Zaiesha Joseph

Zaiesha remembers standing in the classroom in front of 15 students or sometimes even in front of her entire school assembly performing monologues, some of which she had made up on the spot. She remembers telling her classmates that she is going to become a professional actress one day, she also remembers her classmates doubting her, but that never deterred her because she knew she had a true passion for acting. “I have always loved acting!” Whenever the electricity was working, Zaiesha would watch bootleg CD movies on the DVD player and imagine herself playing a certain role or character. “I could see myself very vividly on the Television”.

Zaiesha’s mother’s mother worked in the cane fields, as did her mother until the untimely closing of the sugar manufacturing industry. Her father was a construction worker until his unfortunate death in 2007, since then her mother has been a single parent, supplementing the household income by knitting and crocheting local products which are sold to tourists who visit her beautiful Island. She is the seventh of nine siblings and all her life she has been living ‘hand to mouth’ “I truly know what it is like to go hungry, sometimes for days at a time”.

From as early as she can remember, Zaiesha decided that that is not the future she wants for herself and focused on achieving academic excellence at school. In High School and College, she tried her best to choose subjects that would prepare her for her endeavor as an actress. However, in St. Kitts and Nevis, the educational system, at that time did not allow for careers in theater arts or Acting for Film, therefore the only subjects available for her to choose for this type of career were English and Literature.

Moving forward to September 2019, Zaiesha was granted a Scholarship by The Liamigua Education Foundation to pursue her dreams. Soon, she would become a ‘Summa Cum Laude' graduate of the New York Film Academy with a Bachelor's of Fine Arts Degree in Acting For Film. In New York, Zaiesha would often audition for many acting roles, however all of the roles asked her to ‘Change her accent’. She later realized that there are not many roles available for people of Caribbean Descent and background. Hence, she decided to take matters into her own hand; she started writing. In 2020, Zaiesha started writing her own little skits, then she advanced to short films and later feature films. She wrote, acted and produced her own films; Zaiesha worked multiple jobs as a waitress in New York City and used her tiny paycheck to finance her films. She would later go on to produce three feature films, two of which are on Apple TV, Amazon Prime and Google Play. Her most recent feature film is called ‘Pot vs. Kettle’.

Zaiesha wants to make her country proud, she was born and raised in St. Kitts and Nevis, a small Caribbean Federation with a population of 55,000 people and there have not been many persons from St. Kitts and Nevis who have excelled in the film industry. “My aim is to show the world that no matter who you are or where you come from, you can be whatever you choose to be, and those circumstances should be used as motivation for a better you”.