For Sunita Mani, 2020 has been a year of professional peaks and valleys. At the same time that she was headlining movies for the first time in her career, GLOW, the beloved Netflix comedy she starred in for three seasons, was unceremoniously canceled by the streaming giant. The move, which Netflix blamed on the pandemic, not only blindsided the showâs devoted fanbase, but also its cast, who had already begun filming the fourth season. Soon after the cancellation was announced, Mani posted a letter to her Instagram account that she and five other castmatesâall women of colorâsent to the showâs producers during its pandemic-related hiatus, lamenting the showâs failures to live up to the standards of diversity and inclusion it first set with such a multicultural ensemble. âGLOW has been marketed as a diverse ensemble, but for all of us diverse cast members, it has never lived up to these ideals,â Mani said on Instagram. âSince Season 1, the show has planted racial stereotyping into our characterâs existence, yet your storylines are relegated to the sidelines in dealing with this conflict or have left us feeling like checked-boxes on a list.â Mani said the letter was positively received, and suggested that those issues were going to be addressed in the new season, which made the showâs cancelation even more difficult to absorb.Â
None of this is new for the 33-year-old Tennessee native. Mani has spent nearly a decade navigating the capricious world of show business, first as a stand-up comedian, and then as a member of the Cocoon Central Dance Team, a three-person act which combines comedy and movement. As a performer of South Asian descent, she has had to question whether or not she belongs because of her talent, or because the project needed someone of her ethnicity. This year, sheâs made her own case with a pair of performances that highlight her range. In the contemporary indie comedy Save Yourselves!, she played one half of a couple who has to deal with an alien invasion while disconnecting in upstate New York. Then, she swerved into dark fare with the thriller Evil Eye, part of an anthology that Blumhouse released on Amazon Prime last fall. Mani, who was recently cast opposite Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain in the HBO limited series Scenes From a Marriage, recently connected with the comedian and musician Reggie Watts to discuss her early days in the showbiz trenches, battling imposter syndrome, and learning to be enough.Â
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SUNITA MANI: Well, hi.
WATTS: Long time no see.
MANI: How are you?Â
WATTS: Me good.
MANI: Iâm wearing my mask right now. Iâm on a little walk. Iâve been laying flat on my back a lot so I decided to get up and put these things in motion. Iâm actually a little sore. I was in a little bit of dance rehearsal.
WATTS: With the Cocoon Central Dance Team?
MANI: Yeah. We all got tested and made a video together for a project. It was really wild to be in the same place at the same time, together. It was a celebration.
WATTS: Wowzers. I love that you guys are attacking. Thatâs how I came to know you, you know?
MANI: Yeah. Itâs pretty wild.
WATTS: Thatâs something that I wanted to talk about. Take me through your trajectory when you moved to New York. Why did you want to move?
MANI: I ended up in New York by way of Boston. I was at Emerson College and always wanted to live in New York, but I just went to Boston instead. I think I was too nervous. I didnât really know what I was doing in college, but I got so wrapped up in the comedy scene, because it looked so fun, and it was. I had that dream for myself. Perform with my friends, put on our shows. But we had to also feed ourselves, and pay rent, and have jobs, so we grew up. Cocoon was born out of that misery of that growing pain. Itâs like, âOh, shit. Adulthood.â We would host shows at our house. We had no furniture. We had an exposed brick wall. We thought that was really cool for a backdrop of a show. So we taped a mic handle to a broom handle, and would host these shows. Basically they were just parties, but we took them a little bit seriously, and performed an opening number for them. That was the first of Cocoon Central Dance Team. Then I feel like I met you in New York at shows. Itâs so amazing to be billed on these variety shows, alongside you and people who are doing this. Thatâs where I knew I belonged.
WATTS: With Cocoon, you approach things like youâre taking an art form, or medium, that isnât necessarily immediately associated with comedy per se, and youâre making it into a comedic element. Or, even better than that, I would say an absurdist element. Cocoon could go in a few different places, right? You guys could be at an experimental film festival or an actual dance event, but then you also can be on a tiny stage doing your stuff. So itâs super flexible, but when you bring it into the comedy thing, thereâs so much horsepower there. All three of you are so crazy charismatic.Â
MANI: Did you feel like, when you were in a music program, that you belonged there? I feel like I could never take myself seriously in education. I always had to be a clown.
WATTS: 100 percent. That was my problem. I studied piano starting at age five. Once I discovered Monty Python, I just started seeing everything as ridiculous, absurd, and funny. So when I would have my assignments to do a piano piece, I would start with the piece, but then I would improvise and roll in with some other stuff. I learned music theory up to a point, and then I got disinterested with it and was more interested in doing dumb, silly things. What I get from all of that is that I like to be myself. I could say Iâm a comedic performer and an improviser, but I think defining yourself by what youâre not is super crucial in the engine of motivation for yourself and your life course. I definitely see that in you, because of the similarities of having strong ties to another culture. Growing up in the United States as a brown person, and then integrating with all these different systems, and being a smart person, Iâm sure you donât define yourself by your race. You donât lead by that. At least I never did when I was growing up. I knew I was different compared to the majority. But I didnât lead that way. I led by my character. I led by my personality and my viewpoint.
MANI: I really avoided defining myself by my ethnicity. I just wanted it removed, almost entirely, because I was so aware of it. I wanted to thwart it, and be like, it doesnât exist. But now I feel like Iâm coming back to a place where there is more integration of my culture and my identity. Itâs hard to parse out exactly the mix of what is and what isnât from my Indian culture. Itâs like this new level of awareness that feels a little stinky, but dance comedy and a lot of acting, you donât have to think too much, hopefully. Especially not with dancing. Just do. I feel like Iâm in a stinky phase of my identity right now. And weâre in a stinky place in time.
