Call HER Mary J. Blige The Actress

Mary J. Blige |  The Complete Acting Resume  |  1998 to Present

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Say her name. Say it correctly. Mary J. Blige the Actress Not just the Queen of Hip-Hop Soul. Not just nine Grammy Awards and eighty million records sold. All of that is true and all of that is extraordinary. But that is not the whole story. The whole story includes the Oscar nomination. The Golden Globe nomination. The Critic's Choice nomination. The Off-Broadway stage debut. Four seasons as one of the most compelling characters in the history of television drama.

The whole story is that Mary J. Blige is also an actress. A genuinely great one. And this site exists to make sure everyone knows it.

Who I Am and Why I Built This Site

My name is Kathleen and I am a die hard Mary fan. I have been following her career since the beginning and I will be following it until the end. I was honored and grateful to be part of the Billboard Awards Icon tribute for Mary J. Blige. She is a wonderful, humble, and loving lady and she deserves every single thing that has ever been said about her greatness.

But I kept noticing something that bothered me. When people talked about Mary they always talked about the music. The albums. The voice. Real Love. My Life. Not Gon Cry. Be Without You. And yes, all of that deserves every conversation it gets. That music changed lives. It changed mine.

But nobody was talking about Florence Jackson. Nobody was talking about Monet Tejada. Nobody was documenting every episode, every role, every performance, every outfit. Nobody was making the case that Mary J. Blige is not just a music legend who occasionally acts. She is a legitimately great dramatic actress who also happens to be one of the greatest musicians of her generation.

So I built this site. To make that case. Every single day.

The Case for Calling Her The Actress

Let me give you the resume. Because when you see it laid out all at once, when you see twenty-six years of intentional, serious, committed acting work, it is impossible to argue with.

This is not a music star doing cameos. This is an actress building a career.

THE COMPLETE ACTING RESUME

•        1998  The Jamie Foxx Show — Ola Mae — her very first acting role

•        2001  Prison Song — Mrs. Butler — first film role alongside Q-Tip

•        2001  Strong Medicine — Simone Fellows — early Lifetime TV drama role

•        2004  The Exonerated (Off-Broadway) — Sunny Jacobs — her stage debut in New York City

•        2007  Ghost Whisperer — Jackie Boyd — CBS drama guest role

•        2007  Entourage — Herself — HBO guest appearance

•        2009  30 Rock — Herself — NBC Season 3 finale Kidney Now!

•        2009  I Can Do Bad All By Myself — Tanya — Tyler Perry film alongside Taraji P. Henson

•        2012  Rock of Ages — Justice Charlier — major Hollywood musical film

•        2013  Betty and Coretta — Dr. Betty Shabazz — alongside Angela Bassett

•        2013  Black Nativity — Platinum Fro — alongside Jennifer Hudson and Forest Whitaker

•        2015  The Wiz Live! (NBC) — Evillene — Critic's Choice nominated performance

•        2016  How to Get Away with Murder — Guest role on ABC drama

•        2017  Mudbound — Florence Jackson — Oscar nominated, Golden Globe nominated

•        2018  Sherlock Gnomes — Irene — animated voice role

•        2019  The Umbrella Academy — Cha-Cha — recurring villain on Netflix

•        2019  Scream: Resurrection — Sherry Elliot — VH1 horror series alongside Keke Palmer

•        2020  Body Cam — Renee Lomito-Smith — lead dramatic role

•        2020  Trolls World Tour — Queen Essence — DreamWorks animated voice role

•        2020-2024  Power Book II: Ghost — Monet Tejada — main cast, 4 seasons, 40 episodes on Starz

•        2021  Pink Skies Ahead — Dr. Monroe — therapist role in MTV film

•        2021  Respect — Dinah Washington — Aretha Franklin biopic

•        2022  Lost Ollie — Rosy — Netflix limited series voice role

•        2024  Rob Peace — Jackie Peace — Sundance film premiere

The Moment Everything Changed — Mudbound (2017)

I have to talk about Mudbound specifically because it is the moment that the rest of the world started paying attention to what those of us who had been watching already knew.

Mary J. Blige plays Florence Jackson in Dee Rees's stunning 2017 Netflix film. A Black sharecropper's wife in 1940s Mississippi. No music. No performance. Just a woman living a hard life with extraordinary dignity and grace. And Mary delivers one of the most quietly devastating performances I have ever seen in a film.

She received two Academy Award nominations for Mudbound. Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Florence Jackson. And Best Original Song for Mighty River which she co-wrote and performed. She became the first person in Oscar history to receive acting and songwriting nominations in the same year for the same film.

The FIRST PERSON IN OSCAR HISTORY to receive acting and songwriting nominations in the same year for the same film. That is Mary J. Blige. That is what we are talking about.

And Then Came Monet Tejada

After Mudbound proved to the film world that Mary J. Blige was a serious dramatic actress, Power Book II: Ghost proved it to the television world. Four seasons. Forty episodes. One of the most complex, compelling, fully realized female characters in the history of premium cable television.

Monet Tejada is a drug queenpin, a mother, a survivor, a strategist, and a woman who loves her children so fiercely that it eventually destroys everything she built for them. Mary played every contradiction of that character without flinching. Every season she found something new. Every episode she brought complete commitment.

She died in Season 4 Episode 9 protecting her son Cane. Her last words were My babies. And I have not fully recovered from that moment and I do not expect to.

Why This Site Exists

This site exists because the world needs a place that documents Mary J. Blige's acting career with the same love and attention that her music has always received.

It exists because Florence Jackson deserves to be talked about. Because Monet Tejada deserves to be analyzed episode by episode, outfit by outfit, season by season. Because Evillene's performance in The Wiz Live! deserves to be celebrated every single day. Because the Off-Broadway stage debut in 2004 deserves to be remembered. Because every role from Ola Mae in 1998 to Jackie Peace in 2024 is part of a story that is still being written.

I am not Mary J. Blige. I am Kathleen, a diehard fan from Leesburg, Virginia, who believes with everything she has that Mary J. Blige is one of the greatest artists of her generation in music AND one of the most compelling actresses working today.

And I am going to keep writing about it until everyone else believes it too.

Call her the actress. Because that is exactly what she is.

Subscribe below to follow along as we document every role, every character, and every season of the most underrated acting career in Hollywood.

Every role. Every character. Every season. ♥

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Every role. Every character. Every season. ♥