on display in Hollywood, where long, blond hair, miniskirts and size zero are common. Union does stand out and insists she would never want to be anything but her size six. “I do like to be a size 28 jean, but there are times I’m a 30 and there are times I’m a 27, so I try not to obsess about weight. People can see any extra weight on me now because of high-definition cameras, so it does make me a little more... I would say honest, but honest for me is enjoying life. Sometimes that involves a great bottle of wine, cheese and bread and sometimes that involves 1,300 calories a day.” Nutritional staples include rice drink instead of whole milk, granola, organic fruits and vegetables and “I have to be honest again, real butter and ground beef. I refuse to give them up.” Another thing she refuses to give up: “Red Lobster and Chili’s. People would be surprised to know that I like chain restaurants. Not everyone in Hollywood eats at Mr. Chow and other expensive, fancy places.”
The actress and Neutrogena spokesperson finds comfort in eating at home with her four dogs and friends and is more at ease in neutral-toned clothing, jeans and boots instead of flashy clothing and vibrant colours. Except when she’s in Miami that is. “In that case, every day is Easter and there’s never a time when there’s too much colour.” So what does this talented woman do to ensure her overall health and longevity? “I work out,” she laughs. “If I have work troubles, guy troubles, friend troubles, I work out and tend to up the cardio a little bit to literally just try to sweat out the stress. There will be times I’ll be crying on the elliptical, but I keep on going. By the time I’m done, it’s like I’ve exercised those demons and I’m ready to deal with things.”
Union also takes comfort in reading. And if you’re thinking the latest bestsellers, think again. This down-to-earth gal is a lesson in contradictions, shying away from the next big screen adaptable novel. “Bookstores are my sanctuary,” she says. “I think people get a little shocked because I’m in there so much.” In fact, Union bought 10 titles to get her through the summer. “I went back in a few months later, and they asked if the books I purchased were gifts. I said, they are for me and they’re gifts for my soul.” The written word has been a big part of her life ever since she was five years old when her mother gave young Gabrielle and her sister library cards. “It was a treat that we got to go to the library and then to Coco’s afterwards. So it was an event like when kids go to the movies now. Going to the library was huge and learning how to take care of books and respect them was huge. It’s stayed with me.”
Other memories also linger. Looking at Union’s well-toned body, with curves in all the right places, and her beaming smile it doesn’t seem like she has experienced a nanosecond of personal turmoil. Unfortunately, this is not the case. As a 19-year-old working in retail, she was raped during a robbery. Although her assailant was caught and is serving 33 years for his crime, the incident has guided Union to use her celebrity for good. She is now the global ambassador for the Susan G. Komen For The Cure organization and speaks out for the need for rape crisis centres. With the economic downturn and social outreach programs being cut every day, Union took to the floor of the U.S. Senate in June stressing the need to continue funding for these centres. “Honestly, every time I speak about it, I want to vomit,” she admits. “It really sucks that I still have to keep doing this, that this need is so great and because we don’t have more people who come forward, which I understand, but I feel personally like it’s my responsibility to be the face. What’s hard is recounting the worst part of my life in front of strangers. I will continue to tell my story so people understand that this is not a nameless, faceless crime – it can be your mother, your sister, your neighbour. Being a good person and giving a damn is recession-proof. It’s emotionally wrenching for me every single time, but I want to show victims that I care.” Through therapy, Union has learned how to cope with that part of her life, and even now goes in for a mental checkup. “It’s like a car. If you want it to run smoothly, you have to go in for maintenance. You have to move forward in life.”
And she does – with her trademark smile which some might be surprised to know comes after many years of corrective braces. “I love my smile,” Union says of her favourite asset, “I think because I had extreme buckteeth, like can’t close your mouth buckteeth. When I got braces, I had the head gear, neck gear, rubber bands, braces… the whole thing. After being tormented with those teeth, I got my braces off at 14 and ever since then I’ve been smiling.” On the flip side, Union says her biggest flaw is like so many other women. “We stare in the mirror and look at cellulite!” she declares with a hearty laugh. “There’s not a lot we can do to ever get rid of it, but I’ve found the more cardio I do and the more water I drink, helps. Water also helps with my hair, skin, lips and nails, but if you don’t want to do it for those reasons, do it for your butt.”
Previously married, and more recently linked with Miami Heat guard Dwayne Wade, Union states she is now madly in love. “I am madly in love with myself,” she says coyly of her current love life. “I realized when I was married that if you don’t love yourself, it is impossible to love someone else. If you don’t have that self-love and that self-realization first, you can’t be a good wife, a good mother. So yes, I’m madly in love with myself for once and it’s opened me up to be able to love others.” And the possibility of marriage again with a family? “I wouldn’t rule it out, but one of my girlfriends said it best: I don’t really feel like there’s anyone missing in my house right now.”
by Bonnie Siegler • Photography by Elisabeth Caren
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