An (almost) missed opportunity.
It's hard to imagine what Pose would've looked like without Candy Ferocity, but as Angelica Ross told E!'s Justin Sylvester on the latest episode of his Just the Sip podcast, that was almost the case!
The revelation came while Angelica was recalling her initial reaction to hearing about the groundbreaking series: "First of all, I was like, 'About damn time that they're finally going to do a show on the trans community and the ballroom community.'"
"But when I first heard about it, I actually passed on it a couple times, to be honest," she added.
More specifically, Angelica turned down the opportunity to audition for the roles of Blanca Evangelista and Elektra Abundance.
"I didn't see myself in either of the characters," the actress explained. "Especially when it said Blanca; I felt like it was written for a Latina trans woman. Then there was Elektra, and Elektra, you know, was a little bit more mature. And I just didn't want to quite go there just yet."
Ultimately, Angelica's agent insisted that she audition for the Ryan Murphy show. She was even fielding calls from other agents pushing her to do the same.
So, she auditioned. And she got a callback in New York.
But she didn't land a part.
"I bawled my eyeballs out because everything in my spirit, in my spiritual practice, there were so many coincidences that added up that said I was going to be on this show," Angelica told Justin. "I was like, I don't normally have these type of feelings and I'm wrong, so what's going on?"
"I cried about it and I let it go," she continued.
Here's the kicker: months later, Angelica got a call about Pose.
"And come to find out, after meeting me, Ryan wrote the role of Candy," Angelica revealed. "So it wasn't that I passed on Candy, I was Candy!"
And the rest was history. The star said that looking back, the FX series was the first time she "got a chance to work so much."
"I've been a guest star. I've done a few episodes here and there. I've been in a scene," Angelica said. "But to be a series regular...I was, like, basically a student with a notepad and was just soaking up every single thing."
Even though Candy met a tragic fate in Pose, Angelica explained how grateful she is to have had that big of a platform to share her character's story.
"I have spoken a lot at colleges and done a lot of things," she noted. "I don't think anything will, in my lifetime, do as much, have as much of a ripple effect, as playing Candy did. It just went into people's hearts."
Angelica said her younger self "is doing cartwheels" inside her heart right now, because despite growing up as a "theater kid," and doing things like teaching herself how to play the guitar and piano, for a long time, she was just focused on getting through the day.
"I did all of these things and always thought I would be performing, but when I transitioned, I honestly just had to focus on survival...As we say, I'm taking back everything the devil stole from me," she expressed.
Listen to the complete chat from Just the Sip above.