• Celebrity
    • Celebrity News
    • ‘Yes, Girl!’ Podcast
    • Entertainment
    • Black Celeb Couples
    • Celebrity Moms
    • Red Carpet
  • Fashion
    • Fashion News
    • Street Style
    • Accessories
    • Fashion Week
  • Beauty
    • Beauty News
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Nails
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
  • Hair
    • Hair News
    • Natural
    • Relaxed
    • Transitioning
    • Weaves
    • 4C
  • Love
    • Love & Sex
    • The Solve Podcast
    • Weddings
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
  • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle News
    • Build Your Legacy
    • Coronavirus: Everything You Need to Know
    • Health & Wellness
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Money & Career
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Black Travel Guide
    • Currency Conversations
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Raise Your Voice
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Videos
  • Events
    • Black Women in Hollywood
    • WELLNESS HOUSE: YEAR OF RENEWAL
    • LEVEL UP: Entrepreneur Summit (DEC 2020)
    • Power Tools
    • SHE GOT NOW
    • Girls United Summit
    • Making Moves Now: Virtual Bootcamp
    • #EF SESSIONS
    • Dear Black Men
    • Cares Act
    • News & Announcements
  • Festival
  • Subscribe
  • Essence Studios
  • Girls United
  • NaturallyCurly
  • Shop Essence

Follow Us

Skip to content
  • Essence Studios
  • Girls United
  • NaturallyCurly
  • Shop Essence
  • Celebrity
    • Celebrity
    • Celebrity News
    • ‘Yes, Girl!’ Podcast
    • Entertainment
    • Black Celeb Couples
    • Celebrity Moms
    • Red Carpet
  • Fashion
    • Fashion
    • Fashion News
    • Street Style
    • Accessories
    • Fashion Week
  • Beauty
    • Beauty
    • Beauty News
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Nails
    • AVEENO® Skin Health Startup Accelerator
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
  • Hair
    • Hair
    • Hair News
    • Natural
    • Relaxed
    • Transitioning
    • Weaves
    • 4C
  • Love
    • Love
    • Love & Sex News
    • The Solve Podcast
    • Weddings
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
  • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle
    • Lifestyle News
    • Build Your Legacy
    • Coronavirus: Everything You Need to Know
    • Health & Wellness
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Money & Career
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Black Travel Guide
    • Currency Conversations
  • News
    • News
    • Latest News
    • Raise Your Voice
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Videos
  • Events
    • Events
    • Black Women in Hollywood
    • WELLNESS HOUSE: YEAR OF RENEWAL
    • LEVEL UP: Entrepreneur Summit (DEC 2020)
    • Power Tools
    • SHE GOT NOW
    • Girls United Summit
    • Making Moves Now: Virtual Bootcamp
    • #EF SESSIONS
    • Dear Black Men
    • Cares Act
    • News & Announcements
  • Festival
  • Subscribe
Brandee Evans | Photo credit Starz Entertainment LLC
Home · Entertainment

'P-Valley's' Brandee Evans Says Playing Mercedes Was Meant For Her

By Taiia Smart Young · August 17, 2020August 18, 2020
A string of bad luck nearly made this teacher turned actress quit, but she had too much in common with this fan fave to give up on her dream role.

Before Brandee Evans transformed into Mercedes, the take-no-sh** OG pole dancer on P-Valley, she had 13 acting credits (over the course of eight years) to her name, one of which was a one-liner in 2017’s New Edition Story. Evans knew the NE role would lead to another. It did. Robi Reed, casting director and VP of Talent & Casting of Original Programming at BET, fought for Evans to get shot as Tina Brown (Bobby’s sister) in The Bobby Brown Story. Prior to landing those popular biopics, the Memphis beauty’s parts were so small that “if you blinked you missed me,” she says, chuckling at the memory during a Zoom call.

Nailing those one-liners led to a starring role in the Starz network’s binge-worthy show. Now, Evans is responsible for pages and pages of dialogue, including sharing sage wisdom as the dancer with 20 stacks to slide her way out of the spotlight. Because as Mercedes told Uncle Clifford (Nicco Annan), the owner and HBIC of The Pynk strip club, “25 is the age strippers retire.”

Brandee Evans | Photo courtesy of subject

Evans embodies the role, which includes keeping her mama (played by Harriet D. Foy) in check, shutting down patrons who feel some type of way about paying for lap dances and leading a dance team of teen girls. But the opportunity to breathe life into Mercedes almost eluded the brown skin girl.

“I was told that I didn’t fit any of the descriptions…. So I’m like, maybe it’s because I have this big, curly fro. So I hit up my girl Tia to make me a wig. I was sitting there with my friend and natural hairstylist Sasha and some measuring tape—the kind you get at Home Depot—measuring my head on FaceTime,” Evans says. Tia came through with a bomb wig and shipped it to L.A. “But they still wouldn’t let me in the room for the audition.”

The trained dancer and choreographer, who has performed on global stages and toured with Lil Wayne, refused to take no for an answer. Walking away from the project created by award-winning playwright and showrunner Katori Hall, would have been too easy. Being homeless? That’s hard. And she’s been there. Not making rent? Now that’s hard too. Thankfully, Evans had a good girlfriend who helped her pay her rent for almost a decade. 

