One thing is abundantly clear after spending a few hours with Madison Bailey: She isn't interested in wearing a mask that grins and lies, as poet Paul Laurence Dunbar once wrote. She'd much prefer to show the truth of her reality and to live in a world where that's the norm. "If everyone were just 10 percent more honest, we would see a lot of shit changing," she says over lunch at a French bistro just outside Los Angeles.
"I want to be respected. I want people to think I'm glamorous. I want people to see pictures of me and be like, 'She's stunning," she continues. "But I also want people to know that I don't look like that every day. I'm not perfect, and I'm trying to show y'all I'm not."
It's a refreshing departure from the going-rate expectation that the people on our television screens be different (read: better) than us. But it's also Madison's rare kind of Hollywood magic: People feel like they really know her because she's not interested in publicly being anything but herself.
For fans of the North Carolina native, this won't come as such a surprise. From her earliest roles in 2015 (on Constantine and Swamp Murders) to her multi-episode arc on The CW's Black Lightning to now three seasons of the wildly successful Netflix adventure drama Outer Banks, she's been as open a book as possible. About being a mixed-race Black daughter of white adoptive parents. About living with borderline personality disorder. About being pansexual and in a loving relationship with her girlfriend of three years, former UNC Charlotte basketball player Mariah Linney. (At one point during our chat, Madison shows me a video just sent to her by a friend who's on a snowboarding trip with Mariah. "Here goes my girl. She looks like she's having a blast....Yeah, get some energy out because I can't hear about snowboarding again," she jokes.)
This story is from the Issue 03, 2023 / May 2023 edition of Cosmopolitan US.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the Issue 03, 2023 / May 2023 edition of Cosmopolitan US.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
sabrina carpenter
The singer, actor, and miniskirt enthusiast just wants to chat.
Y'all Better Not Be Sleeping on Canada
It’s so much more than Niagara Falls, okay? And it’s literally right there points up*) waiting for you and your next epic vacation.
We Need to Talk About Secondary Infertility
With reproductive medicine under political attack, this long-overdue conversation is more necessary than ever.
Young Love ON THE Streets OF Mexico City
OUR COUPLE SPOTTING SERIES HEADS SOUTH TO BRING YOU MORE DELIGHTFUL PAIRINGS.
Is Speed Dating...Back?
Hear us out: one outfit, one makeup application, multiple dates.
You're About to See Vacation Everywhere
Sunscreen. But, like, fun.
LOOKING FOR TONI LANE
She was crypto's It Girl, the young woman onstage at the conferences hyping blockchain as a way to radically reshape an unjust world. The young woman at the industry parties schmoozing with wealthy venture capitalists to get them on board. The young woman at the spiritual retreats seeking endless ways to self-improve. People loved her. And then she disappeared. What happened to Toni Lane Casserly-and what does her tragic death reveal?
Higher Power
There will be no \"I just can't believe it!\" sentiments in this story. Twenty-two-year-old pop sensation Tyla isn't interested in being a wide-eyed ingenue-she always knew she'd get here.
COQUETTE
You know it. Tarot actor Avantika knows it. Having gotten a much-needed update, bows are absolutely inescapable right now. Here, we humbly suggest a few ways you can wear them without looking like everyone else.
What It's Really Like to Cut Off Your Parents
More and more young people have entered their family estrangement era, for better or worse. But mostly for better.
