Acclaimed Trinidadian actress Lorraine Toussaint is starring in the new film about Gloria Steinem’s life, “The Glorias,” with Julianne Moore.
Moore leads the movie as one of four actors playing iconic feminist, journalist and activist, Gloria Steinem.
The film is based on Steinem’s book, “My Life on the Road.” Moore stars as one of the Steinems.
SheKnows said the film is called “The Glorias” — plural — for a reason: “There are four Glorias in this movie, and each one is amazing. So many Glorias, so little time.”
The youngest Gloria is played by Ryan Kiera Armstrong; LuLu Wilson takes over as teen Gloria, and then Alicia Vikander “brilliantly plays Steinem for most of her 20s and 30s,” SheKnows said.
“Finally, Moore takes over as the icon in her 40s. And a fifth Gloria appears — in the form of Steinem herself — at the end of the movie,” it added. “There’s a bus scene, which includes five Glorias! Would the real Gloria Steinem please stand up?”
Toussaint, according to SheKnows, plays legendary civil rights advocate, lawyer and feminist Flo Rae Kennedy, and “commands the screen the minute she appears.”
The Julie Taymor-directed film covers the large majority of Steinem’s journey, from growing up in the 1940s to present day, according to collider.com.
“And that, of course, includes Steinem’s experience crossing paths with Lorraine Toussaint as feminist and civil right activist, Flo Kennedy,” it said.
“The movie sees the pair working on Ms. magazine together, and the energy in those scenes is particularly infectious, not just because it focuses on the launch of the landmark publication but also because of the cast chemistry,” it added. “It turns out, Moore’s approach to creating the right tone on set might have had a lot to do with that.”
Toussaint told collider.com how Moore’s attitude made all the difference.
“She’s underplaying what she actually brought to the set because the bottom line is, is that Julie’s generosity set the tone, honest to God,” she said. “And that chatting that she talks about is just her extraordinarily transparent, loving, giving spirit that sort of infused the set, because she is the star of the film.
“And so, when she opened her arms and opened the doors and, suddenly, we were so embraced by her, it made it a very safe place to work; it made it a joyous place to work; it was fun,” Toussaint added. “It was rowdy! I remember more than once Julie coming in to shut us up; ‘You guys gave to be quiet now!’
“We were very noisy, but we were having a wonderful time creating,” she continued. “And the creative timing, it was a heightened creative timing, and joyous. So, it was lovely.”
Toussaint, who was born in Trinidad and Tobago on April 4, 1960, was brought to live in Brooklyn in the late 1960s by her mother, a teacher.
She graduated from Manhattan’s High School of Performing Arts in 1978.
Toussaint then attended the Juilliard School’s drama division as a member of Group 11 (1978–1982), where her classmates in 1982 included Megan Gallagher, Penny Johnson Jerald, Jack Kenny and Jack Stehlin, according to Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia.
After graduating from Juilliard with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, Toussaint then began her career as Shakespearean actress before tackling screen acting in television and film, Wikipedia said.
It said she supported performances in films, such as “Breaking In” (1989), “Hudson Hawk” (1991) and “Dangerous Minds” (1995).
As lead actress, she is best known for her role as Rene Jackson in the critically-acclaimed Lifetime television drama series “Any Day Now”, from 1998 to 2002, and her recurring role as defense attorney Shambala Green in the NBC legal drama “Law & Order,” Wikipedia said.
It said Toussaint later appeared as a regular cast member in the NBC police procedural “Crossing Jordan” (2002–03) and the TNT crime drama “Saving Grace” (2007–10).
Toussaint received critical acclaim and an Independent Spirit Award nomination for her performance in the 2012 drama film “Middle of Nowhere”, written and directed by Ava DuVernay, Wikipedia said.
In 2014, it said she played the role of Yvonne “Vee” Parker, the main antagonist in the second season of the Netflix comedy-drama series “Orange Is the New Black”, for which she received critical acclaim and a Critics’ Choice Television Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series.
She later played the role of Amelia Boynton Robinson in the 2014 historical drama film “Selma”, directed by Ava DuVernay.
Toussaint later co-starred in the ABC fantasy-drama series “Forever” (2014–15), Fox comedy-drama “Rosewood” (2015–17) and AMC drama “Into the Badlands” (2018–19), according to Wikipedia.
It said she starred in the 2019 horror film “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” before playing Florynce Kennedy in the 2020 biographical film “The Glorias.”
