Zoe Kravitz's career has exploded recently with amazing roles in films like Dope, Mad Max: Fury Road, and Divergent.
But despite her talent, Kravitz, like many actresses in Hollywood, sometimes gets turned away from roles because of her race.
In the August issue of Nylon, Kravitz revealed that she was turned down for a small role in The Dark Knight Rises because they weren't "going urban":
In the last Batman movie [The Dark Knight Rises], they told me that I couldn't get an audition for a small role they were casting because they weren't 'going urban,'" she says. "It was like, 'What does that have to do with anything?' I have to play the role like, 'Yo, what's up, Batman? What's going on wit chu?'"
In order to fight back against Hollywood's stereotypical view of black women, Kravitz consciously chooses roles that don't focus on race.
And she's even had a role rewritten just for her; her character Chloe in The Brave Ones:
"That part was written for a white Russian girl," says Kravitz. "I auditioned, and they changed the role for me."
I identified with white culture, and I wanted to fit in," she says. "I didn't identify with black culture, like, I didn't like Tyler Perry movies, and I wasn't into hip-hop music. I liked Neil Young. But as time went on, her views shifted. "Black culture is so much deeper than that," she says, "but unfortunately that is what's fed through the media. That's what people see. That's what I saw. But then I got older and listened to A Tribe Called Quest and watched films with Sidney Poitier, and heard Billie Holiday and Nina Simone. I had to un-brainwash myself. It's my mission, especially as an actress.