There are hundreds of young actors who dream of making it in Hollywood. Some will prosper and some will not make it. You have to have talent, grit, determination and a little bit of luck in the industry.
One actress we will definitely put our money on when it comes to making it in Hollywood is Dominique Mari. New to the business, she’s already had several appearances in film and television. The New York native appeared in the Netflix film Burning Sands, opposite the legendary Alfre Woodard, as well as a role in an episode of MacGyver and most recently, she appeared in the Law & Order episode Heroes.
For her first interview, we had the chance to talk with Dominique about a variety of topics including her training, remembering her very first paid gig, her thoughts on the state of the industry when it comes to diversity and some very sound advice she received from Alfre Woodard on the set of Burning Sands.
Pop Culture Principle – Was acting something you were interested in at a young age and when did you know you wanted to make it your career?
Dominique Mari – I always wanted to be an actor. I remember vividly being eight in my grandmother’s kitchen, and she asked my cousin and I what do you want to be when you get older. My cousin said they wanted to be an architect and I said that I wanted to be an actress. My grandmother told me to pick something else. She said, “that is not the road you want to go down Dominique.”
Obviously at eight, you can’t do anything in the industry without parental guidance. Looking back, I totally get why she said that. I’m a first generation Caribbean American and my family came here to have better opportunities and build a stable future. As we all know, there is nothing guaranteed or stable about a career in any artistic medium. Definitely not as an actor.
So, I opted for a more subtle approach. I did school plays in middle school, and then I was in a performing arts program at my high school in New York. I remember when I turned 18 thinking “I can do this now and no one can stop me!”. So I started making my plan and working on this while in college and I didn’t tell a soul.
Pop Culture Principle – Was there a specific television show or movie that motivated you to become an actor?
Dominique Mari – We used to watch a lot of Sesame Street growing up. I always thought it was cool watching kids that looked just like me. They didn’t look like celebrities, back then they looked like the kids I hung out with at school. It made me realize this is possible.
But when you’re that young, you don’t really think about all the elements that go into it. You just kind of see yourself and think that you can do that too! How fun would it be to simply hang out with Big Bird and Elmo all day. I mean, why not?
Pop Culture Principle – Right out of high school, you trained with Terry Kiser and Laurel Vouvray. Can you talk about that experience and what they taught you as an actor?
Dominique Mari – Terry was the first acting coach I ever had. He played Bernie from Weekend at Bernie’s if his name sounds familiar. He was a big champion of the Lee Strasberg method. He always preached the power of stillness and giving yourself permission to take up space. There is no need to over express or try to show that you are acting. He would tell everyone in class when it’s just you and the camera, that is as real as it gets. There’s nothing else there. So, relax, and just focus on your scene partner.
Laurel teaches the Meisner technique. I remember doing a lot of repetition in her classes. Repetition for weeks and weeks before you can advance to the next exercise. It is a simple exercise but it really sharpened my ability to listen, observe and respond.
Pop Culture Principle – Do you remember your first official paid acting job?
Dominique Mari – Yes. It was an insurance commercial. The audition process was like most commercials.. Super quick. You’re in the room for 5 seconds, say your name, do your profiles, and then you’re out. I believe a week later my agent told me I booked it.
When I got to the set, we spent the whole day pretending we were putting out a fire. 😊 Passing buckets of water down an assembly line and throwing it out of the camera’s view. By the end of the day, everyone cast and crew looked like we left a waterpark! 😊
Pop Culture Principle – One of your early projects was the Netflix Original Burning Sands. Can you talk about your character and working on that project?
Dominique Mari – Burning Sands happened four months after I signed with my first agency and was very unexpected. In acting class, they would always say go to the audition, and then throw it away. (Which is so difficult when a job you really want is in the atmosphere.) Don’t ever expect anything because there are a million potential reasons why you won’t book the role. You’ll go insane trying to figure it out. A month went by, and I moved on.
I felt a wide range of emotions when I got the call. I was living in the South. They were shooting the film in Virginia. The funny thing is, I didn’t know who else was in the film. I tried to research, but at the time there weren’t many articles about the project or who had signed on yet. So, I just went to Virginia. I get to set, walk into hair and makeup and there is Ms. Alfre Woodard. Wow! She says a warm hello and I say hello but, internally I was freaking out and sweating. 😊
And then I’m sitting there a bit longer and Imani Hakim from Everybody Hates Chris walks in, then Serayah from Empire walks in and I’m looking around and thinking to myself, how did I book this? What is going on? I’m a fan of all of these women. Also, I never imagined sharing screen time with a legend like Alfre Woodard, especially on my first project.
