Photographer: Silvia Draz
Actor, executive producer and UN Goodwill Ambassador
Gugu Mbatha-Raw refuses to be put in a box. Now starring
in the new Netflix action flick, Lift, she tells Hannah Marriott how she quietly went from head girl to leading lady
L
‘hurgh’ and ‘hurgh’,” she laughs. “It’s an action-movie thing. It feels very silly when you’re doing it.” In the end she found her voice, realising “you can’t be doing this kind of thing while holding your breath. You have to release your power.”
ast year, when Gugu Mbatha-Raw was filming her first “badass leading lady” role in Netflix’s action-comedy Lift, she had to fight in elaborate scenes set
on a free-falling aeroplane. As a trained dancer, the poised British actor had
the choreography down, “but you don’t want to look like you’re doing ballet,” she says. So the director “was always trying to get me to vocalise. You know –
What has recently changed though is her power behind the scenes. Now an executive producer on Apple TV+’s Surface, Mbatha-Raw is juggling her new role with a star turn as Sophie – an amnesiac trying to make sense of her fraught, glossy, life – and the popular series is currently filming its second season in London. “That’s a great moment; a real milestone – there is something very empowering about getting to a place where you have a voice in the creative process,” she says.
Success suits her. Mbatha-Raw is a vision on Zoom – all bright-fuchsia jumper and enviable bone structure, sipping a green tea at her kitchen table on a rare day off in the UK. She recently moved back to the English countryside after decades living between a West Hollywood apartment and a suitcase on international film sets.
Mbatha-Raw still emanates head-girl energy today, balancing warmth with self-possession. She has strict boundaries, too: she never talks about her romantic life (the last person she was linked to was Game of Thrones actor Harry Lloyd in 2012), asserting she has always been conscious about “what parts of yourself are not up for public consumption.”
Indeed, she credits her parents for instilling in her a sense of confidence and self-belief from an early age. Raised in Oxford, Mbatha-Raw was an only child living with her mother, an English nurse. Her parents divorced when she was very young, but her father, a doctor and former African National Congress activist who fled apartheid South Africa, was a constant, supportive presence. With no siblings, Mbatha-Raw says she became independent at a young age, and loved the community she found in ballet, tap, jazz, drama, and playing the saxophone; the musicals of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tina Turner were early inspirations. Soon, she was obsessed with performing, too: “I had quite a lot of energy. I was always talking, wanting to express myself. They saw my tenacity and genuine love for what I
was doing. It was never pushed [onto me], it was always encouraged and celebrated.”
It’s clear that her combination of warmth and steel has got her to where she is today. While breaking into acting, Mbatha-Raw was self-assured enough to ignore what she now describes as “advice,” using air quotes, from an older colleague who suggested she should change her African name in order to succeed. Her full name, Gugulethu, means “pride” in Zulu, so “it would feel like an absolute contradiction to not be proud of it,” she says. “[They were] from
a different generation and their career had been pretty much solely in the UK, so that was their perspective. But I think the culture has evolved,” she says. “Inclusivity is one thing, but you have to have the confidence to stand up and say: ‘No, this is my name and I’ll help you pronounce it’. Or, you know, I'm not going to straighten my hair. It takes somebody to
actually put their foot down.”
This tenacity is evidenced by the long game she played to star in Belle, too, with Mbatha-Raw passionately chasing the role for eight years before stepping on set. “It’s a competitive industry – you have to,” she says.“It’s not going to happen by magic. I go about it in my own way, but if you want something, you have to remind people [you’re there].”
As an executive producer, she says, “I was keen, from the outset, to be able to bring the story home and to be able to work in the UK.” Now, on the rare days when she isn’t filming, she makes the most of being at home and staying feeling grounded. Her perfect day involves
“a great night’s sleep, a leisurely breakfast, staying in my pyjamas, drinking coffee, reading, sitting in my garden, yoga, walking in the countryside. Definitely a deep-tissue massage
and ending the day with a delicious meal and a hot bath.” The pyjamas are a deal-breaker: “Like full, old-school silk pyjamas. You get to a point in life where you want a full pyjama. Very relaxed and slinky.”
