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21-year old Guyanese-Canadian, Rebecca is playing the role of Padma in the Netflix comedy-drama “Ginny & Georgia” (2021) which is in its second season. The show had risen to the Number One spot and attracted tens of millions of viewers. Rebecca said she has been performing from as “soon as she could remember” and supported by parents who put her in singing and acting classes.
Per Netflix, “Ginny &Georgia” is a story about an American free-spirited character named Georgia and her two kids, Ginny and Austin, who moved north in search of a fresh start but discovered that the road to new beginnings could be bumpy. Rebecca who plays Padma in the drama is cast as the girlfriend of Marcus Baker (Felix Mallard), a potential love interest for Georgia’s daughter, Ginny (Antonia Gentry).
The cast of Ginny and Georgia is diverse in race, age, sexual orientations, among others. Rebecca’s role as Padma was specifically cast for a South Asian actress. She told Caribbean Collective that “I love going in for parts that are specifically South Asian or specifically Brown because you go into the audition room and it’s just a whole group of other Brown women.” For her, “It’s kind of the feeling of like, ‘If I don’t get this, one of these women are going to get it, so it’s kind of like we win either way.”
Also in the drama-comedy is Rebecca’s brother, Raymond Ablack. He is cast as Joe, a childhood friend of the troubled Georgia whom he reconnected with after 15 years and fell in love with only to have his heart broken. To find out how Padma is doing with her boyfriend, Marcus, who is seeking to have the best of both worlds, by having a soft spot for Ginny, watch the drama as it unfolds.
Asked by the online magazine, Brown Girl, why her representation in the mainstream entertainment industry is important, her response was: “Growing up, it felt like Indo Caribbean people were just not on television. The closest I came was watching Bollywood movies at my grandparents’ house. Brown people are not on television. But hopefully this is a step forward, and I can actually show little girls that we’re actually on TV. If we can do this, you can do this too.”
She went further in saying: “We can use our imagination, but it makes it a lot easier to see a face like yours on TV and know that it’s a possibility; I don’t even have to imagine it. It’s important to see ourselves represented in cultural roles too, but it’s also important to see ourselves represented in roles that aren’t race specific. We’re not just here for when they need an Indian person. You’d never see a casting call for an Indo Caribbean person, we are very rarely represented in the media and in the cultures of the world. We remain in this grey zone of Caribbean and Indian.”
Rebecca also appeared in other films: – Netflix, Impulse (2018)- a story about a delusional girl with a medical illness whose life is forever altered the day she discovers an ability to teleport the life of a classmate in coma; Youtube, Let It Snow (2019) as Anisha (a storyline about young people brought together through a snowstorm on Christmas Eve); and Netflix, Awake (2021) as a Student Protestor.
On success, Rebecca said, “It is individual, when you feel happy and challenged and constantly growing …improving yourself not for anybody else but for your own self.” (The Arroyo Show)
Sources (internet).