WATTS: How so?
MANI: We are totally redefining structures. And as you say, itâs so important. I have more language, for instance, of how to talk about my identity, and my experiences, because more people are talking about their experiences in having multicultural backgrounds. Itâs helpful. But it is like, thereâs more space to exist in, and itâs almost hard for me, because the confines, the things to push against were so defining for me growing up, and now itâs like, âOh, I have more space. Oh, shit. What do I do? What do I do with this space?â
WATTS: How did you become an actor?
MANI: As a kid, I think I did want to be an actor, but I couldnât really say it out loud, or I didnât let myself think that far or dream that big. So it was far away. But I really love it, and I think itâs such a cool job. I think it was a couple seasons into Glow that I was able to say, âI think Iâm an actor now.âÂ
WATTS: Do you ever feel like you have imposter syndrome? When you are acting do you ever feel like, âWhat am I doing?â
MANI: Oh my god. All the time. Itâs something I definitely compound with being a woman and part of a diversity quotient. I can really rip the rug out from under myself and be like, âWow, Iâm only here because Iâm a brown woman. Otherwise, I wouldnât have this show.â Itâs always there a little bit. I know itâs not healthy, and itâs not always real, but itâs there because it feels like Iâm not allowed to be in the room with my Julliard-trained actor friends, because theyâre amazing. But at the same time, I am someone who learns on the job. I do feel like Iâve been schooled because Iâm watching people like Gayle Rankin and Betty Gilpin and Alison Brie on set. Itâs a different type of learning, but I do feel like Iâve gotten opportunities because of the rise of diversity. Itâs amazing, and at the same time itâs like, âWait. Did I earn this? Should I be here?â Thereâs always something chasing me like, âYouâre not enough.â
WATTS: With the diversity hire aspect of it, do you ever think of that as an advantage in this climate?
MANI: I think with Glow, I was so happy it was me because I believed in this role just as much as anyone, if not more than anyone. Iâm going to bring my personal experience to this. Thatâs an advantage. Itâs a good thing that Iâm here.Â
WATTS: Aside from your desire to perform, do you ever think about how you might influence someone of color, and also women? Do you view yourself as someone who helps people push themselves into knowing that they can do these types of things?
MANI: I donât hear from that many people outside of my friend circle, but sometimes Iâll get an email, or a comment, thatâs like, âThis really helped me.â Or, âIâm so glad I could see this representation.â Sometimes itâs from Indian women and sometimes itâs from anybody. And thatâs making more sense to me now, that I can have that impact. I didnât really feel that until recently. You have albums, and you have recorded documents of things. How do you look back on those? Do you have a different relationship with it as youâre making it?
WATTS: I think of them as snapshots of moments in time. Itâs funny, because I thought about the idea of recording all the way back to when I was a kid and had a tape recorder, and I remember hearing my voice back from a recorded medium, and I was so fascinated with that. Youâre kind of dividing yourself. Youâre able to step out by yourself and go, âOh, interesting.â Which is just an incredible feeling. That brings me to your film, Evil Eye. When does that emerge, or has it emerged already?
MANI: It was released on Amazon on October 13th. It was part of this series of films that came out. Blumhouse and Amazon partnered up to make an anthology series of horror movies. Four were released this year, and then theyâre going to release four more next year. Our movie, Evil Eye, got to be in the first set and it was a thrill. Honestly, itâs not that scary, so if youâre a horror buff, I think youâll be disappointed.Â
WATTS: I donât like horror movies. I find them a little boorish, but Iâm glad to hear that itâs not that scary, so now I can watch it. What was that like? That was your first film without it being a thing created by friends?
MANI: Yes, I met a bunch of strangers. Iâm super excited by one of the castmates in particular. Sarita Choudhury, who plays my mom in the movie. That was the reason why I did the movie, because Iâm not normally up for a horror movie. I was suspicious of the whole thing, but it is an Indian led cast, which is cool. Iâm also weirdly suspicious of that, too. Iâm like, âHmm. What is this about?â But I loved being around so many people of south Asian descent. I wasnât alone. That was really exciting. My character in that movie is slowly dragged into the horror movie. The momâs character is living the horror movie more so in the plot of the movie, and my character is catching up.Â
WATTS: Wow. Thatâs a trip. Okay, Iâm looking forward to seeing it now. What do you have coming up in the future?Â
MANI: This is a wild time, but Iâm excited to hold on to a few ideas that I have that I want to write and turn into a TV show or a film, to just have something to work through all this anxiety. Itâs nice because I feel like Iâm writing a little bit of an escape for myself. Iâm still working with Cocoon. Weâre also writing and trying to work on the TV project together. And man, I donât know. Still do this acting thing. Still auditioning, and hopefully cool stuff pans out. But I donât mind not knowing. Hopefully I can keep my pen to the page. Iâm not super inspired right now. I was a few months ago.Â
WATTS: I really look forward to that. Youâre definitely one of my favorite actors now. Youâre completely unique, and your expressiveness is huge.Â
MANI: Thatâs so kind. I think the world of you, so itâs nice to be on your mind in this way.Â
WATTS: Well I guess thatâs it. We did it. Thanks to Andy Warhol.
MANI: We are Andy Warhol.
WATTS: Thatâs our conclusion.