Harriet D. Foy as Patrice Woodbine and Brandee Evans as Mercedes in Starz’s P-Valley | Photo credit Starz Entertainment LLC

Evans had too much in common with Mercedes to give up, right down to being a preacher’s kid with southern fried roots and a thorny relationship with her mama. As luck would have it, a tape of Evans dancing (submitted by her manger) got her a seat at the table. This time Evans brought the wig with her and even carried it to set when it was time to shoot the pilot. But the bone straight headpiece isn’t seen on-screen because Mercedes wasn’t rocking bangs in Episode 1. 

What Mercedes does rock is that pole. In the first episode we see her scale it and slam her heels into the ceiling using muscles and superpowers Wonder Woman could only dream about. “Our choreographer Jamaica Craft got me together because this was not ‘Dancing Brandee’ or even tour life Brandee,” Evans shares, admitting that she’s still learning the names of certain moves. “If I could do the head slides, I promise you, I probably would’ve tried it, but it was against my contract and keeping me safe, which I appreciate, but the daredevil in me just wants to do everything. My double [Spyda] is amazing. Every double I have is amazing,” Evans gushes. 

Brandee Evans as Mercedes (second from left) in Starz’s P-Valley | Photo credit Starz Entertainment LLC

That’s Spyda on the ceiling in the pilot episode. But that is Evans doing the surfboard, the trick where she’s standing on top of another dancer. The former high school English department chair says she has natural upper body strength, but she does give her guns a good workout. For her, freaking the athletic moves isn’t about how toned her arms are, it’s about properly using her legs and core muscles. 

While Evans is comfortable with the shows artful nudity (thanks to eight women directors at the helm), it has helped her to fall in love again with her thick thighs that save lives. “I’m embracing the stretch marks, embracing the cellulite and all that is beauty and natural. Everybody ain’t perfectly smooth. You are not a baby,” says Evans. “Now, I’m more comfortable with my body and I don’t care what people think. Everybody has an opinion. I don’t need your validation.”

It’s one thing for it not to work out, but it’s another to give up without trying everything first.

This is new territory for the actress. She comes from a dance world where girls were weighed every Friday. If she didn’t “make weight” she’d be ridiculed for coke-bottles curves and being built just like her mother. These days Evans celebrates that she gets it from her mama.

It’s been 11 years since Evans resigned from Southwind High School in Memphis. She was terrified as she sat on a bunk in Lil Wayne’s tour bus and wrote the letter terminating her teaching career. It was a risky move to leave benefits and stability, but education wasn’t her dream job. And she believed that dreams don’t have an expiration date. 

View this post on Instagram

On this day, 11 years ago I wrote my resignation letter to the school board. I was the English Department Chair. I penned this letter in my bunk on a tour bus. I have never regretted this decision. I wrote this letter afraid that I may burn a bridge I may need to cross again. But, I did it anyway. I even called the principal many times when things got hard in LA and said, “I may need to come back.” But God never allowed that to happen. THANK YOU GOD! As my teacher @mrrichardlawson says, “Dreams Don’t Have Expiration Dates!” Go after your dreams ya’ll! 🤗 #Jeremiah2911 Thank you for believing in me @kennismarquisofficial @otheezycreatedit 🙏🏾 #WayBackWednesday #TheRoadToPValley #PValley #ItsMyAnniversary Thank you for your music @indiaarie! It has inspired me over the years. #StrengthCourageWisdom #FollowYourDreams #PValleyStarz

A post shared by Brandee (@therealbrandee) on Jul 29, 2020 at 9:30am PDT

Evans promised herself that if she got the opportunity to be an actress she’d take it. And she cried each time she lost a job to another person, but wouldn’t give up until she exhausted all the possibilities. “I felt like if I didn’t keep pushing, I would’ve been a loser to myself. I don’t like to lose in life. I don’t like to lose in competitions. It’s one thing for it not to work out, but it’s another to give up without trying everything first.”

Spoken like a true hustler.  

Taiia Smart Young (@taiiasmartyoung) is an award-winning author, editor and speaker. She lives in New York.

Share :
TOPICS:  Entertainment Brandee Evans Nicco Annan pvalley startz stripper
COMPANY INFORMATION
  • Our Company
  • Customer Service
  • Essence Ventures
  • Change Your Address
  • Contact Us
  • Job Opportunities
  • Internships
  • Media Kit
  • tag
SUBSCRIBE
  • Newsletters
  • Give a Gift of ESSENCE
  • Magazine Tablet Edition
FOLLOW US
MORE ON ESSENCE
  • Home
  • Love
  • Celebrity
  • Beauty
  • Hair
  • Fashion
  • ESSENCE festival

ESSENCE.com is part of ESSENCE Communications, Inc.

Essence may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.

©2021 ESSENCE Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Essence.com Advertising Terms

Get The ESSENCE Newsletter and
Special Offers delivered to your inbox

By clicking Sign Up, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

Get The ESSENCE Magazine
by subscribing below
subscribe now