Hello … I’m Darja Igorevna Vaarsi or Darja Vaarsi in English terms … I was Originally born in Estonia … I’m now a proud resident of the US … I came here as a political refugee … I’m kind of a jack of all trades artistically … I consider myself to more of a emotive artist and a personality … but … I would consider myself to a professional model just because I’ve done a lot of professional modeling work along side agency models and I’m usually the odd one out that’s tattooed and short … I do get a lot of professional model castings … I’m obviously not the standard one … I’m unusual … I’m short … I have scars … I’m covered in tattoos … I don’t look normal … My friends don’t recognize me from day to day because I have so many wigs … I change my appearance for all my work constantly … But … I do think that part of being a professional model is being a chameleon … I consider all the work to be some aspect … an … element of myself … I don’t feel like I’m really ever playing a character … I’m just showing a different side of me … I’m a highly creative person … I’m just into so many different things as well as esthetics and looks … I began modeling a long time ago … I think my first shoot was probably when I was fifteen … I began professionally when I was eighteen … I managed to do a lot of mainstream work because I photograph tall … so that helps … (laughter) … no one can ever tell that I’m short and that helped me a lot with work … I learned a lot of skills … like photography … photo editing … I do hair and makeup … wardrobe … even photo editing professionally to help with my career … that first segued into television with me doing music videos … I have done some work for number one MTV music videos … Now I work professionally as an actress … But the reason I book the majority of my work … is kind of to do with my modeling and also my own personal style and esthetic … actually … more recently playing myself in a lot of movies and TV shows doing cameos where I’m playing myself … I would say that the modeling has translated into TV because both of them are performing arts … it’s kind of like whether you’re touring …  performing music or working on a TV show or doing photo shoots you’re performing in front of large amount of people … The one commonality with all of these jobs is that you have to be comfortable in front of crowds … you just have to be able to get to work and do your thing and not be remotely shy or self-conscious … A lot of time there’s million’s of dollars at stake for that one thing … and there’s hundreds of people waiting to go home … so you can’t fuck up …  I do consider myself to be a professional model but more importantly other people do … so … (laughter) … So … fashion wise and aesthetics … Right now I’m sort of in off duty style … I’m a Black Metalist … Satanic 666 music … Also a Biker Chick as well is my husband … so when I’m off duty my style is kinda like more biker … everyone thinks I’m in a biker gang because of the patches I wear … showing the tattoos … that’s why everyone leaves me alone … I scare people … For my work … for everything creative in my life … I’m always dressed up … whether it’s wigs … whether i’m wearing suits … ballroom gown … I work on a lot of tv shows … predominantly Empire on Fox … I play Lady Gaga  a lot because I sincerely love fashion and I have a very flamboyant and eclectic personal style …  I’ll bring up my husband now … he’ll always like … “Take off your costume” … Alright … this is not a costume … it’s all just  different versions of me … I don’t think you just have to have just one distinctive personal style … I honestly have my hands in so many pots … and I have so many interests and passions that I cant just have one style … day to day even my friends don’t recognize me in person, the director doesn’t recognize me … on Empire for example …I play five different people … I’m always me … but I look completely different … I think it’s a wonderful way to express different aspects of your personality … Modeling is great … I don’t really recommend it to people with low self esteem … It’s a really tough industry … It’s super competitive … cut-throat … There can be things like sabotage … what not … For me … Modeling is a form of art therapy so it helps me significantly with PTSD … Coming up with a concept for a photoshoot … the hair … the makeup … wardrobe … editing … modeling … So that for me is also a form of therapy … as well as a creative outlet as far as modeling … I’m super confident with it … but that’s sort of a personality thing … Either your comfortable being around other people or not … It’s the kind of industry that if you lack confidence … it’s going eat you up … I’ve become friends with a lot of strong … creative … confident artists … But … it’s also a double edge sword … In relationships sometimes people worry about you because you work in an industry that’s based on your appearance … They’re worried about the content … or you being misrepresented or something too sexual … Things kind of change a little bit when you’re married depending on what your partners perspective is or how private they are … It’s obviously a very public job … So … It’s been six years … I haven’t changed