About five years ago, before "Insecure" became one of HBO’s most acclaimed comedies, the screenwriters of the series were in a ruthless Nerf war, when the co-creator and star of the series Issa Rae told the screenwriter Na Tasha Rothwell (Natasha Rothwell) made her opinion and remembered it as a suspicious proposal.

"We belong to different factions in the screenwriter room," Roswell said when describing the battle with foam ejection toy weapons. "At any time of the week, you can be ambushed. Issa called me to her office and said, "We need to talk to you. "I was not by her side [in the game] at that time, so I was thinking,'They are going to kidnap me, this is part of the Nerf war. I'm ready to fall."

She burst into tears after she finished speaking.

The defenseless host of the series Rae and Prentice Penny called Rothwell and told her that she is best suited to play Kelli Prenny, the perennial support friend we don’t deserve to have her, and brought her an unforgettable feeling that humor is “insecure” Any interaction of your friends. Before that, Roswell informally gave life to the role in the screenwriting room and while reading the script-and acting as if she hadn't auditioned, it turned out to be a perfect audition.

"This was unexpected," Roswell, 41, said in a recent video chat. "I shed the ugly tears that I shed only for myself. I feel that I am regarded as a complete creator."

Since then, Roswell’s stealth performance has made Kylie the fan’s favorite GIF queen-her lines about "growth" in season 2 are likely to circulate in hundreds of text threads at this moment. Now, as "Insecurity" draws to a close, Roswell added another hyphen to her title, making her debut as a television director in Sunday's episode.

As Kelly said, Roswell is booming. Rich.

She recently signed a comprehensive agreement with ABC Signature to develop a TV project through her brand Big Hattie Productions. This summer, she was praised for her role as Belinda in the lively satire "White Lotus" on HBO. Belinda is an overworked and courteous spa manager at a Hawaiian luxury resort and dreams of starting her own business. She will soon appear in the sequel of "Sonic the Hedgehog" to be released next spring; the upcoming musical fantasy work "Wonka" is a prequel to Roald Dahl's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"; and "We Was there too", this is a growing up story inspired by John Hughes, written by her and Gloria Calderon Kellett (Gloria Calderon Kellett), which tells the story of "The Browns Children, LGBTQ children, black children and real outsiders".

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"I think a lot of people like to be famous overnight, but I have been doing this for a while," she said. "I just never knew it was possible. I knew that if I approach my craft with integrity and intention and [do my best] to respect God’s gift to me, then good things will happen, I just I don’t know if “good” will be “great” and “great” will be “leave this world”... I remember watching every award of Taylor Swift early in her career, she Always shocked, like, "Oh my God, I can't believe it. "You're like,'Really, Taylor Swift? But I sympathize with her very much now, because every time I interview, I feel more and more of Taylor Swift."

Rothwell wore a revolving pastel sweater that looked like it was spun elegantly in a cotton candy machine. He was low-key and lively: "In real life, many people mistake me for Kelli. They will come to me, wondering why. I'm very introverted, very introverted, and very nerdy." She kept meditating until a topic really got her excited-for example, when she, a self-proclaimed fan of romantic comedies, talked about living in London, the lovely movie capital For one, she filmed "Wonka" there.

"When I told you that I dreamed of moving to London when I was 25, I thought:'I want to be Blackbridge Jones. I just want to live that kind of life. It will be perfect. I will find my Darcy. I haven’t even been to Notting Hill because it’s a lot of pressure, I-you don’t. I’m afraid that going there will ruin the “Notting Hill” in my heart. I will go, obviously. But, mine. It means that [this movie] is about an American actress and looking for love. It's so stressful for me!"

Writing a romantic comedy for the big screen has always been her ambition—a representative of expanding Hollywood's grand gesture to who can experience love. And she has already proven her good at "Insecurity" and wrote an unforgettable episode of the previous season, reuniting the core predecessors of the show, Isa (Ray) and Lawrence (Jay Ellis). Roswell's feature film attempt "Black Comic Con" created during the quarantine period was accepted by Sundance College's Screenwriting Lab. She hopes to direct this movie in the coming year, about meeting lovely people at popular conventions.

Rothwell's personal experience explains why she prefers a genre based on a wide range of stories about love and connection.

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Rothwell was born in Wichita, Kansas, but grew up on an air base from Albuquerque to Turkey. Her father is serving in the military, so her family has become accustomed to a changed life-she went to two elementary schools, two middle schools and two high schools. When she was very young, she discovered that humor is a reliable icebreaker for meeting new students.

"Humor is a simple way for me to show myself," she said. "This gives me the opportunity to hone my skills and think,'What are these audiences like?' This is very formative. But it really makes me difficult to decipher, because when you think you are about to leave and look forward to When your heart is broken, it’s hard to become fragile and pursue deep relationships. Every step is an opportunity to win friends and influence others. When you do this, you don’t think: "Let me be the truest self, let me do Myself. "It's,'Who do they want me to be? I can do it.'"

Roswell did not forget that she brought this impermanence into her career, especially in her handling of the most critical transformation to date.

"I think every performance is like a military base," she said. "Leaving'insecure' is no stranger; I am accustomed to leaving places and people I really like, and I know how to deal with these friendships, even if I'm not there."

Roswell continued to make a lasting impression among his peers.

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"I have always believed in everything Natasha did and said," said Jennifer Coolidge, who played a wealthy woman who took advantage of Roswell's role in "White Lotus." "My favorite memory in [the show] is that one day we were trapped in the middle of the sea, and the waves were rough and made me seasick. [Series creator] Mike White asked us to improvise a scene about our many failed relationships with men. It’s painful, but it’s really fun. Natasha came up with something that made me cry... I can never predict how she will provide her lines, or how she will look at me. Some of the greatest actors can seduce you into thinking that the scene is Reality. Natasha has that. She makes you forget that you are on the set."

