Corinne Massiah is what I’d like to call a triple threat. She has been acting on TV series 9-1-1 alongside Angela Bassett since 2018, is a full-time college student at UCLA, and is a genuinely fun person to talk to.
I might be biased since I have been a HUGE fan of hers from the beginning, watching every new 9-1-1 episode on TV with my family; it was the one show that could bring all of us together and that we could watch together enjoyably. In preparation for season seven, Corinne and I chatted about the new season of 9-1-1 premiering March 14th on ABC, her journey in acting, and life at UCLA.
Balancing UCLA & Acting
Although May Grant, her character on 9-1-1, attends USC, Corinne is a true Bruin. Corinne is a third-year Sociology major at UCLA. She explained that she originally liked political science. Still, for her, “sociology helps with acting because we study society and people and patterns and everything, and I’ve seen it help me approaching scenes and building characters.” Her twin sister, Halle, is also at UCLA, so Bruin blood runs in the family.
Balancing a career in the entertainment industry while being a student is no joke! When asked about balancing college and acting, she said it’s “Pretty difficult. I’m not gonna lie and try to say it’s super easy. I pretty much plan my classes around my work schedule because like, I’ll try and either do really early classes or really late classes because usually throughout the day I would be at work and I would try to find classes that were either online, asynchronous or online classes recorded or discussion sections that weren’t mandatory. So that participation wasn’t necessarily something that was stressed. But I will say, communicating with TAs was probably the most important thing.”
Since she has a passion for making a difference, if she weren’t an actress, she shared that she “would have loved to be a NICU Nurse.” As a nursing student, we would have loved to have her in our nursing cohort!
On top of this, she is on track to graduate early from UCLA. This should make her a quadruple threat!
corinne massiah talks angela bassett & industry role models
In the entertainment industry, having a mentor or role model is important. Throughout our conversation, Massiah gushed over her on-screen mom, Angela Bassett. She explained “It means so much to be able to learn from one of the absolute greatest actresses of our time. And I say this all the time. I say this all the time. It’s probably so redundant. But when I was around Angela, I was a sponge. I was soaking up everything she was doing because she’s just so confident and she’s so knowledgeable, just about character development, about what her character would do. And it was so amazing to watch because I’m like, that’s what I want to be. It’s so cool to have a role model so close and to watch her in action.”
Outside of Bassett, her other role models in the industry include “Halle Berry, Viola Davis, Lupita Nyongo, Zendaya, and Quinta Brunson”. These are all remarkable women in the industry, that our generation and future generations will continue to look up to.
massiah’s journey to acting
With her first audition being for CSI New York, her journey to acting has been lifelong. When asked how she became interested in acting, she described it as a transition from scary to inspiring.
“My parents put my sister and I into acting classes because as twins, it was a lot *laughs*. They never put us in soccer or ballet, [but they did put us in acting]. And at first, I was really scared. So I was literally clinging to my mom’s leg. Don’t let me go in. Don’t let me go in. And I was like, seven or eight at the time. And then after I went in and I came out, oh, my gosh, mom. When can I go in? When can I go again? When can I go again?”
“So I fell in love with it from the get go. So did my sister. Every eight weeks, they hosted these showcases where people would put up scenes and monologues, and they would invite managers and agents from LA, and my sister and I put up a scene and monologues, and agency managers went to my parents. Can you send us their headshots? Then I signed with a manager and an agent, and then I got an audition for CSI New York. I booked my first ever audition. I always kind of knew it was my passion. I knew I wanted to do something creative. And, nothing makes me as happy as when I’m acting.”
New Season of 9-1-1
Taking place in our home of LA, the new season of 9-1-1 is not something that you want to miss! Massiah’s character, May Grant, is the daughter of Angela Bassett’s character, Athena Grant, a field sergeant in the LAPD (Angela certainly did the thing). May is a 911 operator at LA Service Center and ironically (coming from a UCLA student’s perspective) a USC student.
When asked if she would want to follow in May’s footsteps and pursue a career as a 911 operator, she told me “I just live vicariously. Kudos to all of the people that work as dispatchers or in emergency services, because it takes a special kind of person, a very strong person.” She also shared that the show has taught her some emergency skills, so they might come in handy if the LA tsunami episode was a reality.
When asked about her character attending USC she said “I didn’t think they did it to mess with me. I’m pretty sure it was Athena’s alma mater as well. Athena went there, so it was nice to see May kind of follow in her mother’s footsteps. But it was ironic, literally experiencing me going through college applications. I worked the night before I had to move into my freshman dorm. Everyone on set, from the directors to the DPS, they all knew, like, oh, what do you major in? And they all knew the process. So it was just really funny. Like, oh, you’re going to UCLA.”
As for the new season, Massiah told fans that we should “expect the unexpected.” A lot of big and exciting things will happen in season seven. Corinne Massiah is a rising star to look out for! Watch the first episode on March 14th on ABC!