a bit … I’m still awesome … (laughter) … I’m just kidding … I have changed significantly as an artist … I don’t really do as much modeling now because I’m really busy with main-stream acting … That’s incredibly time consuming and I also have a band … actually with my husband … It’s a husband and wife duo … super cute … and I also do stunt training … I’m actually incredible busy and I have less time for modeling now but when I do modeling … what I’m actually more into right now are portraits and that sort of thing … I’m less into going over the top and crazy … I kind of prefer things that seem less staged and more real … I think there’s a lot of beauty in candidness … and you can show other parts of your personality which I couldn’t always capture in the kind of photo shots I used to do … I used to do extreme beauty … extreme fashion … a lot of really dark … messed up things … People would see me and it terrified the hell out of them … Which was great because I do think a huge part of being a model is being versatile and I just love challenging myself and seeing if I can accomplish something that I think I can’t and trying to compete with the best talent in the world … not really competing … just seeing if I can do the same thing with far fewer resources … The reason I love acting so much is that it’s a lot like modeling and photography but it’s the 3D version of it … I feel you can get more out of a person sometimes in film media … I’m an emotive artist … I’m highly emotional in everything I do … but it really makes it easy for me to be not even remotely self conscious … It doesn’t matter if I’m around hundreds of people and I have to do something bizarre and weird … I just get into it and it’s like there’s nobody around me and I just go … Regarding the #MeToo movement … I’ll touch on that first … I really don’t have the opinion that most people would expect from me … Not that I think that anyone should assume what I’m going think just because I’m a woman and I work in entertainment … but it does surprise a lot of people … First thing is … I’m from Northern Europe and we don’t really have political correctness there and there’s more gender equality … In fact … the place that I’m from was part of the USSR and Russia was… in WWII… the only country to have a female tank unit … so gender equality is very common there … it’s not really an issue … So… for me it’s not really an issue… For me… that’s a huge cultural difference moving here … where this country and this culture… I do feel is kind of backwards and is moving forward … but really slowly … whether its women voting … slavery … you name it … but I do feel it’s a culture where there is a lack of gender equality where there are gender specified rules here … which where I’m from … doesn’t really exist … Men stay home and take care of the kids … Woman do … it’s totally different … So for me … that was a huge learning curve … As far as the #MeToo movement goes … I feel that people are too sensitive … that people can’t have an opinion about anything … even things you have experience in … You just can’t have a differing opinion from other people … you can be attacked for pretty much anything … As far as the #MeToo movement … I don’t really feel … some of the time… that woman are necessarily empowering themselves … They’re kind of making themselves look more like victims … even about situations where they’re not victims … It’s not to be insensitive … obviously woman go through a lot things… I’m saying this too because I’m a person that survived violence … domestic violence … I was almost killed by an ex previously … I also lost my virginity to rape … So… I would say that I am entitled to my opinion … and I have it for a reason … But … I feel right now … there’s a trend … you blame a guy for anything and basically get him out of your life … you can take over his job … if you accuse someone of inappropriate conduct … Like the Harvey Weinstein situation … there were a lot of actresses that knowingly slept with him on purpose to move forward with they’re careers … and they did it willingly … and then after the fact they turned around … and I guess they’re ashamed of it…So then they called themselves a victim… For me … and other friends that are rape survivors … that were actually raped against our will and held down … or were beaten and attacked … I have friends that have horrible rape stories and they also work as models … and as actresses … and in entertainment … and they do not get ahead that way … It’s kinda of offensive whenever people choose to do something that they’re embarrassed of and then they turn around and call themselves a victim … It’s not really the same thing … and I think people should distinguish between the different forms of sexual harassment and rape … and analyze it more … or otherwise it’s offensive to people like me that didn’t have a choice in what happened to us … and … I never slept with anyone to get ahead with work … I’ve never even dated a photographer … It’s pretty crazy … right? … (laughter) … I’m probably the only model that’s never dated a photographer … (laughter) … And … Just the cultural sensitivity … It’s kind of bizarre because I was born in a worn torn