By Okla Jones ·Updated May 26, 2026 < /> Getting your Trinity Audio player ready… “It’s always nice to share what you’ve learned on your journey with everyone because it’s so vast,” Pam Grier says. “I’ve learned so much and there’s so much abundance that we all have.”
Grier has spent more than five decades building one of the most recognizable careers in Black cinema, but speaking with her now, her legacy was built by staying curious in all things. At 77 years old, Grier still approaches life with the same fearlessness that made performances in Coffy, Foxy Brown, and Jackie Brown unforgettable in the first place.
“I still run in the first car of the rollercoaster,” Grier says with a laugh. “I still snowboard. I still do crazy things.” Age, according to her, only becomes limiting when people stop allowing themselves to experience life fully. “Every day is a birthday if I wake up and I’m healthy,” she explains. “If you stop living, go ahead. You will stop living. But I love to live.”
Of course, audiences have spent countless hours watching her do exactly that on screen. Quentin Tarantino once referred to Grier as “cinema’s first female action star,” and her influence can still be seen across multiple generations of actresses who cite her work as inspiration. Yet Grier remains interested in community rather than individual praise. “I want everyone to have the opportunity to share their equity,” she explains. “I want people to know that they’re viable and give and care for one another.”
Grier’s philosophy on life also informs her latest venture, Pam Grier’s Soul Flix, the FAST channel she launched earlier this year to spotlight classic Black films and television. Grier describes the platform as both preservation and discovery, allowing audiences to revisit performances and stories that might otherwise disappear in an era dominated by algorithms and rapidly changing streaming libraries. To celebrate her birthday month, the channel will air a 24-hour marathon of Jackie Brown on May 26 across Prime Video, Roku Channel, Plex, Sling Freestream, VIZIO WatchFree+, and additional free streaming platforms.
Tarantino’s 1997 crime drama reintroduced Grier to a new generation of viewers while giving her one of the defining performances of her career. Looking back now, the actress says the role continues resonating because so many women recognize themselves in the titular character’s survival instincts and self-reliance. “A lot of women are Jackie Browns,” she says. “Learn how to trust, learn how to be self-efficient, learn how to take care of themselves after they’ve been mistreated.”
In this edited transcript of our conversation for clarity, Grier reflected on everything from longevity to protecting crews on film sets, empowering younger women in entertainment, and why practical skills still matter just as much as fame.
ESSENCE: Throughout your career, you’ve played so many strong roles. How do you think you’ve been able to stay relevant in this industry?
Pam Grier: Well, I am me. I play me and I’m a person that has never been late. I enjoy it. I respect what everyone does because I respect the crew. And those are the people that guide you and tell you what and what not to do and set examples of their respect for what we do to be storytellers, graphic designers, all the way up to the CEOs who provide. But if you don’t have your crew and you don’t respect them, you have nothing.
That’s how we take care of each other. And when you have that, you can do your best work. You make people happy because they’re working outside for you 15, 20 hours a day. At least you can be on time. At least you can be prepared. At least you’d be respectful because it’s a family. They take care of you. And we’re all nomadic. People work maybe three times a year and are off and don’t work two months, but they make their finances last. They respect what they give. They’re not wasteful. It’s just a different breed of people like farmers, you need everyone. Everyone needs each other. Without the crew, there is no film industry.
Jackie Brown will be celebrating 30 next year. You had an amazing and iconic performance in that film. What does that role mean to you today?
It means a lot because a lot of women are Jackie Brown’s. There’s a lot of women who use the resourcefulness, learn how to trust, learn how to be self-efficient, learn how to be an alpha, learn how to take care of themselves after they’ve been mistreated or someone had told them the truth and it wasn’t, and they found themselves in the worst life predicament and how to get themselves out, either not either be a victim or you’re not. And so that’s what Jackie Brown was. I was using my resourcefulness, and that took a lot of strength and then to have four storylines and rehearsed with Quentin Tarantino. And if you don’t rehearse, you don’t get to work with him. And so to work with all these actors that gave up their time to work with him and work with me at a level that they come gunning, they know what they’re going to do.
It’s filmmaking that records our transitions in life. But there’s storytelling when people don’t have the luxury to go to a movie theater or have television subscriptions. So when we’re able to provide entertainment, whether it’s fantasy or reality, we’re very lucky to do that. And we try to do it the best way with efficiency and with a fantasy, some people want to embrace fantasy. They don’t want reality. Their lives are real enough.
Is that why you do what to do as far as your network?
One of the reasons why I joined the Soul Flix group was that we wanted to curate the best classic films. And I have been doing research with Black films and pictures because it’s already vetted what they say, what they dress, how they dress, their hairstyles. It’s in the years, the classics, old school, new school, and after school. And when I would do these researches, I’d have to go to several sites and go through days of looking at footage and was it real? Is it a lawsuit? Is it a scandal? Is it this and that? And when you find a network such as Free TV, Roku, or Amazon Prime TV, there’s so many that have come aboard now. It’s just great that you can go because I come up with ideas. I was mentioning to someone the other day, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid with Robert Redford and Paul Newman. And I said, I’d love to have seen Sydney Poitier and Richard Pryor on a bicycle scamming away back there doing some great comedy. And when you see some of the films like Uptown Saturday Night, you see Sidney Poitier do some of the best comedy where he’s coming from the heart laughing where he’s just eyes are sparkling.
