Concreteloop recently had an opportunity to chat it up with actress, singer and activist, Tatyana Ali. The 31 year-old is best known for her role as the young Ashley Banks in the 90′s television sitcom, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Since leaving the popular show, the singer has gone to college (Harvard University), started her own production company, (HazraH Entertainment) and given back to the community. After nearly a decade and a half, the Harvard graduate is making her return to television, starring in a new sitcom Love That Girl!. Check out what Ms. Ali had to say about her life after Fresh Prince as well her upcoming show:
Concreteloop:
Ms. Tatyana Ali! How are you?Tatyana:
I’m doing great, excited, how are you?Concreteloop:
Good, good. Happy New Year!Tatyana:
Happy New year to you, too.Concreteloop:
Can I just say that I cannot get your song ‘Day Dreamin’ out of my head? I’ve been humming and singing ‘All day long I think of you…’ for the past to days! It’s gotten pretty bad…but yeah, I love that song!Tatyana:
[laughs] Oh my goodness, thank you. I love that song, too. I really do. Thank you.Concreteloop:
Yeah, of course, but anyway before we even talk about your music career and of course, your new show Love That Girl!…Let’s take a step back to your Fresh Prince days, shall we, ‘Miss Ashley Banks’?Tatyana:
Yes, let’s do it!Concreteloop:
Alright. First of all, what was it like working on that show (Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) at such a young age?Tatyana:
Umm, it was amazing. It changed my whole life. It changed my family’s life. It moved us from New York to California and I went from, you know, being a normal kid. I’d been acting since I was four, so I always had this strange schedule, you know? Sometimes people knew me from commercials or whatever, or from Sesame Street. I remember me and my Mom being in NYC during one of the summers after the show had come out and there was this school bus of kids that had just kind of pulled up and we were just walking down the street and they started kind of yelling and screaming.
