Lana Parrilla has built a successful career as an actress, landing roles in a slew of big-name movies and television shows—most notably starring in ABC’s hit fairy-tale drama “Once Upon a Time.”
The actress, who stars in the new Netflix film “Atlas” alongside Jennifer Lopez and Sterling K. Brown, told the podcast’s host, Tommy DiDario, that she once battled homelessness when she first started acting—an experience she said still “terrifies” her to this day.
“It’s something that I will always remember,” she said.
Ms. Parrilla, who was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, moved to Los Angeles shortly after she graduated from high school. At the age of 19, she found herself struggling to balance work while attending college and pursuing her acting career.
“My family and I were in different places, and I was kind of left on my own,” she recalled.
“It was really hard; it was really hard to, like, support yourself, you know, chase after a dream, and also try to get an education all at the same time,” she said. “And I couldn’t do it all. I had to drop out of college, which broke my heart, and I had to go figure out how to make more money to support myself.”
The “Spin City” actress—who managed to attend acting classes at the Beverly Hills Playhouse in Los Angeles—finally found success after booking her first film, earning $1,000 per week.
“But like, with commissions and taxes and all that stuff, I didn’t have a place to live at one point, and I ended up homeless,” she described.
‘A Terrifying Reality’
Ms. Parrilla was cast in her first on-screen role in 1999, playing a waitress in two episodes of the sitcom “Grown Ups,” according to her IMDb page. The following year, she was in the crime-comedy film “Very Mean Men” and the horror/sci-fi flick “Spiders.”Ms. Parrilla gained traction as an actress throughout the aughts, appearing in “Semper Fi,” “Spin City,” “JAG,” “The Shield,” “Boomtown,” “NYPD Blue,” “Six Feet Under,” “24,” “Windfall,” “Lost,” and “Swingtown,” among others.
After her leading role in “Once Upon a Time” from 2011 to 2018, she starred in the 2020 action-thriller “The Tax Collector,” featuring actor Shia LaBeouf and comedian George Lopez. In 2021, she landed a role in the television series “Why Women Kill,” and, more recently, she portrayed the character of Lisa Trammell in the Netflix drama series “Lincoln Lawyer.”
Ms. Parrilla’s acting prowess has been recognized throughout her career at various award shows. In 2012, she won an ALMA Award for “Favorite TV Actress-Drama” and a TV Guide Award for “Favorite Villain” for her work on “Once Upon a Time.” In 2014, she took home another TV Guide Award, winning a Teen Choice Award for “Choice TV Actress: Fantasy/Sci-Fi” for the same series two years later.
However, despite her marked success, Ms. Parrilla said she still worries about financial security given the tumultuous nature of the Hollywood entertainment industry and the high cost of living in Los Angeles.
“I look at a lot of homeless people on streets and it breaks my heart, and they’re not all drug addicts,” she told Mr. DiDario.
“It’s really about the affordable housing in this city,” she continued. “This has like become the most expensive city to live in—the most unaffordable city to live in—in our nation. And so there’s always like a little part of me in the back of my head that’s like, ‘Oh my God, don’t ever stop working so hard,’ because I don’t want to end up—I didn’t ever want to end up—in the basement of my grandmother’s home.”
Reflecting on the time that she spent experiencing homelessness, including the two months she spent living out of her car, Ms. Parrilla was adamant that she never wanted to end up in that predicament again.
“So it forces me to like, you know, be more creative and find new ways to make money and find all these different ways to, like, develop projects and do your own thing and take on all these new talents and just try and see what works. As an artist, it’s like a, it’s a terrifying reality,” she explained.
Ms. Parrilla said she now prioritizes projects that allow her more control over her career.
“It really comes from that little girl inside who’s like, ‘I don’t want to end up on the streets,’” she said.