So you can go to our network and find a huge library. Now, you can tune in and find incredible pieces and see, they’ve already been marketed. They’ve already had the premiere. They’ve already been in magazines and everyone’s heralding everyone’s performance. And now you can go back and see something two and three or four times. And because of Sinners, the elderly are seeing Black vampires and saying, “Wow, that’s really interesting.” So it’s another level of acceptance of art, fantasy, horror. We’re trying to create that horror genre and Black West genre where it hadn’t been seen or heard really. So now you can repeatedly go to Free TV. You could go to 365 Black, Roku, etc. I was looking at Alyssa this morning. I was like, “We’ve really expanded because we have something to offer in the classics that are culture curated that haven’t been seen.”
Amazing.
It is amazing.
What was it like working with Quentin Tarantino as a director?
He is immersed in all cultures, very respectful of all cultures. He was so respectful. He would ask, “Well, would we say this? Would we do that? And how many times?” So he would ask you, he would ask Sam [Jackson], “How would you do that? Pam, how do you feel about this? How do you feel about putting your hands between Sam’s legs? How do you feel about that? ” And I said, “It’s either his balls or my life, so I’m going for my life.” So the humor comes out of that. The humor comes out of the story and he’d give you these layers and subtexts to align yourself to open up.
He says, “So have you done that? Have you ever shot anyone? Have you ever seen death?” He explores your sensitivity so that he can get the best out of you, honestly, but not traumatize you. If there’s something that happened to you that’s going to traumatize you and hurt you mentally or physically, he’s going to say, “No, we don’t need to go there. We can do something else. What else can we do that we can show?” So, he’s a real sensitive director to humanity, to our empathy, to how we feel. And not all the directors are like that. They just want to get the footage in. They wanted sensationalism. Did the stunt work? Did the blood spurt? Did the brains fall out right? So we didn’t see a lot of that. It wasn’t sensationalism like gore, flattering, really overly. And some people love that. Some people want to see that, but he said, “No, I want this to be a little bit more cerebral.”
So when you think about your legacy, Ms. Grier, what are you most proud of?
I’m most proud that I can name 10 tractor companies.
Can you expound on that?
Because when you want to live on land, you have to understand land management. If you want your “40 acres and a mule,” generational wealth and all that, you have to understand the land. raise livestock. I’m adventurous, and I’m curious—that’s the thing about me and to be an actor is to be curious and share. People are embracing culture sharing. And to see that and be a part of it is amazing because I have so many great, great film ideas from who we are, where we’ve been and where we’re going.
When I see people stealing land from the urban cities and using it as leverage, but they’re not building homes for the common men, I don’t like it. They’re just leaving the land vacant and you have an opportunity to go and buy it and build like Chance the Rapper, who is building homes for people—that impresses me. That says they care about other people who have made them successful. That makes me feel really good that I know how to build. So you can be white collar, you can be whatever you want to be, but if you can’t fix your home, it can become a problem. So, when you start putting people down and you obliterate those shop classes from schools, you are tearing down society. And when I hear that, I go nuts.
I’m hoping to put those classes back into school so kids can have a future who just want to work. Maybe they’re not made to be a CEO or wear a white collar, but they can build your home and take care of you and the community in ways that no one else has been able to.
What do you hope younger women in the industry take from the path that you’ve already created?
You’ll always be a master if you continue to learn things from people. My grandfather said, “Pammy, if you can do certain things, a man will respect you.” Back in the day, not too long ago when I was applying for a mortgage for a home and they said, “well, you need a man to sign for your mortgage. Your father, a brother, a boyfriend, husband. You need a man.” I said, “but I have more money. I could pay for it.” Why do I need a man? Why do I need another person? But see, we grew out of that. Now women are finding their asset base. They’re becoming independent. They’re getting their education. There’s so many educated Black women in this nation. It’s beyond the count because they figured out that they were viable and they could do things and don’t wait for the master slave syndrome.
You’ve learned how to do so many things at home and you can apply that to your work and community. Don’t think that you have nothing because someone said you don’t. Break out of that. And I’m just so pleased when I go to the Oscars party and here’s Mary J. Blige, here’s Gabrielle Union, here’s Keke Palmer, here’s Teyana Taylor. Here’s Queen Latifah—all these women coming to me saying, “if it wasn’t for you, we wouldn’t be here.”
We all really appreciate all your contributions that you’ve given to us, the culture, and to the film industry.
Let them know. There’s no jealousy here. We all have an aisle. We all have a lane. So let’s embrace each other and share what we have. We’re only here for a little bit.
The post Pam Grier Talks ‘Jackie Brown,’ Soul Flix, And The Legacy Of Black Cinema appeared first on Essence.
