Emmy Quickie: ‘Underground’ Star Jurnee Smollett-Bell on Pool Parties With Her ‘Home Skillets’ (Exclusive Video)

Actress also tells TheWrap about her first time live tweeting during an episode of the WGN America series

“Underground” star Jurnee Smollett-Bell says that she and the cast became very close when they would unwind after filming the more intense moments of WGN America’s series about the Underground Railroad.

“On the weekends we would have pool parties. Aldis [Hodge] would cook,” Smollett-Bell told TheWrap. “So I think collectively we all became really close. I’m really close with Amirah Vann, who plays my mother Ernestine. But the fellas — I grew up with four boys, so Aldis and Alano [Miller], those are my home skillets.”

Smollett-Bell, who plays runaway slave Rosalee, also spoke about the passionate fans of the show and how she has gotten to interact with them since the premiere.

“It was the first time I ever live tweeted with people,” she said. “That’s an experience! That’s like really cool because you get real-time reactions from fans. They go hard in the paint. They love when certain people got killed off. When Rosalee shot August they were like, ‘Boom!’”

Finally, Smollett-Bell explained how she would convince people to watch “Underground” over other shows in this year’s Emmy race.

“I would tell them that it’s unlike any show that’s on,” she said. “That it’s bold. That it’s unexpected. That you can never predict what’s going to happen. …The story of the Underground Railroad, the first integrated civil rights movement, has never been told before.”

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