Actress and writer Lena Waithe made history last night as the very Black woman to win an Emmy for best writing for a comedy series for “Master of None.”
“Let me reclaim my time, give me a second,” Waithe joked as she walked on stage to accept the award with her co-writer Aziz Ansari.
The duo was honored for their writing of the episode “Thanksgiving,” which if you haven’t seen yet. Stop everything and turn on your Netflix. Ansari deferred his time at the mic to Waithe, who thanked her mother for inspiring the story, Ansari for “pushing” her to co-write the episode, and her girlfriend who she loves more than life itself (~swoon~).
Waithe called her LGBTQ community, family. “I see each and every one of you,” Waithe says. “The things that make us different, those are our superpowers. Every day when you walk out the door, put on your imaginary cape and go out there and conquer the world because the world would not be as beautiful as it is without us in it.”
“And to everybody out there who showed us so much love with this episode,” she concluded, “thank you for embracing a little Indian boy from South Carolina and a little queer black girl from the South Side of Chicago. We appreciate it more than you could ever know.”
To see an out queer woman play the role of an out queer woman on television is revolutionary. Waithe shows representation for not only lesbians when she wrote this episode, but for Black LGBTQ people who face different complexities in coming out to their parents. This award was so well deserved. Waithe is an inspiring, showing young Black queer girls that they can have it all.
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