Interviews Conducted by Robert J. Beck

Do you know what your character’s going to be doing

next season?

No I don’t know what I’m going to be doing next
season, we’ve just started getting new scripts. I don’t
think that the writers even know necessarily what’s
going to happen for each character, I know they paint
with broad strokes. I know they have a rough idea of
what the arcs of certain characters should be and
how some certain episodes should go but I don’t
think they know what episode number 18 should
look like right now. But I think that’s what makes the
show brilliant. Every episode feels like there’s a whole
load of plot, a whole load of story in one episode and
there’s a whole load of jokes and I think it’s because
they’re focusing on what’s immediately in front of them
rather than space it all out.

Is there anything you’d like to see your character get
to do?

[laughter] Well I’ve said this before to someone but I
think it’s time for Toofer to get a love interest and I
think that the love interest should be Oprah Winfrey’s money [laughter]. But seriously what I really love about Toofer is how seriously he takes himself so I would love to see him kind of step out of his comfort zone in this way.

Do you think that there are enough roles for black actors in the US?

Well that’s a fantastic question. No, there’s not enough. I think that the black community is large and varied and diverse and I don’t think that the full spectrum of the black community is represented as well as it should be. But I think it’s a struggle for every minority so I’m defiantly not complaining about it. I wish that things were different but it’s not something I sit around and get bitter about or get upset about it’s just a reality of the business and I believe that everyone needs to pave their own way anyway and figure out how they fit in their profession and it’s no different for minority actors.

You have also produced your own show on Youtube called Keith Powell directs a play, what made you want to start that project?

Well I started that project about two years ago because during that time I was directing a play in real life and every time I spoke to someone in the television industry that I was directing a play they looked at me like I head three heads [laughter], saw me as being incompetent. Not in a condescending way but it’s just not something which they associated with me. So I had a summer off and I had a lot of friends around me and I really wanted to do something that kind of showed what people were looking at me like [laughter]. What would happen if a spoilt TV actor actually directed a play? So a lot of my friends were making fun of me when I was writing it and it was a lot of acting like a spoilt brat and being completely incompetent and crazy and shooting a story based upon a crazy version of me.

Do you plan on doing anything else on Youtube?

Well I’m in the middle of doing this challenge on Youtube that I’m very excited about where I post a video everyday for the month of August. Alyssa Milano who’s a pretty famous television actress here in the states, wanted to raise a certain amount of money for the national wildlife federation and I wanted to post for everyone who donates to the federation, through my site I pick a random donor and make a Youtube video for them. I think it’s very important to give to them because of their efforts to clean up the mess that the BP oil spill caused and you can donate to me site at www.firstgiving.com/RealKeithPowell and if you donate it goes straight to the federation, I don’t touch the money. Then I might make a very weird crazy video about you.

Have you been working on anything else over the summer?

Yeah but I want to keep that under wraps at the moment. There are a few writing projects that I’ve been developing and involved with. One of them being an animated show about when I was caught with porn when I was 13 years old, I’ve written an entire show about that.