When asked to describe herself Rosario Dawson replies ‘I am an actress, a producer, a philanthropist, an environmentalist and a bad-ass chick’. Clearly, she is a woman of many talents.
Raised by her mother and grandmother, Rosario was discovered when she was only 15 on her ’stoop’ by Larry Clark and Harmony Korine. They asked her if she wanted to be in a film and that film ended up being the popular mid 90s hit Kids. By 16 she had an agent, had moved to New York and took it upon herself to ensure she finished high school. And after 13 successful years she is still going strong.
Though producing is more of a recent string to her bow, it was actually when she was 15 at the Lee Strasbourg Institute that she decided that she would produce and act, whilst her friend Talia Lugacy would go onto write and direct. Many years the fruits of a collaboration between the two finally came into fruition with Descent released in 2007. Also, take into consideration her work for charity Lower Eastside Girls Club, as well as co-founding her own charity Voto Latino and you wonder how on earth she finds the time.
In her own words, ‘acting as it came to me as a career has helped to evolve me as well as someone who understands how we can all change hats and be different people and accomplish quite a lot actually in a full day…’
Unlike many of her contemporaries Rosario seems refreshingly content, ‘I’ve been really glad and grateful that I have a career that has been good and well but has also encouraged me to try out different things that I want to do and be the different people I want to be – not just for playing a character with different lines but actually playing and growing to be different people in my own life and that’s been a good journey.’