I had originally auditioned to play Imani Hakim’s best friend, but they offered me another role. My character was a super opinionated student. Which is similar to my personality. Anyone who knows me knows I’m very sure of myself and what I want to do. So, it was interesting that some of that essence read in my audition for a totally different role. Working with Alfre Woodard was incredible. Overall, it was a special experience and I’m forever grateful.
Pop Culture Principle – You also got to appear in an episode of the recently rebooted series MacGyver. What was it like working on that episode?
Dominique Mari – Fast. It was a same day audition, same day booking and on set 12 hours later kind of situation, which was once again, unexpected. I’ll be honest, I didn’t know much about MacGyver. The extent of my knowledge of MacGyver were the skits on SNL. There wasn’t much time to prepare beforehand either. But thankfully, I had a lot of downtime on set to figure everything out.
It was a cool, quick scene where I played a bride arriving at her honeymoon suite only to discover it was trashed by a monkey that had stolen MacGyver’s knife earlier in the episode. It was my first time acting with an inanimate object. There was a tennis ball with an X on it in a cone and the director wanted us to pretend that it was the monkey coming at us. He called action and we went for it!
Pop Culture Principle – It shows you can still learn something on set. Would you agree?
Dominique Mari – Oh, absolutely! So much work goes into the overall production of every scene no matter the size. I left the lot that day with a huge appreciation for the set design and lighting crew. The scene was set in a tropical island, but we shot it at night and I really did forget it was not a warm sunny day. Once outside, that late November winter air smacked me back into reality though. Talk about TV magic.
I always appreciate observing how the crew works, and what it takes to keep all the gears on the train moving. It’s one of those intangibles you can only learn through experience.
Pop Culture Principle – Most recently, you appeared in the Law & Order episode Heroes. Can you talk about the landing that role and what it’s like to be a part of that franchise?
Dominique Mari – I was speechless when I got the call. Growing up in New York everyone knows Law & Order and the iconic DUN DUN, you know? You’ll be on the subway, and somebody will say “Mariska and Ice T are filming down the street today.” It is one of those shows every actor wants to book. Even though there are so many episodes, and obviously so many actors get blessed with the opportunity, it’s a hard job to secure.
The first time I auditioned for the franchise was in 2019. So, for me, booking it was not a little win, it’s a MAJOR win and means so much. It’s all the motivation I need to go forward and continue. L&O was on my bucket list and my vision board. Now I proudly get to check that off!
Pop Culture Principle – Your scenes were with veteran actors Jeffrey Donovan and Mehcad Brooks. What was it like working with them and did you get a chance to talk with them about the business between takes?
Dominique Mari – It was great! I was so excited to get started. I went into it thinking,” you’re here to do a job and everybody’s going to be very professional, make sure you do the same.” They were cracking jokes and having fun between takes. Which took me by surprise because working with actors of their caliber on a drama you assume it will be a ‘don’t talk unless spoken to situation’ but it was the complete opposite. They probably thought I was the weird one because I was so focused on being respectful, but honestly I was simply in awe of their ability to seamlessly drop back into the scene after laughing the moment prior. You can tell Jeffrey and Mehcad really enjoy working together. Both of them were so kind and encouraging, I really appreciated it.
Everything from my fitting to ADR was such a collaborative experience. Alex Hall, the director of that episode, was also wonderful to work with. There was a suggestion I made about my character that he agreed with and approved. It’s an awesome feeling as an actor when your ideas are taken into consideration and then applied. I think it also speaks volumes to the type of director he is. He really allows the actor space to give their own interpretation. It’s an experience that I’m going to cherish for the rest of my life. Law & Order really reminded me of why I wanted to be an actor.
I just want to tell compelling stories and work with good people. I love meeting new faces and hearing how they got started. It was an honor and a blessing to be on Law & Order. I got lucky and I’m so grateful to Jonathan Strauss Casting and Alex Hall for giving me an opportunity because it’s something I’ve wanted for a long time. I’ve auditioned for SVU a few times, so it was nice that this one landed, and landed on the original Law & Order.
