We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Flora Sofia a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Flora, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

The most meaningful project of my acting career has been a play I performed: Another Kind of You. 

In 2017 I enrolled in acting training with the Foley Marra Casting. Early in the course we were told we would have to present a project at the end of the semester. We learned, honed in, and trained in a set of skills from July through October. From that point until mid-December, we focused on getting the final project finalized, produced, and ready to show on stage.

The project was a collaborative play, co-written by the students enrolled in that semester, and scripted in a way that each actor would deliver a specific set of lines. In the process of writing the play, I was introduced to Joseph Campbell’s body of work. More specifically The Power of the Myth and The Hero’s Journey. This material impacted my life in such a way that I was able to understand my life story in a different light. It also empowered me to reframe certain situations and specific people’s participation. As a result, I developed a newfound ability to let go, heal, and forgive. 

The cathartic experience made a dramatic difference in my trust in my acting skills, and it has also produced long-lasting effects on my personal life.

In mid-December of 2017 I had my stage debut in Hollywood, at a small theater, where I played myself in Another Kind of You, directed by Chuck Marra and Megan Foley Marra. It was a small, three-day show that changed my life.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I got into the fashion and entertainment industry by accident. One day I walked into the office of Mr. Jaroslav Pribyl who used to be the coordinator of this beauty pageant—Miss Brazil USA. At the time he was scouting for contestants. I signed up, competed in the beauty pageant, and to my surprise, placed as runner up! 

A few months later, I met a veteran actor and model, who saw potential in me. She asked if I had thought of being a model, and upon learning that I did but felt intimidated by it, she took the role of my mentor. Lael Jackson coached me in posing for headshot photos, building my portfolio, enrolling in acting lessons, seeking representation, and in industry ethics.

Today I have 16 years of experience as a model and actor. I have been in numerous fashion shows and my work has been shown in magazines, TV commercials, on social media, websites, and in auto shows. As an actor, I have performed on stage as well as in short films, and as a voice actor. I am fluent in two more languages: Portuguese is my first language and I have a BA in Spanish from Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. The College of Letters and Arts at UFMG was the number one in the field in Brazil at the time I graduated. I had a seven-year career as a Spanish teacher and a three-year career as a translator by the time I was twenty-three. Because I am trilingual, I have had the opportunity of booking speaking roles and voice over jobs in all these languages.

Along with a successful career as a model and actor, I am also an author and facilitator of women’s empowerment. I am the founder of The Beautiful Power, a service that provides world-class training, one-on-one guidance for women who want to become self-empowered, and group lectures and presentations. Women’s rights and empowerment are big to me. I come from an upbringing that included a significant amount of disempowerment, oppression, and violence.

I attribute some of my career success in a very tough industry to the aid of personal empowerment. Thanks to it, I have overcome insecurities that were embedded in me because of my background.

I am proud of my work ethic, determination, resilience, and initiative to pay forward what I have learned, and what has worked for me.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

To continue representing Black women as successful, intelligent, sophisticated, and beautiful (not as dejected as I learned growing up). And, to carry on the legacy of self-empowerment of Latin-American women of color. We need places of empowerment where we can lean on one another and feel safe. I don’t believe in exclusion, however. If a woman needs to feel empowered, no matter her background, I hope to give her some of the tools she needs to thrive. My ultimate agenda is to create a different, more beneficial world for the future generations of women to inherit. My vision includes doing it via my women’s empowerment business, The Beautiful Power, as well as storytelling through screenplays.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

I had to unlearn that I was not attractive – ugly actually – and not worthy of success. 

Brazil, where I was raised, is a racist country and if your complexion is not light enough, meaning being close to white, or you’re not member of a specific social class, you’re going to struggle. It has a very oppressive class society. Being a Black child and being raised by a single parent who came from a humble background made that an uncontested reality.

When I emigrated to the United States, not only did I embark on a journey of recreating myself, but I also ended up discovering that I could be successful and thrive. As I mentioned before, I resorted to personal development to undo the old, disempowering programming so that I could give myself a chance.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.thebeautifulpower.com
• Instagram: @flora.sofia, @thebeautifulpower
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/FloraSofiaModelAndActor, www.facebook.com/thebeautifulpower
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/florasofia/
• Twitter: @florasofia, @UBeautifuPower