country … came here as a refugee … most of my family was murdered … went through hell … I was in foster care too … I was on my own since I was fourteen … I had a super crazy life … super negative and violent … So … I don’t know … everyone that’s giving me these opinions about culture sensitivity … they’ve had very sheltered lives … It’s just an observation that I’ve have that they don’t know very much about other cultures … they haven’t traveled very much … A lot of them were born in the suburbs … they never left … they’ve literally never been anywhere but there … Now in this country you can’t say anything … even your opinion about something without being attacked just because it doesn’t align with what someone else thinks … but … just because someone has an opinion … it doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re right or wrong … everyone’s entitled to it … In this country it’s actually part of the reason why I use social media just for work … I almost don’t share anything personal except happy … positive things … because … I even say nice and positive things … and then people attack me … It’s the way that I interact with the world … I’m an incredibly private person … I just focus on work …I have my future goals … I have my husband whom I love … But as far as the cultural climate … It’s made me an incredibly private and reclusive person where I just kind of keep to myself … I don’t really say anything … But for me … it’s also different … I was adjusting my immigration status … I had a really difficult case … It took about eleven years … fifteen thousand dollars … I don’t have the time to go into it because it’s so wild … A lot of people don’t understand … immigrants … and I would actually get attacked a lot online because there’s all this stuff happening and I don’t share an opinion … about the president … about politics … about immigration … but people don’t realize that when you’re an immigrant … and you’re adjusting your status … if you’re not a citizen … you can’t say anything negative … about the president … you can’t share your opinions about politics … or the government because the government is actually allowed to go through your social media and use any of that against your case … If I were to actually say any of my opinions publicly about the president … my status wouldn’t be … hypothetically … it wouldn’t be adjusted depending on what I have to say … A lot of people don’t realize that I’ve been attacked a lot because I’m silent … and people don’t realize why I have to be silent … and I cant even really say it publicly … Yeah I really don’t share my opinions about anything because half the time … I’m not allowed to legally and my lawyer told me I’m not allowed to … as an immigrant … So … we’re going social media … the funny thing is I’m not really a fan of social media … but also just cause I know there’s a lot of false news … and people spreading misinformation … We all know the whole situation regarding Russian being involved in the American election … with them circulating fake news and then everyone  here in America believed it … and then everyone spreading it like wildfire without verifying facts … It even had an impact on the whole nation … and a lot of people aren’t aware of it … and I constantly catch people sharing news that is false and it can have catastrophic effects if they share it … Social media is not something that I’m personally  a huge fan of … however I do use it professionally and it’s a really important tool for my life … work wise and personally … I have friends from all around the world and the country … I’m still friends with people that I’ve known since the third grade or second grade on there … I kind of stay in touch with everyone that I become friends with for the rest of my life … pretty much … Work wise … I actually book the majority of my television work using social media … and I work on Netflix …Showtime … Amazon … Fox… NBC … Pop TV … I do a bunch of mainstream commercials … I just shot commercials for Facebook and Aflac and Kmart and Marlboro … all these different things … I actually got all my bookings from social media believe it or not … so it’s actually a very powerful tool … It’s also how I get contacts for photo shoots now … and I have different companies contacting me to work with me … through social media … so … I would say what’s changed with me … regarding social media … Firstly … I was the last person of all my friends to join Facebook … I was like Facebook … “Fuck that shit” … (laughter) … I was …I’m not doing that … that’s lame … I was the last person out of everyone I knew on Facebook … and I didn’t care… I enjoyed having my little Zoolander flip phone … when you couldn’t text … you couldn’t do anything on it … It was great … It took you five minutes to type one word in it … It was the kind where you had to keep pressing the same button … remember that? …  I just liked living life like that … and then when I did started using it … I guess just seeing the way other people used it influenced me a little bit … I was younger back then so I really didn’t think about that information was stored permanently … someone can always access it … you don’t own any information