Pop Culture Principle – Can you tell us about your role in that Law & Order episode entitled Heroes?
Dominique Mari – I play a cocktail waitress that was in the club while the victim was shot. Later on in the episode, Cosgrove and Shaw come back to the club to get a witness statement because they can’t quite figure out what happened that night.
Pop Culture Principle – In Hollywood today, one of the big issues is diversity in film and television, in front of and behind the camera. As a woman of color, do you feel the industry is heading in the right direction or is there still a lot of work that needs to be done?
Dominique Mari – There has been a lot of progress and we can’t deny that. But in the same breath, just having any role or a staff writing job isn’t enough. We need development behind that. We need unique characters with an arc. We need fully fleshed out stories that exist outside of race.
In my opinion, getting around roles that keep us stagnant in a sense or don’t really propel us forward is the biggest hurdle for POC actors. I’m sure there is a long list of tropes and stereotypes every group has to battle. Every role has merit, it’s just, we have to expand the picture that we’re painting.
I know for myself, there have been a few times where I’ve said no to roles, because I felt the role didn’t align with me as an actor or a black woman. And for some artists, it works, but I know for me, it’s paramount not to be reduced exclusively to my outward appearance. You just want to tell a story because you’re a woman living in this time, and this is what’s happening. And I think in that space of the whole equation, massive strides still have to be made. Every award season we hear about history making wins for POC actors. I think it’s a subtle reminder there is still more work to be done.
Pop Culture Principle – Where do you see yourself five to ten years from now?
Dominique Mari –You know, the timeline questions are a little eerie for me. I guess I think of them differently now post COVID because before COVID, I was the girl that had everything down to a science. I road mapped what I should have by this and that year etc. I added unnecessary pressure to art that I really love so much, and it sucked all the fun out it. Then COVID hit, everything stopped, and the industry had to regroup. I had to regroup. The world had to regroup.
It was a gentle reminder that this is real life, and you can’t plan real life. You can do things to set you up to hopefully move the needle, but you know, there’s the undetermined out there. So, I’d like to say ten years from now, I’ll be a solidified fixture in the industry and have some great projects under my belt. I would love to be a part of a horror franchise (my favorite genre), work on romcoms and whatever else the universe has laid out for me. I’d hope to establish my own production company by then as well. 😊
Pop Culture Principle – What has been the best piece of advice you were given when it comes to acting and what piece of advice would you give someone thinking of becoming an actor?
Dominique Mari – The best advice I’ve received so far came from Alfre Woodard when we worked on Burning Sands. We had a lot of downtime in between shots, and I got to sit down with her. I asked her if she had any advice for us. Even though many of the cast were established, there is so much we can learn from someone on her level with her range of experience. It really was a blessing to spend some time with her.
I’ll never forget her response. She said, “Be careful how you’re introduced into the industry. Because once you’re introduced, it’s hard to change that perception.” Yeah. Wow. She also said, “Never be afraid to say no.” Wow. To this day, when I get auditions, when I read scripts, if the story isn’t something that connects with me, or the role leans into stereotypes too much, I’ll pass. She said it casually, but there was so much depth and intention with her words. Again, I think about that advice all the time as my career progresses. She gave me the confidence to advocate for myself as an actor. That is such amazing advice I would gladly share it with anyone wanting to enter the industry.
Pop Culture Principle – Do you have any upcoming projects that you can tell us about?
Dominique Mari – Nothing I can talk about at this moment, but I feel like every actor right now with it being pilot season. I have a stack of auditions to get through now and I’m really happy in these moment because I remember when I didn’t have auditions. Who knows, what will rise to the surface?! I’m hopeful the right opportunity will stick.
I think over the years I’ve also learned not to put so much pressure on it. Do what you know you were invited to do. Show them your take on this character and that’s it. If it comes to you, it’s for you and If it doesn’t, it wasn’t for you and that’s okay. There will be another one and you just go from there. So, here’s to 2023 being my most transformative year.
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A huge thank you to Dominique Mari for taking the time to talk with us. She has an extremely bright future ahead of her and we are honored to be her very first interview!
If you would like to keep up with all of Dominique’s latest news and projects, you can follow her on Instagram and Twitter @ohhh_dom.
Heroes promo – Law & Order
Burning Sands trailer
**All headshots courtesy of Dominique Mari**
**Law & Order stills courtesy of NBC**
**MacGyver still courtesy of CBS**