I grew up in a world where a woman who looks like me, with my kind of skin and my kind of hair, was never considered to be beautiful.

I realized that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume, it was something that I just had to be.

For me, true beauty has nothing to do with wrinkles and everything to do with the fact that my maternal grandmother raised five children just after the war and remained a fighter throughout her life. True beauty is the slick of red lipstick my paternal grandmother would put on before going to church on Sunday.

It was the sort of beauty you feel so deeply it becomes contagious and somehow makes you feel beautiful too.

I am not beautiful. My mother once called me an ugly duckling. But,listed separately, I have a few good features.

I'm proud of my wrinkles. They give my face character. As an actress, you mess with that at your peril.