“You know, I spent a lot of time trying to convince this industry that I’m more than a one-trick pony,” Niecy Nash-Betts told EBONY. “They met me doing comedy, with things like Reno 911, I played Bernie Mac’s sister on the Bernie Mac Show. They were like, oh, we know what you do. I was Cedric “The Entertainer’s” wife for many years on a show called The Soul Man. And I was like, but there is more! It took me a while to get the industry to see me like I saw myself.”
Now a multi-award winning actress—most recently an Emmy for her supporting role in the thriller series Dahmer—Nash-Betts is showing us just how multi-faceted she is. She’s an author; she directs and has a song under her belt after her wife released a single inspired by her viral 2024 Emmy speech. Now she’s adding one more thing to her ever-growing resume: menopause spokesperson.
The actress recently teamed up with Versalie, a new, digital-first platform offering connections, support and resources for all things menopause. As she navigates this chapter in her own life, she hopes to shed a little light for other women as well.
“Let’s talk about the fact that I feel like I was duped because the only thing I heard from my mother and my aunties was at one point, ‘Girl, you gonna get so hot.’ I thought that was all it was. I didn’t know much more than that, and there are so many other things that come along with it. So, after hearing about Versalie, I immediately leaned in because I was like, wow, this is one-stop shopping. You have menopause-trained clinicians, which is a special thing in and of itself. Typically if you go to the doctor with a symptom, they may just treat that and not even be aware that what they’re treating is your menopause. There’s also a curated storefront and online community so you feel like you are not alone.”
Beyond this important work and her passion for being a voice for those who are often overlooked—as evidenced in that viral speech—the star is shining in her latest role as lead actress in the Ryan Murphy series, Grotesquerie, now on FX. Hitting our televisions this fall, Nash-Betts says this project is special because she’ll not only be the lead character but also one who struggles with something deep.
“I like the fact that I get to thread the needle and taste multiple disciplines in the industry,” she shared. “I will tell you, though, in Grotesquerie, I’m playing something I’ve never played before, which is a woman with an addiction.”
Although different from any other role she’s played thus far, the actress shared that it wasn’t as heavy as her role in Dahmer since this character isn’t based on a true story. But, despite that, it’s just as important because of the special friendship she’s built with Ryan Murphy and her own internal pressure to “get it right.”
“I just wanted to make sure that I did the character justice the way he [Murphy] saw it. And leading a series is very, very different. You work all day, every day. It’s a labor of love, but it is labor.”
A class act in every sense of the word, the star said she isn’t stopping until she can reach the acclaimed EGOT status—and even then, she’ll likely still keep going. The epitome of EBONY’s mantra, pushing Black forward, before we closed we asked Nash-Betts to share what those three words mean to her and how they manifest in her life and the work that she does.
“Oh, honey, I push Black forward every day when I open my eyes, you know what I mean? I chose to share the best of my love with someone who was also Black. I make myself available to people who look like me, every day. Whether they need advice, need prayer or me to help pick up their spirit. I mean, I love being Black. I’m unapologetically Black, and I know that there are some things that unless you are Black, you just don’t understand.”
