Thank goodness for Jodie Turner-Smith. In the fabulous but fickle world of Hollywood interviews, actresses can verge on the prickly and defensive side. Not her. The woman is a lightning rod of self-assured charm and relentless positivity. Yes, there are the typical Hollywoodisms — “feeling blessed”, “meditating on grace” — but she really does love to laugh. And oh, she is wonderfully frank. Over our hour together we tick off motherhood (“I had no idea what I was capable of”), her early days of modelling (“I was told I should think about getting lipo!”), fashion, family — and even her high-profile divorce.
We start with her career. Born in the UK but raised in the States, Turner-Smith got her breakout role in 2019’s critically acclaimed Queen & Slim, opposite Daniel Kaluuya, about a couple on a first date who unwittingly become fugitives. She has since acted alongside Colin Farrell in the AI drama After Yang, Jennifer Aniston in Murder Mystery 2, Greta Gerwig in the dark comedy White Noise and Brian Cox in the political thriller The Independent. “I love Brian Cox — he’s amazing,” she says. “He asked me to do a movie that he’s written. I was like, ‘I’ll do anything for you, Brian, are you kidding me?’” She was the first black woman to play Anne Boleyn on primetime TV, in a mini-series for Channel 5 in 2021, and played God in the last series of Netflix’s mega-hit Sex Education.
As for what’s next, Turner-Smith, 37, has just wrapped The Acolyte, a TV series from the Star Wars franchise, and has another series in the works, Bad Monkey, with Vince Vaughn. I speak to her from her hotel room in Vancouver, where she’s spending months filming a huge sci-fi blockbuster, Tron: Ares, a sequel to 2010’s Tron: Legacy, with Jared Leto, Greta Lee and Gillian Anderson. “I feel like the world is my oyster. I’m pinching myself, it’s insane!” she exclaims. “I really love what I do. It excites me, it thrills me, it fulfils me. And I feel like there’s only more to come from it. All I want is to grow, get better, to learn from what I’ve done and to constantly move. And all the while make sure that I’m looking after myself and everyone around me.”
The main person around her is her three-year-old daughter, whom she had with the former Dawson’s Creek actor Joshua Jackson, 45. “The most important thing, like in any relationship, is boundaries,” she says on parenting. “I love how strong my daughter’s personality is and I don’t want to crush any part of that, but at the same time I want to teach her how to have respect for herself and for others.”
Talk often comes back to her daughter. “Everything really is for her. Women are always taught that we’re second class in so many ways, especially once we become mothers. You’re treated as if you now have limitations and it’s like, no, I’ve just done this amazing thing [giving birth] that shows me I’m actually one of the most amazing beings to ever walk the earth!” She laughs at herself. “And you’re treating me like I’m less?! Motherhood makes me more powerful. Now I know I am capable of so much, because I became a mother. Thank God I became a mother! Not only has it been revealed to me exactly how powerful I am, but it has also been revealed to me that I deserve the world.”
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I first met Turner-Smith back in 2019 on the London set of her first Style photoshoot. At 6am her publicist phoned me to say that, by the way, Jodie’s pregnant. Panic ensued as the team were unsure if the clothes would fit — but Turner-Smith wore them with aplomb. Jackson accompanied her to the set, she wore an enormous diamond engagement ring and referred to him as “her husband” weeks before news of their marriage went public. When I interviewed Jackson last April he told me: “We have an understanding of each other and have enough differences that it stays interesting. And then we have this beautiful baby — you literally create the manifestation of your love. It is impossible for me to look into the face of my child without feeling love for my wife.”
So the world was taken aback when Turner-Smith filed for divorce last September, citing “irreconcilable differences”. Three months later pictures emerged of Jackson holding hands with the actress Lupita Nyong’o.
“Sometimes things we really want to work just don’t end up working,” Turner-Smith says now. “And that’s OK. The most important thing is that you choose what’s healthiest for you and your family and definitely your children. There are so many different moments in our life where we look at ourselves and say, ‘Who am I and am I being true to that?’ If the answer is no, then you have to make a move because I believe that there are visible scars from staying in places that are not good for us. And they don’t just affect us, they affect everybody around us. I don’t think it’s a failure. We obviously had such a beautiful moment together. And now it’s time for a new moment for both of us. And how exciting! The bravest thing in the world is to recognise when something’s not working and to make a move, and I always want to set that kind of example for my daughter. The big takeaway is that this is about just as much love and joy as it has always been. This is only about taking a step forward into a better life for everybody involved.”
