Abbott Elementary star Janelle James is on the cover of Variety looking incredible, and opened up about why she has zero interest in talking about her age.
Variety reported that Janelle declined to “disclose her age” during their cover story, and also noted that she has two sons, “one who is 20, the other whose age she’s not revealing. She doesn’t see the point of sharing that.”
“I’m grown,” Janelle explained re: the decision to opt out of sharing her age. “I have a 20-year-old son. I’m not ashamed of my age or anything like that. But for women — and everybody knows it and acts like they don’t — it gives an idea of what you are in people’s heads.”
Janelle also explained that she doesn’t want to be viewed as a “mom comic” just because she has kids, saying “That’s not my jam. People have this idea of motherhood, the same way they have an idea of women as we reach a certain age. Each age group, people have an idea in your head of what it is. I don’t want that to prevent me from doing anything, because I can do everything.”
Obsessed with this! Also, fun story, Janelle spoke about her Abbott Elementary audition, and revealed that she wasn’t looking for acting work at the time but loved the pilot so much that she sent in a tape. The she went ahead and DM’d Quinta Brunson, who watched the tape and was immediately ready to cast her. “It was just perfect. It was just exactly what I was looking for,” Quinta says. “You couldn’t get me off the Janelle train. Once I saw her, it was case closed.”
The rest is history, etc!