Taraji Henson covers the January issue of InStyle to promote What Men Want, the lady-centric version/reboot to the old Mel Gibson movie What Women Want. Taraji not only stars, she’s the executive producer too, and this is her baby. She’s been longing to be the lead of a comedy, and she’s finally there. I love how InStyle styled Taraji for this shoot too – she’s a grown-ass woman and a boss, and that’s how they styled her, to look like an executive or CEO. You can read the full InStyle piece here. Some highlights:

She’s been dying to do a comedy: “I’ve always been the funny girl. Not that I was pigeonholed. They were all great dramatic roles, but I’ve been dying. I just felt so honored and grateful to get a comedy where I could let it all hang out.”

She wants to do more family films: “You know, that’s [audiences buying] four tickets instead of two. That’s generally going to be the largest-grossing film in anyone’s repertoire.”

Taraji knows she sells overseas: “Hollywood executives would tell me that I don’t have fans all the way over there. I said, ‘You’re lying because they can reach me any time. I’m a finger tap away, and they let me know every day.’ Then we go to Paris [to promote Empire], and it’s standing room only in a room with 1,500 seats. I cried. If you believe what people tell you?…?you can’t let people tell you sh-t.”

She grew up in the “hood”: “I was like the Punky Brewster of the hood. I was a well-rounded kid, but I could also scrap if necessary. But I wasn’t that hard. I still had Strawberry Shortcake wallpaper in my room, and my friend Tracie and I were doing Shakespeare in the Park?…?and we were in the f—ing hood.”

How Hollywood talks about diversity & then casts white dudes in everything: “Here’s the deal: When you talk about money, don’t you want to make money? I want every walk of life [in my films]. If I could put an alien in, I would. I want their money too. Come on, it’s what the world looks like. That’s what people want to see, representation. That’s all. You can make money doing it. It’s a no-brainer.”

She established the Boris Lawrence Henson Foundation to focus on African-Americans and their mental health needs: “It was born out of necessity. You know, traumatic stuff happened to me and my son. [Her ex-boyfriend, Marcell’s father, was murdered in 2003.] You can’t just pray it away. I don’t care how strong you are. It gets to you, and if you don’t deal with it, it manifests itself in ways you don’t even know. My white friends have standing appointments with their therapists. I was like, ‘Why aren’t we doing that?’ In our culture, it’s taboo.”

On finding her wedding dress: “I’m not going to go through 10,000 dresses. How does it fit? How do I feel? Does it complement me well? Let’s just go with this one. I know what looks good on me. I’m not going to spend 10 hours on a fitting. I hate that.”

She’s a vegan now: She made the jump to veganism after suffering massive stomach pains while filming The Best of Enemies this past summer. “It took a doctor in Macon, Ga., to say, ‘If you don’t change what you’re doing, you’re going to get stomach cancer.’ I said, ‘Say no more.’ So I switched everything up out of necessity. I want to live. Thank God, because I feel so much better.”

She’s open to doing a superhero movie: “The older I get, I want to work smarter, not harder. DC, Marvel, you all can call me!”

[From InStyle]

Her foundation is named after her dad, who was a Vietnam vet with PTSD. I didn’t know she had started a foundation, but she’s absolutely right that “it’s taboo” in African-American culture to seek mental health treatment. I didn’t know she had gone vegan too – it seems like there should have been some other steps between “you can’t keep eating the way you are” and “go full vegan.” But if she feels better, so be it. And what she says about being told she won’t sell overseas… good lord, that’s some bullsh-t.

Covers courtesy of InStyle.