“It’s not going to happen
by magic... if you want something, you have to remind people [you’re there]”
Indeed, Mbatha-Raw is someone who thinks about self-love a lot. “It means listening to
your body, your instincts and being honest about how you are feeling; setting boundaries
and respecting yourself,” she says. She reads a lot of self-help literature, too, citing Brené Brown as an icon, as well as Malcolm Gladwell and Eckhart Tolle. She is also a repeat reader
of The Alchemist. When it comes to self-love, her biggest obstacle is being scheduled to the hilt – when she overworks, she becomes “depleted.” In this respect, her career brings “challenges every day,” she says, laughing. “Like getting up at 4.35am yesterday.” But she’s getting better
at managing her time, and has learned how to steel herself against the occasional toxicity emanated from “fragile egos” and “personas” which, she points out, come as standard in any industry. Naturally, she tells me about this in her own charmingly upbeat way: running her hands down her body, smiling broadly and exclaiming: “Forcefield of light!”
“There is a huge, soft power in the stories that are told. It’s a form of therapy, catharsis, in a way, even
if it’s pure escapism”
Indeed, self-expression and staying politically engaged go hand in hand for Mbatha-Raw,
who attended Time’s Up rallies long before the movement was globally famous, took part
in Black Lives Matter protests, and painted portraits of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor during Covid before auctioning them off for charity. In 2021, she also became a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN Refugee Agency, with whom she has visited the Democratic Republic of the Congo and campaigned for the country’s displaced people. She describes this as a
full-circle moment, helping her to put the experiences her father talked about at the dinner table into context (UNHCR assisted her father in fleeing South Africa more than 40 years ago).
Whether she’s on or off camera, it’s clear that Mbatha-Raw is a force for good. “There is a huge, soft power in the stories that are told,” she says. “It’s a form of therapy, catharsis, in a way, even if it’s pure escapism.”
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PHOTOGRAPHER AND DIRECTOR: Silvia Draz
EDITOR IN CHIEF: ANDREA THOMPSON
Shoot and film DIRECTOR: LISA OXENHAM
WRITER: HANNAH MARRIOTT
SENIOR DESIGNER: TREASA BURNS
CHIEF SUB-EDITOR: NICOLA MOYNE
PRODUCER: SOFIA PIZA
VIDEOGRAPHER AND VIDEO EDITS: CELINE HONG
MAKE-UP ARTIST: KAY MONTANO AT C/O MANAGEMENT USING CHANEL LES BEIGES WINTER GLOW COLLECTION
STYLIST: ANNA HUGHES-CHAMBERLAIN AT STELLA CREATIVE ARTISTS
STYLIST Assistant: Lizzie Ash
HAIR STYLIST: BJORN KRISCHKER AT THE WALL GROUP USING MARIA NILA
NAIL ARTIST: STEPHANIE STAUNTON AT CAROL HAYES MANAGEMENT USING CHANEL BEAUTY
LIGHTING TECHNICIAN: ARTURO SYLAR
SOUND RECORDIST: JOSH DYKES
DIGITAL TECHNICIAN: OLLIE WILKINSON-AVIS
FLOWERS: PAPER FLOWER COMPANY
LOCATION: LOFT STUDIOS, LONDON
WITH THANKS TO PUBLIC EYE COMMUNICATIONS
FASHION: TOP AND SKIRT, ZIMMERMANN BEAUTY: Stylo Sourcils Waterproof Eyebrow Pencil in Brun Clair, Le Volume De Chanel Mascara, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
FASHION: DRESS, HUISHAN ZHANG; EAR CUFF, CHANEL BEAUTY: Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Primer, Rouge
Allure Velvet Luminous Matte Lip Colour in 57 - Rouge Feu, Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Blush in Mauve Glacé, Chanel
FASHION: TOP AND JEWELLERY, CHANEL BEAUTY: Stylo Sourcils Waterproof Eyebrow Pencil in Brun Clair, Le Volume De Chanel Mascara, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
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GUGU MBATHA-RAW
The subject of power comes up a lot with Mbatha-Raw, whose own influence feels very much on the ascent. The 40-year-old already boasts an impressive body of work – from her 2005 theatre breakout as Juliet opposite Andrew Garfield’s Romeo, to 2013’s boundary-breaking costume drama Belle. And projects including Black Mirror’s iconic queer love story San Junipero, the #MeToo-inspired The Morning Show, and 2020’s Misbehaviour, in which Mbatha-Raw played the first Black Miss World, showcase a longstanding interest in “moving culture forward.”