that you share on there as well … it’s not yours anymore … I wasn’t irresponsible when I was younger with social media … but … I didn’t really have a filter … Nowadays anytime on Facebook it says … on this day … and it goes back the past seven years … I’m just constantly deleting everything that I said when I was the younger version of me because I was unfiltered … I didn’t say anything negative … but I just said what I was thinking … and maybe I wasn’t as thoughtful …with my words specifically … I thought I was in a safe space and surrounded with friends … but now I’ve just changed it … the problem with social media that a lot of people don’t think about is … if you share too much personal information … people think that they actually know you … often times … I’m really interested in forensics … I would love to do that type of work in the future … just due to my past and whatnot … I’m generally very careful about what I share because … people don’t realize when you’re online … people think that they actually know you … and then they fall in love with you … or they stalk you …I’ve actually had a lot of really bad experiences with stalkers … where people are like … I love you … we’re going to get married … and I never met them before … people just doing dangerous things … and crazy things … and then attacking on other forms of social media … here … lets just put it this way … this is a detail that a lot of people don’t know about me … I’ve been on the news a bunch … world wide … one of the reasons is related to social media … and this is a cautionary tale … A few years back … this was not facebook … but using twitter … the governor of Delaware … his office … shared a tweet … and it said … helping the disadvantaged students of Texas … and there was a picture of me … I had long yellow hair … and I had kind of an alternative outfit from the top up … you couldn’t really see anything … but it was a selfie that I had on Twitter that was public … from a photoshoot … it was totally PG and I looked really cute … However what happened was … I woke up one morning …and NBC was contacting me … and CBS … and networks from all around the world to interview me because the governor accidentally posted my photo … and it just went like wildfire all over the news…and then all the of the sudden…everyones saying that … I’m a dominatrix prostitute in the New England region of the United States … A place at that time I had never been to … I still have never been to Delaware … Obviously … this almost destroyed my relationship … it distressed my relationship with my fiancé’s family … because they actually believed it … because people believe just what they see … and then … people were spreading it everywhere … a lot of people thought it was funny … they’d torment me over it … and a lot of people believed it … because if people don’t like you … and here something negative … they’re going to want to believe it …Just think about that … all of that is still on the internet forever … you can just Google … Governor … Delaware …Tweet … and model … and I’m going to be there … there’s going to be thousand of pictures of me … That was just one mistake with social media … and what happened was … I was being attacked on Reddit … I was being attacked on all the news … Everybody was saying I was a prostitute … a whore … when honestly … that photo was taken when I was doing a photoshoot … but at the time that my dad died …The entire time … it was an emotional time for me … I wasn’t even doing anything about it … and I was also just making art … I was just innocent … candid … I was also engaged to the man of my dreams who I’m now married to … but you can imagine what kind of effect that has on your life … most people are not strong enough to withstand something like that … a lot of relationships fail because of it … not because it’s necessarily true … but because people worry that people might think that it’s true and what they might think about them … I would say that’s a cautionary tale for me about social media … not to mention … people are also stalked and murdered because people think that they actually know you and you share too many details … and when you use location check-ins … I would never check into somewhere when I’m actually there because it’s really dangerous…and people don’t know where I live … they might know the city … but … yeah … I just keep things very … personally … because I’ve actually had a lot of bad things happen because of social media … that’s why I think that people should be more thoughtful about the information that they share … I didn’t do anything wrong … but someone tweeted about me … and I was torn to shreds in the media …The Governors office never apologize to me … and I was told I don’t deserve an apology from anyone … so … and that’s just due to social media …and they made one small error … it was a link issue … they left out one number … and it just linked to my picture … it could happen to you … it could happen to anybody … What I have going on with my life right now is … I still do everything at once … but I am trying predominately focus on acting … I just have a natural knack for act for it … I try harder and I get into character …