Macy Gray is a big Denzel Washington fan like the rest of us.
The singer sat down with “Daily Blast Live,” on Thursday to discuss her new music and divulged that almost 20 years ago she signed up to be apart of Training Day simply because she wanted to get a photo with the movie star for her mom.
“That’s when I signed up for the movie because I wanted to get a picture with him for my mom. That was my entire inspiration for doing that movie. I had no interest in acting,” she confessed. The star is in the new horror film, Phobias.
The Grammy Award winning artist added that aside from the photo, she went to Mr. Washington’s trailer to get acting advice.
“I got to the set and I realized ‘Oh my god I don’t know what to do!’ So I asked Denzel, I went to his trailer. And he said ‘Just do yourself as your character.’ You know, which is basically what he is a master at!”
Read More: Denzel Washington crashes New York wedding photoshoot
Gray is also socially minded. Last summer, the singer spoke with theGrio about her new non profit geared toward families impacted by gun violence.
Gray launched a non-profit organization, My Good, to help aid the families of police brutality.
Gray stopped by theGrio to discuss the organization and continue to shed light on the many families that have been impacted by unnecessary violence from the police.
“My Good is a new charity, and what we do is we support the families of victims of police killings,” she explained. “A lot people, you know, you hear about police shootings, but people forget about what the families go through after–the grief and, you know, mental health issues, huge financial burdens. So we’re there for particularly those families.”
Sadly, many of these police shootings do not result in justice for the victim or their families. Gray’s target is to be there for those families and provide them with as much help as possible. Since launching the non-profit, the reception has been great and Gray is in the process of building partnerships with other organizations.
“We get a great response from people from all over the place, all walks of life, just wanting to be there and support,” Gray said. “A lot of people in the mental health field have reached out to say they want to offer their services for the families, you know, particularly the mothers. It’s going really well. We’re doing a couple of partnerships with a group called Farmlink, who distribute food to all the food banks around the country.”
My Good provides families with mental health services, financial relief and advocacy against laws that influence violence. Gray opened up about why she chose to include financial relief within the foundation.
Read More: Keyshia Cole reveals she’s retiring from music after upcoming album
“One of the moms was telling me how she borrowed money to pay for the funeral, but she didn’t have money to buy the pallbearers’ suits,” the singer shared. “She wanted her son’s friends to have nice suits for his funeral, and just a little things that you might not think of.”
Gray went on to share some of the bills that families may have to pay out of pocket, such as hospital bills, tow trucks, legal bills and more.
“People think, ‘Oh, they get these huge settlements,’ but 99 percent of them don’t. [Even] then thats a 2 to 3 year battle. So, its just an impossible thing to deal with,” she explained.
TheGrio’s Nayo Campbell contributed to this report
Have you subscribed to theGrio’s podcast “Dear Culture”? Download our newest episodes now!
TheGrio is now on Apple TV, Amazon Fire, and Roku. Download theGrio today!