WNBA Star Tina Charles Uses New Film ‘Game Changer’ To Incite Change in Gaming

Skilled basketball participant Tina Charles is not any stranger to the highlight as a two-time Olympic gold medal winner in basketball and member of the WNBA’s Washington Mystics, however it’s movie that has afforded the 2010 #1 draft decide the chance to inform poignant and highly effective tales about on a regular basis all-stars and sport changers. In 2019, Charles launched a documentary undertaking about her music business father, titled Charlie’s Data, which made its debut to a sold-out crowd on the Tribeca Movie Pageant that 12 months.

Along with her newest work, Charles put the world on discover—she’s received a imaginative and prescient and a voice, and he or she’s hellbent on sharing it via movie, one documentary at a time.

In Sport Changer, Charles follows the journey of Tanya DePass, a lifelong Chicagoan who takes on the skilled gaming world to combat for higher illustration of African Individuals and girls within the business. DePass is on a mission to make gaming higher and extra inclusive for everybody, together with folks like herself, and in telling her story, Charles hopes to obviously display why illustration in usually white areas issues, in addition to encourage others to combat for the causes that may really result in progressive change on the earth. 

Sport Changers is one in every of 4 brief movies chosen to be a part of the 2023 Queen Collective, a expertise improvement program launched by Procter & Gamble in partnership with Queen Latifah and Tribeca Studios to mentor and information numerous ladies filmmakers who’ve a recent perspective on the storytelling that examines humanity and constructive social modifications. This 12 months’s spherical of movies will likely be featured on BET and BET Her as a part of the Juneteenth celebration.

BET.com spoke with Charles about what motivates and evokes her to pursue varied movie initiatives, why variety is so vital, and the recommendation that she acquired that actually modified the way in which she makes movies.

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BET.com: What do you discover most fun or interesting about being a movie director?

Tina Charles: What I discover most interesting is simply the method and what it takes to make a movie. And that’s one thing that I like, being part of the method after which the ultimate course of. Being an athlete, being within the WNBA, getting up and going to the fitness center early so as so that you can work exhausting, to grow to be nice…these are all of the issues that I utilized to filmmaking. I like the truth that I could be behind the scenes and nonetheless have an ideal affect on how a narrative is advised. And so, for me personally, that’s the enjoyment that I get. It’s seeing one thing come collectively, particularly with nonfiction having the ability to inform anyone else’s story and provides them a platform and permit them to be seen.

BET.com: For you, is there any distinction between being acknowledged as a director and as a Black feminine director?   

Tina Charles: For me personally, the African American feminine administrators who got here earlier than me are the explanation why I’ve the alternatives that I’ve at the moment. You wish to get to an area the place you’re only a director and it doesn’t should be excellent like, ‘Oh, this can be a Black lady that made this movie.’

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BET.com: Black ladies like Issa Rae (HBO’s Awkward Black Lady) and Michaela Coel (HBO’s I Could Destroy You) are actually altering the sport of filmmaking. What do you imagine is the largest impediment for ladies eager to make their mark in movie, and what recommendation are you able to supply for ladies making an attempt to beat these obstacles?

Tina Charles: Simply having entry and having the ability to erase the stigma that variety means much less high quality. I believe that’s the largest impediment. Minorities have to have the ability to see themselves doing this stuff to allow them to imagine that they are often there at some point. Simply take a look at Issa Rae, and what she’s been in a position to do, being a trailblazer, that’s what gave me hope. Yeah, I’m recognized for being a WNBA participant, however this can be a lane that I can get it in. I imply, Issa didn’t make her first movie till she was 32, 33, in order that positively gave me hope, simply being 32 myself.

BET.com: Have you ever gotten any recommendation from anybody else within the business that has modified the sport for you?

Tina Charles: I must say my producer, Veronique Bernard, who can be a movie instructor at Hunter School in New York. She advised me that you just make a movie 3 times—you make it earlier than you really do your capturing, you make it if you’re capturing it and truly placing it collectively, after which you’ve submit. She was simply letting me know that it’s a course of and that’s one thing that I’ve taken with me ever since she stated it to me. That is the primary movie that I used to be in a position to work alongside her, with Sport Changer, and I’m very grateful to have had her with me.  

BET.com: Let’s speak about Sport Changer. What was your inspiration for the movie and why did you are feeling that it was vital to tackle the subject material of variety in gaming?

Tina Charles. I grew up enjoying video video games. I began at an early age, however I didn’t see myself as a superhero. After doing a little analysis and discovering Tanya DePass and what she displays and represents within the gaming business, simply pushing for equality, pushing for illustration, being a job participant, developer, marketing consultant—that did wonders for me. I stated, you understand what? Her story must be advised as a result of she is breaking obstacles. She is getting entry, and he or she received sick and uninterested in not seeing herself in video video games. She’s not somebody who simply stated one thing about it; she took motion. And I’m all about taking motion in issues that I wish to advocate for and alter.

Her story is simply unbelievable. What we’re seeing now, the reflection of Black characters, all of it begins together with her. The entry that she will get via her nonprofit, I Want Extra Numerous Video games, it permits the youth and minority folks of colour, LGBTQ people to have entry to the biggest sport improvement convention. It’s vital for them to have the ability to see themselves and imagine that they too could be sport builders and alter the panorama. Tanya DePass is simply very particular.

BET.com: What’s the message or the takeaway that you really want folks to depart with as soon as they’ve considered the movie?

Tina Charles: That variety doesn’t imply much less high quality. There are different tales that should be advised. We’re going to maintain seeing video video games the place there’s a white superhero, Black ladies solely mirrored as prostitutes, Black characters who’re solely seen as both a thug, a villain or an athlete, however Tanya is altering that panorama.

To ensure that these tales to alter, the people who find themselves making the tales have to alter, after which it’s important to give alternative and entry. And in order that’s precisely what Tanya is doing in her video video games with how Black characters are represented.

BET.com: Is there something that you just’ve discovered about your self as a filmmaker via the making of this documentary?

Tina Charles: I must say that I can face something. I don’t suppose that there’s something that I can’t overcome if I put my thoughts to it and if I’ve the appropriate folks round me. And simply being humble within the course of. I didn’t go to high school for movie, however I’ve a love for telling tales. I’ve a love for placing issues collectively. I like giving others a platform for his or her tales to be advised and doing movie permits me to just do that for another person.