Rae remembers that Rothwell moved from New York to Los Angeles to work in an "unsafe" job. She didn't know much about many people or the city-and, just as she adjusted to a new environment when she was a child, she started to become humorous.

"From her first day in the room, she set up this hilarious part, including talking to an imaginary person about her situation in Los Angeles on our big butt conference call in the writer's room," Lei recalled. road. "Whenever she proposed something we wanted, she would pick up the phone and whisper,'Hey...yes, open my suitcase, they like me.' If we don't respond to the promotion, She would pick up the phone and say,'Hey...can you start checking the flight back? Thank you.' Throughout the first season, that phone call will be her inner monologue, telling what happened in the room, sometimes about a specific writer Yes. It has never beaten all of us."

Nevertheless, as Roswell himself pointed out, the road to that room or other rooms is not simple. Rothwell initially studied journalism and did not dare to regard acting as a career, and thought it would satisfy her interest in writing. She soon realized that this was not her atmosphere: "Objectivity is not my strong point," she said. "A b—I have opinions. I will write these big and gorgeous articles, but full of opinions. I am now thinking about something I did on the fifth anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. I just entered Moshi McVeigh. My editor was like:'You can't call him an asshole,' I think,'but its punctuation is correct!'"

Later she turned to the theater and was convinced that she would become a terrible waitress-an educator after graduation. Before returning to the United States, she moved to Tokyo and taught English part-time while performing in a Tokyo comedy shop, where she worked as a high school drama teacher in the Bronx for four years. (White has at least one idea for the future plot of "White Lotus", which draws on Roswell’s experience abroad, in which Belinda was transferred to Japan.)

"When you walk around the world with brown [breasts], people think of you a lot; people have opinions," she said. "So, for me, it's important not to make any assumptions about my students. I want to say that 99.9% of my students are people of color. I don't want to be "raisins in the sun". We are making Neil Simon We are making "You are a good man, Charlie Brown" and we will make "Oedipus King"-the children eat it up. Let the children in a room laugh at Neil Simon-Brown The brown baby of Cox, they may have never heard of this name before. I just want to open their eyes to the world of drama."

Then, in 2014—while “Saturday Night Live” was actively looking for a black woman to join the cast—Roswell auditioned. Sasheer Zamata won the role, but Rothwell left enough impressions to get a spot in the screenwriting room. Although she was careful not to completely reduce the experience, Roswell said that her short time in the series had a negative impact on her behavior.

"I don't want people to think that I joined to meet demands," Roswell recalled. "I want to show that I belong to me. I want to sit at the table in'SNL' and I want them to think,'F-, she is funny. I like what she says. I see her, oh, that joke is great There are a lot of things to carry. And I think this is also an expression of the privilege of white writers: they don’t know how it feels to walk into the room and feel that the audition is not over. I have never felt it. Raising my hand is I want to know if it’s okay. Hear my voice. This is Pavlovian to me."

"I remember I said,'Girl, you don't have to raise your hands like that. Why do you keep raising your hands? Let's get it straight," Petunia said, emphasizing that Roswell was the first writer hired for "Insecure." "And she was like,'Well, because in my last show, I was not allowed to talk. I had to ask,'Can I talk? We were all heartbroken in the room when I heard the news. The idea of ​​anyone trying to kill her talent or trying to hide her talent under a lampshade-can you imagine?"

Roswell finally found confidence in "insecurity." Since then, it has been inspiring her.

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"My confidence in entering'White Lotus' revolves around what I started to be'insecure'," she said. "Six years ago, I would only say yes to this part without asking any questions. But now I say,'I need to talk to the director because as a person of color, I am in a servile position in a homogeneous group. I think Make sure we do it right... If it weren’t for “insecurity”, I wouldn’t have this confidence—and my confidence as a writer to be able to make a joke to Mike White who I’ve been watching The promotional moment has been since "Freaks and Geeks"-it feels like I am sitting at the table with him."

"She reads the script from a dramatic perspective, not just as an actor," White said. "She is very reflective about this. She has a more comprehensive view of the whole project. I think I have seen myself in the circus we are building, and there is a like-minded person to rely on."

"White Lotus" not only marked a breakthrough moment for her as an actor, but also heralded her next move: Roswell evaluated her life and career during the quarantine-just like Kelly was mistakenly classified as dead After reflecting on her legacy, as at her 10th college party-she began to think about what she hoped the next five years would look like.

"I want to direct TV. I want to direct a movie. I want to enter the field legally and become a participant in it," she said. "So when I needed to direct this season, I had a big fire, and I don't think I will have this kind of fire before the pandemic. This is a very real activator."

Rothwell said that this episode is about choices: “It’s a bit like Issa, Lawrence, and Nathan [Kendrick Sampson] walking towards Jesus and knowing that you have to support the decisions you make and make those about what you want, Rather than what you think others want. It’s basically a call for authenticity. As we saw in this episode, Nathan wants to know if his choice in the barbershop is correct; Isa wants to know that she is not with Lawrence Did you make the right choice, and is Nathan's idea correct? It represents your 30s: "What do I think? How am i feeling? What do i want? what do you want? "

Now Roswell is learning how to answer these questions. Do you know what it is? Grow.

The complete guide to family viewing

Get Screen Gab weekly recommendations, analysis, interviews, and irreverent discussions on TV and streaming movies that everyone is talking about.

You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.

Yvonne Villarreal reports on TV shows for the Los Angeles Times.

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