“Inclusivity is one thing, but you have to have the confidence to stand up and say: ‘No, this is my name and I’ll help you pronounce it’… It takes somebody to actually put their foot down”
Looking back, she thinks that Belle – the true story of a biracial gentlewoman in 18th-century England – was really “a breakthrough in terms of point of view. When I grew up, you wouldn’t know that there were any people of colour in England in a period context, unless they were slaves or servants. Now we have Bridgerton, Queen Charlotte… What changed is that you can’t ignore the brown person’s point of view. It’s there and it’s being told — and it wasn’t being told in such a nuanced way before projects like Belle.”
Increasingly, Mbatha-Raw seems to see fashion as power, too, recently sitting front row at Chanel's Manchester show, which she says was “so inventive. As a creative, artistic person, you see that all art forms at the highest level have crossover.” She describes red-carpet dressing as “heightened reality. I’ve come to look at it more recently as artistic expression – a living, breathing painting that you put on your body.”
Lift, however, is lighter than Surface, and sees Mbatha-Raw play Abby – a straight-laced Interpol agent – alongside Kevin Hart’s art thief, Cyrus. Attracted to the project for its “buoyancy”, Mbatha-Raw admits she and Hart found it easy to relate to their characters, with Hart playing a “cheeky, rascally guy that gets around the rules” while Mbatha-Raw’s Abby “plays it by the book. I like to think I’m not as uptight as Abby, but I was head girl
at my school. Not a goody two shoes exactly, but I was definitely a good student,” she says. Despite being “chalk and cheese,” the actors bonded when the film’s director, F Gary Gray, took them to see a Kehinde Wiley exhibition as part of their prep, and Mbatha-Raw went full “art nerd”. An art collector himself, Hart opened up “about things he was looking to acquire; he would ask my opinion,” Mbatha-Raw says. At the end of the Lift shoot, she painted Hart’s portrait and gave it to him as a wrap gift: “I think he was delighted and flattered,” she says. It now hangs in his home office.
The actor also keeps a gratitude journal – a practice recommended to her by Oprah
following Mbatha-Raw’s performance in Belle. They are still in touch. “I ran into her in
New York recently. She’s just such a warm and powerful figure in the culture,” Mbatha-Raw says, citing Oprah as one of many women who inspired her to change the game in Hollywood. Others include Gina Prince-Bythewood – who directed Mbatha-Raw in 2014’s Beyond the Lights and recently won plaudits for The Woman King – and Reese Witherspoon, whose company, Hello Sunshine, makes both The Morning Show and Surface.
Gugu Mbatha-Raw
On fashion, self-love and cultivating soft power
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BEAUTY: Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Primer, Chanel Le Correcteur de Chanel in PEACH, Les Beiges Healthy Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
BEAUTY: Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Primer, Le Correcteur de Chanel in PEACH, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
FASHION: TOP AND SKIRT, ZIMMERMANN BEAUTY: Stylo Sourcils Waterproof Eyebrow Pencil in Brun Clair, Le Volume De Chanel Mascara, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
FASHION: TOP AND SKIRT, ZIMMERMANN; EAR CUFF, CHANEL BEAUTY: Chanel Stylo Sourcils Waterproof Eyebrow Pencil in Brun Clair, Le Volume De Chanel Mascara, Les Beiges; Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
Stylo Sourcils Waterproof Defining Longwear Eyebrow Pencil in Brun Clair, Le Volume De Chanel Volume Mascara, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
FASHION: DRESS, HUISHAN ZHANG; EAR CUFF, CHANEL BEAUTY: Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Primer, Rouge Allure Velvet Luminous Matte Lip Colour in 57 - Rouge Feu, Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Blush in Mauve Glacé, Chanel
FASHION: TOP, MOLLY GODDARD BEAUTY: Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Primer, Le Correcteur de Chanel in PEACH, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
FASHION: TOP AND JEWELLERY, CHANEL BEAUTY: Stylo Sourcils Waterproof Eyebrow Pencil in Brun Clair, Le Volume De Chanel Mascara, Les Beiges Healthy Glow Natural Eyeshadow Palette in Cool, Chanel
FASHION: TOP AND SKIRT, HUISHAN ZHANG; EAR CUFF, CHANEL BEAUTY: Les Beiges Healthy Winter Glow Primer, Rouge Allure Velvet Mat Lipstick in Libre Libre, Les Beiges; Healthy Winter Glow Blush in Mauve Glace, Chanel
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