The actress says 10-month-old daughter Adaiba is husband Robert Sweeting's "princess"
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00:00Now it's the sit down with Uzo Aduba.
00:02Hi, Uzo.
00:03Congrats on your new memoir out September 24th.
00:06Walk us through your decision to write one
00:08and why is it meaningful to tell your story right now?
00:11I did not know what was going to be happening in my life.
00:17You know, when I said yes to this book,
00:20the book I was saying yes to was not the book I wrote.
00:24For some reason in this season in my life,
00:26when I was approached, I said, yeah,
00:27and I was thinking about it like,
00:29this could be fun.
00:30I can tell these sort of fun stories about my mom
00:35and we can remember some fun things
00:39and blah, blah, blah, Nigeria and crazy eyes, you know?
00:44And the big piece that wasn't present at the time
00:48when I was approached and the book I signed on to
00:51was my mom wasn't sick at the time.
00:53So then when I sat down to write it,
00:56she was at that point
00:58and that had just totally changed the shape
01:01of the story I imagined I was going to tell, yeah.
01:05What do you hope people take away from the book?
01:08What I learned from my mother that I did not expect
01:13when I set out on this journey
01:16is that life is filled with so many stories,
01:21so many chapters.
01:23So whatever moment, story you're living in right now,
01:27it is not the final story, that life is long, you know?
01:31It is long and it has many different seasons.
01:35And I learned that unexpectedly in the process of this book,
01:40the season I was in when I was writing this
01:43of loss and leaving is not the season that I'm in now,
01:49which is life and receiving.
01:51Is it cathartic to reread passages
01:53and relive certain moments now?
01:56It was to revisit, it is every time, you know?
01:59Like each time there's a catharsis of a different sort,
02:01whether it's finishing it,
02:04and she's not with us when I finish it,
02:08whether it's reading the draft
02:11before I submit it for the first time,
02:13whether it's putting together, you know, the audio book
02:17and realizing that was the first time
02:19I was saying any of these words in front of another person.
02:23This year has also brought you and your husband, Robert,
02:26your sweet baby girl Adeba.
02:28If we were to play Roses and Thorns,
02:30what are some roses and what are some thorns
02:32that have happened since you've welcomed Adeba
02:34into the world?
02:35Roses, I have a daughter.
02:37Thorns, I have not slept.
02:40Okay, between you and Robert,
02:44who spoils baby Adeba the most?
02:46One of us has her wrapped around her finger,
02:51and it's not me.
02:53She, that's his princess.
02:55You know, her name means,
02:58it literally means daughter of the kingdom,
03:00which makes her the daughter of the people, everybody,
03:03because she's the firstborn granddaughter.
03:06And so that's his princess.
03:09You know, we can't let you go
03:10without asking about our forever favorite show,
03:12Orange is the New Black.
03:13When's the last time you've talked to any of your co-stars?
03:16The most recently seen was Natasha this summer,
03:20person to person, because we're all over the place now.
03:23Everybody's working so much,
03:26but I text with like quite a few of them regularly.
03:29We still have like a group chat.
03:32I was texting with Natasha last week,
03:34but like that love is constant.
03:37We're gonna put 10 seconds on the clock,
03:38promote any one of your projects.
03:40Ready? Go.
03:41Check out The Road is Good,
03:43my book about my mother and I,
03:46our stories, our lives,
03:47and both of our coming of age stories.
03:49And I'm so grateful and proud to be her daughter.
03:52Uzo, thank you so much for being here today.
03:54Thank you so much.