9 Facts About The Harder They Fall's Zazie Beetz That Prove She's a Badass in Real Life, Too

Zazie's father is from East Germany and her mother is a New Yorker. The actress was born in Germany and lived between there and the US up until preschool. Most of her father's family, including her grandparents, still reside in Germany. Zazie speaks German fluently, which came in handy for a season two episode of Atlanta, in which Van, who is also half-German, takes Earn (Donald Glover) to a Fastnacht celebration as an attempt to share her German roots with him. In an interview with Seth Meyers, Zazie described how one of the show's producers had no idea she spoke German and assumed Zazie had studied the language for the episode. "He was like 'Wow, she really worked a lot for it,' and um, I didn't," Zazie teased.

Zazie completed drama classes and even performed in several plays while studying at Skidmore College, but she actually majored in French. "After I graduated, I was like, 'I've spent so much time acting. I can't not try it,'" she told Essence. "I think after high school, I was like, 'I can't get trapped in this. What are my other things?' And then I had an opportunity to see those other things — and I chose acting again."

In 2018, Zazie picked up an Emmy nomination for outstanding supporting actress in a comedy series for her role as Vanessa on FX's Atlanta.

During an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Zazie explained the French origin behind her name. Her father borrowed it from the French movie Zazie dans le Metro, which was an adaption of the book by the same name. Instead of pronouncing it like "Za-zee" which is how the name is enunciated in French, her family calls her by the German pronunciation, "Zah-ze," emphasizing on the "Za." Zazie jokingly told Jimmy her name is a blessing and a curse.

In an essay she penned for Glamour, Zazie wrote about her lifelong battle with anxiety and fear of failure. In it, she described situations where she felt overwhelmed and explained how she tries to push her fears and concerns aside and keep going. While Zazie makes sure to keep herself motivated, she's also a believer of taking things easy when she can. In one Instagram post, she described her need for "should-less" days — days where one does things they want to do as opposed to things they "should" be doing.

When recently asked if she was a Western fan before joining The Harder They Fall, Zazie responded, "If I'm being very honest, not really, no. But it was a great opportunity to honestly get educated on a genre I should know a lot about, because it's a very iconic one in cinema history," she told Slashfilm. "And me and Edi Gathegi, who plays Bill Pickett in the film, we would meet up on Sundays and watch a movie together. And so we started, we just watched a bunch of Westerns and that was really cool. There's a reason why things are classics and it's really cool to discover that." Love her honesty!

Zazie and fellow actor David Rysdahl have been going strong since 2015, though they're very private about their relationship. The pair worked together in the films Shelter and Nine Days.

"I've begun feeling that my responsibility is to the Earth," Zazie said during a conversation with Donald Glover for Interview magazine. "Our generation's war is climate change, so I've really been modifying how I eat and what I eat."

After a quick scroll through Zazie's Instagram, it's clear the actress is a cat person. "Soooooooo cutttteee (not our dog, cat person over here, but I'm warming up to them they aiight)," she captioned an Instagram photo of her boyfriend, David, posing with a dog.