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Chloe Bailey: You Can Dress How You Want And Still Praise God

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There’s no limit to Chlöe Bailey’s talent. We’ve watched her artistry grow before our eyes — from a nascent Youtube star to a sexy songstress forging her own lane. Between her pristine vocals, intricate dance moves in stunning visuals that kept us waiting up at night, and her acting chops on shows like grown-ish, there’s no doubt that Miss Bailey can do it all. And she’s clearly not slowing down with a new role in the Tina Gordon-helmed Praise This and debut album In Pieces on the horizon.

The Georgia peach is set to star in the Peacock original choir comedy Praise This. Bailey portrays Sam — a young songstress with her sights on stardom, who uses her big voice to bring her sister/cousin’s church choir to the top of Atlanta’s youth gospel competition.

We spoke to the Grammy-nominated singer and director Tina Gordon ahead of the premiere of the Praise This trailer. Bailey opened up about how style and religion go hand-in-hand, and how spirituality is a reflection of beauty and inner peace.

“Sam’s style is definitely shown through herself and her on the outside and she is no stranger to showing her artistry through her hair and through her clothes and she’s trying to become a star. She’s like, okay, I want people to see me in this light. How do I get them to represent me and see me in that way,” the Have Mercy singer told HelloBeautiful via Zoom.

Praise This director and screenwriter Tina Gordon, who has also worked on ATL, The Fighting Temptations, and Marsai Martin’s Little, chimed into the conversation with one of her favorite running jokes while on-set about the actress’ midriff section. “You’re going to get that waist at church, whether you intended to get that waist at church or not,” Gordon laughed as she referred to a scene in the forthcoming film where the church women comment about Chlöe’s mid-section showoff.

When asked if they believe that a God-fearing woman by definition has to dress to society’s definition of modesty, Chlöe instantly rejected the idea with a firm “no.” The Surprise songstress added, “Even in the Bible, it says come as you are. God sees us. He saw us as little babies when we were naked, so. That’s how I feel. You know me, I will be there in a bikini and a small little top and in heels and I would be like, God is good. God is good because it’s true. “

Chlöe continued, “I think that’s amazing how it reflects within this film and how Sam finds herself and knows that she doesn’t have to change herself in order to be accepted by God.”

“Yes, I agree,” Gordon added. “I think [with]  the message in the movie, we always try to stay at the intersection of what people perceive as a saint and what people perceive as a sinner and have fun with that assumption. We don’t take ourselves too seriously in the movie. It’s meant to be a big tent for everyone to come in and you will not be excluded on the basis of your abs or risque dress or anything like that.”

“We try to include the voices of haters in the movie so that people feel comfortable with it,” Gordon continued, as she referred to the characters of Kelly and Kiki, played by The Young and the Restless actress Loren Lott and Grammy-nominated gospel singer Jekalyn Carr respectively. “You definitely have people that have their opinions, whether it’s trying to hold you accountable or not, whether it’s trying to make you still perceive maybe what you’ve done in your past as what it’s going to be in your future or whether judging you for how you dress or look. We give voice to them only to show that it doesn’t matter.”

As for her personal relationship with God, Chlöe leans on her faith to keep herself balanced and as a means to achieve inner peace and self-love to demonstrate her inner glow. “I’m still in the midst of my self-love journey and finding myself and appreciating myself,” she admitted to HelloBeautiful.

“It’s easier for me to call someone else beautiful than it is for me to look in the mirror and tell myself, but something I’ve always been such a firm believer in is God is a creator. I’m all beautiful things and I’m contradicting myself by thinking otherwise of who I am because God made me in his image, so why not believe that when it comes to myself? That helped open my eyes as I’m on this journey of self-love. Some days are easier than others, but it’s definitely getting there.”

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Chloe Bailey: You Can Dress How You Want And Still Praise God  was originally published on hellobeautiful.com