“I always go against the grain,” says award-winning actress Chandra Wilson.

 And that’s just what landed her the role of Dr. Miranda Bailey on the critically acclaimed Grey’s Anatomy which had originally been written for a blond, white actress. She knew that casting directors hadn’t envisioned someone of her description for the part, but that may just be why she landed it.

“I basically didn’t have anything to lose so I could just go buck wild because it wasn’t for me,” she laughs.
The Texas-native who’s appeared on a string of popular shows including Third Watch, Sex and the City, The Sopranos, and Law & Order: SVU and on Broadway in “Coraline or Change” and “Avenue Q” admits that having a look that was outside the ideal Hollywood image of beauty did sometimes play on her self-esteem.

“For a hot minute- just a hot minute,” she stresses. “I entertained the thought that maybe I shouldn’t go on certain auditions.

“I could say, ideally, if I could lose 15 more pounds that would be good, or maybe if I did some work on my nose that would be good. If my hair was a little longer that would be good, and I could just stay in the house until all that happened.”

 Ultimately, if for no other reason than to avoid, “the inconvenience of having to cancel it,” she would push herself to go on every audition booked regardless of what she thought her chances were of getting the role.

“I would show up at my auditions and I would get the role, so my hair and my weight and my nose was not an excuse. It was all about going out there and doing it anyway as opposed to feeling like you have to look a certain way or be a certain way,” the mother of three explains. “The only thing that could have gotten in the way was me, and I just showed up as I was and found out that it was enough.

“That is something that we all have to learn anyway across the board. You’re already enough where you are so just present the best of what you are.”

And Wilson knows something about being among the best, this year being nominated for two NAACP Image awards for her role as “Grey Anatomy’s” Dr. Bailey and for portraying the leading role in the Hallmark original movie “Accidental Friendship.”

Though it’s the fourth time she’s been nominated for her role as Dr. Bailey, it’s the first time she’s been considered in the leading actress category rather that supporting, and Wilson understands the significance of image.

“Parents tell that me that their daughter for the first time is considering going into medicine because they’ve seen Dr. Bailey,” Wilson says. “You can’t be naïve enough to not think television impacts people’s lives in positive or negative ways so that’s a big compliment to the writing of the show as well— that it has changed young women’s mindsets about who they can be.”

While honored to receive both nominations, Wilson is especially excited about the movie receiving attention.

“It’s like the little engine that could, our little movie for hallmark,” says Wilson. “The producers came to me and wanted me to take a look at the script because it’s something that they had me in mind for. I really took to it because of Yvonne’s story.”

Based on a true story, Wilson’s plays a homeless woman, Yvonne, who pulls her life together with the help of a policewoman who befriends her.

“It’s a very human story,” Wilson explains. “Anybody at anytime can find themselves a little bit down on their luck, but they don’t have to stay in this situation just because they’re there. This movie makes it a little bit harder to just look down on folks that seem a little less unfortunate.”

A graduate of NYU’s prestigious Tisch School of the Arts, she began performing at just five years old with Houston’s Theatre Under the Stars, appearing in over ten of their major musicals, and graduated from The High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.
 

“My mom got me involved with a whole lot of stuff at a young age so I wouldn’t be idle and bored and start getting in trouble,” Wilson recalls. “That’s why I started taking acting classes and it was the place where I had the most fun, so she kept me in the class and she kept on encouraging me to keep at it.”

‘Keep at it’ she did and by the time of her senior year in college Wilson had landed an Off Broadway role— an invaluable experience for her.

“I had wonderful mentors early on. Women in the business that said look you’re going to do this and that’s what a career is,” says Wilson. “They just broke it down like that. Hearing that early on gets your mind in the right place, otherwise you’re constantly pounding the pavement asking when is it going to happen instead of enjoying that you’re already there.”

Taking their advice, Wilson kept busy the next few years constantly working on commercials, in television and film, and on the stage

“I was never trying to ‘get somewhere.’ As far as I was concerned I was already there because I was working as an actress.” It’s a mentality that keeps her down to earth and what she calls her saving grace. “I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be when I need to be there so there’s no need to be anxious.”

As such, the Screen Actors Guild, Image, and People’s Choice Award recipient who has been nominated for three Emmys and a BET Award chooses her roles carefully.

As a Christian in the entertainment industry she remains conscious of what she presents to the world and can proudly state that she has yet to take on a role where she’s felt that she’s compromised herself.

“There are certain things I’ve looked at and said, this is a great opportunity and it would be great to work with x, y, and z, but there is no reason for me to represent this image. It’s not furthering anything spiritually,” Wilson explains.
“I have to reconcile my view of the world and Christ’s walk, and I tend to lean more towards Christ’s walk and His gospel than I do about what man teaches because it all comes from the point of view of another human being. In any time of conflict I say– it’s very cliché but I’ll say it anyway, ‘where would Christ be on this issue.’”

Wilson is a constant humanitarian having worked with Habitat for Humanity in 2008, serving as the ambassador for Lee National Denim Day – one of the largest single-day fundraisers for breast cancer in the country – in 2008, and now she’s representing two campaigns. One is a series of PSA with OTCsafety.org on educating parents of the safe use and storage of children’s over the counter cough and cold medicines and the other, Donwy’s Quilts for Kids, distributes handmade quilts to young patients in the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals across the nation.
She confesses though that with all her good deeds, she hasn’t attended her home church regularly in a few years.

“At three, my son’s not ready to sit and be cooperative, but once he’s ready I’ll be able to attend weekly fellowship again,” she laughs. “Give it another 6 months.”

But she definitely plans to become a churchgoer once again. She’s had periods in her life before when she’s been without a church home for years and she knows she needs “to fellowship with others, and not just rely on what you know, because then you become stagnant and you’re not growing in your spirit. That’s what made me go back because I know that I have to feed my spirit.”

She remembers that before finding her most recent church home, “I had to rely on my Sunday broadcast which is completely different than when you’re in fellowship. It’s scriptural that we need to be in fellowship, that it’s not just enough to study on your own. When two or more are gathered in one place in prayer, Christ is right in the middle of that.”