Award-winning actress, Wunmi Mosaku (Instagram), has been featured in some amazing content from Luther to Black Mirror and has had her most recent success with the HBO hit series Lovecraft Country. The British- Nigerian actress spoke with Taji Mag about her character, Ruby Baptiste, in Lovecraft and her experience as a Black actress working on the set of a show featuring a predominantly Black cast with a Black female showrunner. 

*SPOILER ALERT*

Dapper Dr. Feel (DDF): During episode four, “Strange Case,” we saw Ruby transform into a white woman, how much do you think that experience affected Ruby? 

Wunmi Mosaku (WM): Ruby is a very confident self-assured woman. Being white did not change that for her. She did appreciate walking around freely, her skin color not incriminating her or being weaponized against her. Ruby mentions she was railing and raging around the streets, people were scared for her and not scared of her. 

I think Ruby will always use the magic potion as a tool for herself. She is not disillusioned, like “Gimme some more, gimme some more! This is the life I want to live!” Ruby is as Black on the inside as she is on the outside when the potion turns her white. I don’t think the transformation comes with joy or freedom for her. Ruby is Ruby and she loves who she is. She just wants everyone out there to stop fucking with her and let her be brilliant. Ruby wants to be all that she is without any interruption. 

Ruby has learned a lot and her eyes are open. If anything the transformation made her love herself more. 

DDF: Do you think during the course of the season that Ruby gravitates more towards Christina Braithwhite (Abbey Lee) than she does towards her sister, Leti ( Jurnee Smollett-Bell)? 

WM: I think there’s truth in that. Ruby and Leti have such a tense relationship and truly don’t understand each other. Maybe it’s because they walk around the world so differently with different privileges and lack thereof. It’s also because Leti is difficult. Ruby has this idea that if she works hard enough and cracks through this whole system, she’ll be apart of it rather than against it. 

Yes, sometimes Black people can “crack” through the system, but let’s face it you can be famous as whoever, be stopped by the police, and be treated inappropriately. 

Ruby has this eye-opening experience and growth from Leti. Whereas before she was the big sister that looked after her little sister and bailed her out many times. Ruby would be like, “Leti, you can stay with me but when are you going to get a real job like the rest of us?”

Ruby and Leti do not have an equally yoked relationship. Ruby is kind of Leti’s mom in a way? They’ve both had a weird relationship with their mom. With Ruby having a mother-daughter relationship with Leti, it’s really hard to be open and honest. To be able to say how she feels and how the world is treating her as a dark-skinned woman when her sister is a light-skinned woman and has these privileges, plus someone looking after her, Atticus. 

Ruby doesn’t open up to Leti. Leti does not even know Ruby moved out of her nice apartment to pay for their mother’s funeral until she reconnects with her sister in the first episode.

DDF: Can you interpret the William/Christina and Ruby relationship? 

WM: There is something about when she first meets William, that she just lets it all out. While reading the script I thought, ‘Why is she telling her business to this stranger?’ but there is some chemistry between them – which is obviously sexual in episode four. Ruby’s relationship between Christina and William kind of veers. William gets one side of her, which is physical and has a magical connection, while with Christina she is honest, it’s not explained but it’s understood.

DDF: Ruby’s character is a talented musician. Who would you say would be your top three favorite artists from any time period? 

WM: I would say, Jill Scott, Billie Holiday, Erykah Badu and  I really love Red Hot Chili Peppers but mostly their album “Californication.”

DDF: What made being on this show so unique?  

WM: Just being on the set of Lovecraft Country, having Misha as my showrunner, and being able to talk about my experiences as a Black woman was great. Being able to talk about being a Black woman with a Black woman on set was a great experience. I did not do that beyond my husband or my siblings. I had to do it every day for work, during these interviews. I have to talk about body images, these things I did not talk about. It was just like “Let me get this work done.”  Talking about those things has been both scary and therapeutic. I feel like I’m growing every time I have these conversations. I have never been on a show so Black before.

DDF: Is there anything you learned about yourself while portraying this character? 

WM: I feel changed spiritually and emotionally by portraying Ruby. Her confidence in who she is which includes intelligence, sexuality, and education. Ruby is so beautiful and she loves herself, it’s so beautiful and rebellious. She isn’t afraid of the changes that have been made in her because of her experiences. Rubi embraces these changes that have happened to her intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually. She doesn’t try to fit back into who she was five minutes ago, two years ago, etc. I feel like I have taken on a little bit of that. 

I love myself by playing Ruby. I never thought I’d play a character like Ruby. People always struggled to dress me because I am not this size or my hair is too kinky. I always thought I am not commercial, I am not this or I am not that. I feel so much more confident because I embraced all of me and I was encouraged to by Misha. 

Hopefully, you have already watched Wunmi Mosaku play the charismatic Ruby Baptiste in the horror series Lovecraft Country. If not, you can catch the full season on HBO Max. Wunmi Mosaku is also starring in the upcoming Netflix thriller, His House, about a refugee couple that escapes from war-torn South Sudan.