"True Blood"'s Tara is a stand-out characterI don’t know about you, but when Sunday Funday night rolls around, all I want are my fat pants, Thai food and some quality time with the supernatural beings on True Blood. Now before you get all, “Oh Sookie — I love her!” on me, let me tell you I could kind of care less about Sookie Stackhouse and vampire Bill Compton. For me, it’s all about Sookie’s BFF Tara, played by Rutina Wesley.
What makes her so special? Well, have you seen her? She is gorgeous and her body is like a brick house. Her skin looks as though it has been bathed in honey and milk and kissed by pixies in the garden of hotness.
Beyond the superficial, Wesley is able to capture the balance of sassy attitude and childlike naivety of Tara’s character in a way that makes her likeable. To be honest, when the series started out, her character bugged me. I’m all for bitchy attitudes, but there were times when she went off for no apparent reason. As the show has progressed and her character has shown more vulnerability, I’ve grown to love her. So of course, now that I am on the road to becoming president of the Rutina Wesley fan club, I had to find out where to see more of her. Luckily for me, she starred in the movie, How She Move, which happens to fall into my favorite movie genre: The dance-off.
Ever since I was a young girl, movies like Beat Street and Breakin’ have made up the majority of my video collection. Yes, I do own You Got Served and Step Up and, yes, I have tried to replicate the movements with little to no luck. A girl can dream can’t she? Why can’t all disputes be settled with a good electric slide or cabbage patch? Wesley’s character in How She Move has dreams of going to medical school but can’t afford to due to some family issues. To keep her dream alive, she decides to try to make money in the most entertaining of all ways — by winning a step competition as the only female on an alpha-male led team. Perfect!
Interestingly enough, Wesley is a classically trained actress and dancer who has appeared on Broadway and was directed there by Sam Mendes (who worked with True Blood director Alan Ball on American Beauty). She grew up in Las Vegas and her parents are both professional dancers — her father a tap dancer and her mom a showgirl. After graduating from high school she got the heck out of Vegas and pursued her passion for the arts at the University of Evansville (in Indiana) and later at Julliard in New York.
She’s had a few small roles elsewhere (one of which was edited out), but not much more. Hopefully, her involvement with True Blood, will pave the way for more movies and TV shows. Until then, I’ll be going to the local Spencer’s Gifts at the mall and searching for the perfect Tara poster to hang on my wall. |
Recent blog posts
New forum topicsActive TopicsNew Comments
|







Facebook
Twitter
True Blood's Tara
Tara is a trip. I'm still trying to figure her out. The actress who plays her is hot. I most defintely notice her figure. Now knowing her background explains it all in how she got that body. Too bad her character isn't queer.
I,too, hope Rutina gets more acting gigs in films . I'm proud that a dark-skin sistah is gettin' some love and props.
Thanks,Hornito for doing an article on her. Speaking of True Blood I need get by Blood fever on.
I'm a huge fan.
Aside from the fact that she is absolutely stunning, I've loved her work in both True Blood and in How She Move. There's no doubt that she's extremely talented and I'm really hoping that her role in True Blood will help her to break out and get more acting roles. It's nice to see some new blood out there.
Dance like no one is watching. Love like you've never been hurt.
she's the reason
I have to admit that when I started watching the first episode of True Blood I was annoyed with the accent (probably because when I read the books they didn't have accents lol) but the minute Tara showed up in that store yelling at that lady I absolutly LOVED HER! Then I saw Lafayette and I was sold! Together they make the show spicy and I love me some spicies!!
*partir en premier ne veut pas toujours dire arriver en premier*
character Tara.
The best part of the show
Someone said this statement before but it deserves to be repeated: Sookie and Bill may be the lovers of the show, but the heart of it is Tara and Lafayette.
"I ate the mythology and dreamt."
---Yusef Komunyakaa
She's a brick-house!
damn!
shes fit! i have been looking for her dance movie but havent found it yet in the stores here i hope itll come on tv soon here, i love her southern accent when shes talking trash on true blood lol her and lafayette are what keep me watching the show ive grown bored of sookie and bill annoys me
"Hands upon my back again.
Survival is my only friend.
Terrified of what may come.
Remember I will always love you,
Even as I claw your fucking throat away.