Until now Turner-Smith has stayed silent on her divorce despite constant chatter online. “I’m not out here responding to everything that people say and people’s opinions because that’s a losing battle. At the end of the day I am not the only person in the world going through a divorce. There are millions of people in the world who are going through what I’m going through and that’s something that’s amazing about the internet, that sometimes it can offer you community.”
She’s not on the lookout for another relationship, in case you were wondering. “I am a single mother and it is incredible,” she enthuses. “Right now is a sensitive time, the time for me to be focused on her. I’m enjoying not having to focus on a man. Men take up a lot of space!”
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The other big relationship in Turner-Smith’s life is with fashion. She has been working with Gucci since 2019, and the brand “has always been my vibe”, she says today. “I’m bold, I’m out there sometimes.” She notes the significance of the support of such a huge luxury brand. “I have such a deep and profound love and respect for them that they took a chance on a young actress who didn’t have anything behind her. A fashion deal, a fragrance deal — that is an incredible amount of support for someone in the business and for a black woman. They changed my life financially, which is something that’s important to note and to be grateful for. Because money talks and allows independence. And independence lets you move in a way where you don’t have to be so afraid.”
Turner-Smith was born in Peterborough to Jamaican parents. Until he recently retired, her father was an officer at the Metropolitan Police. When she was ten her parents split up and her mother moved her and her older brother and sister to Maryland, where her own mother lived. Turner-Smith ended up going to university in Pittsburgh to study finance and became a banker, but quickly realised it wasn’t for her, so she moved to Los Angeles to pursue modelling. She hit the open-call castings, found an agent and within a month landed a Levi’s campaign.
“Back then, if you were a black model you really needed to have an agent and an agency, and you needed to work very hard,” she says. “It was much harder to get work. I was so f***ing thin and I was still being told by agencies in LA that I should think about getting lipo on my legs. I was 22 and tiny! Instagram has really changed things because people can be their own agencies in a way. We have so much more inclusivity now. Models with disabilities, models that have vitiligo, size inclusivity — it’s just better.”
In 2013 she landed a part as a vampire on the series True Blood, working her way through auditions here, parts there, before Queen & Slim propelled her to stardom.
And now here she is, her hair short and bleached blonde for Tron, gearing up for the day’s stunt scenes. In the next room her daughter is playing with grandma, who comes on set with Turner-Smith to help out. “Though there were a couple of times before my mum got here that I took her to work with me. I’m like, let’s go! I’m doing my stunt and she’s there in the back just watching.”
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She’s working with Gillian Anderson, the star of Sex Education, although Turner-Smith didn’t have any scenes with her when she was on the show. “Thank God in Tron I have scenes with Gillian and I can report to you that she is f***ing amazing, iconic and so much fun to work with,” Turner-Smith says. “We had her round for breakfast, did proper Jamaican ackee and saltfish, fried dumplings, fried plantain. She ate all of that and I got to tell her how much I love her and pick her brains.”
The plot of Tron is under wraps for now, “but I will tell you that they are sparing not a penny for this, the effects are incredible”. And they involve a number of stunts, which Turner-Smith loves and is off to do when we wrap up our interview. “That’s all you need to know, OK? I’m a bad bitch. That’s what’s clearly happening in this movie. You’re going to see that I’m a bad bitch.”
Jodie, I have no doubt.
Styling: Daniel Gaines. Hair: Ursula Stephen at A-Frame Agency using Living Proof. Make-up: Raisa Flowers at EDMA using PMG Labs. Set design: Jenny Correa at Walter Schupfer Management. Tailor: Jen Hebner at Carol Ai Studio. Postproduction: One Hundred Berlin. Local production: The Morrison Group. Location: WSA. Video cover photograph: Gabardine and silk blazer, £3,250, leather bag, £2,030, and necklace, £1,850, Gucci Ancora
