Moonlight's Ashton Sanders: ‘America isn’t made for the black man’

The actor was just 21 when the Oscar-winning film made him a star. He talks about dealing with bullies and racism, and why he'll never become too Hollywood

"Talk about an emotional rollercoaster, man." Ashton Sanders is taking a well-deserved break during a year that has transformed him from an unknown 21-year-old to the star of an Oscar-winning movie. He's perched on a sofa in a studio on the west side of Chicago, where he is filming his next project, kitted out in an all-black ensemble complete with leather jacket and movie-star shades that he keeps on throughout our interview. His words are interspersed with coughing, symptomatic of an exhausting schedule.

He has barely had time to register the effect of his powerful performance in Barry Jenkins' much-lauded best picture winner Moonlight, a soulful triptych tale that examines three key periods in the life of Chiron, a black gay man in Miami struggling with his sexuality, played by three actors of varying ages. In the middle section, Sanders portrays Chiron's teenage years with understated power, winning him the sorts of plaudits for which most established actors wait years. In the New Yorker, Hilton Als wrote that his performance was "like seeing Montgomery Clift act for the first time".