But it will end no other way"
Tara...
It goes to show you never know...
It goes to show you never know who you are watching until an article is done about them. I did not put the pieces together until I read this that she was the young lady from How She Moves. I love all musicals and dance flicks so imagine my surprise when I put two and two together.
I must say I like this show from the beginning and Tara is my favorite character because she takes no mess. With that said I think that the writers are slipping a bit with her personality and this crazy chic having control over her. I still like the show and will keep supporting this talented young lady!
"Her skin looks as though it
"Her skin looks as though it has been bathed in honey and milk and kissed by pixies in the garden of hotness."
Funny...
I wanna have her babies; i mean, i really want them to genetically alter her eggs into sperm and inseminate me with them. She is so fucking HAWT!!! I just wanna drink her bath water or chew her toenail clippings...
Her hottness makes me dizzy...
"...close your legs, bitch; i can see your Spanx..."
OMG!!!
When I read your coment it had me laughing so hard I that I couldn't even breath. I so concur with you on her HOTNESS!! *Fans self with hand*
Pain is my only weakness...
Evansville?
Love True Blood and Weeds
Though sometime I get frustrated with True Blood, I mean they KNOW they are living with inhabitants of the underworld and they are so blase about it. :o(
Technology Will Lead To The Demise Of Civilization As We Know It.
I used to love Tara..
especially in Season 1. She and Lafayette were all about the trash talk! She is my favorite female seconded only by Amy.
She really annoys me now, because instead of the show focusing on her strong suit, they are really pulling out the neediness she can sometimes have.
Everybody is hot on True Blood. Even the guys (Eggs, Eric, Lafayette, Sam, Jason, DAMN)
I LOVE Rutina Wesley! I
Beauty & Talent!
Rutina Wesley is hooot! Bless the person who invented DVR. Tara's scene gets a lot of playback. On a non-oogling, I like Tara hard core directness.
" True enjoyment comes from activity of the mind and exercise of the body; the two are ever united" ~ Wilhelm von Humbolt
Hot-headed and HAWT
I love the fact that Tara is a multi-dimentional character. In movies and on television, I get kind of sick of seeing black women angry for no apparent reason. At least the character of Tara has a history, and is seeking a future as well. Bravo to the writers, and the talent of Rutina Wesley!
Did I mention she has fittest body I've seen since Angela Basset in "What's Love Got To Do With It?"
It just had to be said
It just had to be said again:
"She is gorgeous and her body is like a brick house. Her skin looks as though it has been bathed in honey and milk and kissed by pixies in the garden of hotness."
She and Lafayette are the only things the keep me watching this annoying show. We'll see how the Lesbian Vampire Queen of LA plays out. Maybe some hot butches? Wouldn't that be a dream come true. For me, anyway.
i agree
Woo
Although I like the other characters Tara definitely makes the show for me, her comedy is a welcome relief to the Sookie storyline at times (still love her but its a bit sappy), her and the grandma are the bestest.
If you have not found something you are willing to die for, you have not yet lived. - Dr Martin Luther King Jr.
shes cool
oh hell yeah
I don't think many people
I don't think many people watch for the main characters. lol I used to think the show sucked but I saw a bit of Eric and he was really interesting. I still have yet to watch any episodes in full (I saw a bit of the pilot and was just not impressed at all) but I'll eventually try it out.
Lauren
Total Agreement
My friends watch true blood all the time and their focus is primarily on the sookie/bill relationship, I found mine to be on Tara the moment her mouth opened in that grocery store-ish scene. She's freakin phenomenal and I'm extremely glad Rutina's getting into more roles that I can oggle her in lol but I really like how Rutina plays Tara, can't wait to see more of her ^^
~She gave me eleven roses, one was a plastic one and she said "I will love you until the last rose dies"~
i know!
they need a lafayette/tara episode with focus on them because i only watch true blood to see what they are going to say and do lol episodes that made me fall in love with them was when tara started working at the bar and making people uncomfortable by pulling the race card and the episode when lafayette cursed those guys out because they were say he was cooking "aids" food lol
"Hands upon my back again.
Survival is my only friend.
Terrified of what may come.
Remember I will always love you,
Even as I claw your fucking throat away.
But it will end no other way"