Vanessa Williams was “so naive” early on in her career.
The star made history as the first Black woman to be crowned Miss America in 1984 and is currently known for her roles in “Ugly Betty.” She said she endured a lot of “pressure, shame, judgment” in the early years of her career when X-rated photos of her were leaked.
“There was a tremendous amount of onus, pressure, shame, judgment,” she told People. “Had there been an internet to break back then. I took all that on as a 21-year-old. It was global. You can fail quietly, but that was a worldwide fail.”
“I look back at my 19- to 20-year-old self and think, ‘Oh my God you were so naive, so trusting, so vulnerable,'” Williams recalled. “In your mind, you think, ‘I’m old, I know what I’m doing.’ I give myself grace now, but as a young adult, I beat myself up, like, ‘I should have known better,'” she explained.
The Hannah Montana: The Movie star — who has Melanie, Jillian and Devin with first husband Ramon Hervey II as well as Sasha with Rick Fox — got through the scandal with the support of her “tremendous family,” However, she admitted that her kids these days have no idea how she coped with it all at such a young age.
“Luckily, I have a tremendous family. They’re all older than I was now, but the fact that I became famous at 20 years old — relative to their lives — and having death threats and having to go through breaking a huge hurdle and what the repercussions of that [were],” Williams said. “[My kids are, like,] ‘Wow, how did you handle all this, Mom, at 20?’ Then, I look back at my 20-year-old self and say, ‘My God, I was a baby …”
