Do you think much about your gender and how that has affected your career?
I wasn’t aware of my gender until 2013 when I did a play called Blurred Lines [at the National Theatre]. Since then I have really come to know that I am a woman and that means something. That means life can be a tiny bit more difficult. [Before], I wasn’t aware because I’m black and I’m poor. So, I was focused on those things: I was really busy being black and poor [laughs]! I can’t believe the things that have happened. At one awards show there was a production company who I’d been considering working with and I was talking to this guy [from the production company] when he said, “Do you know how much I want to f**k you right now?” Then said to my friend, “No-one is on my vibe, my n*****.” If I was a man, I can safely say that wouldn’t have happened. It’s those tiny reminders, of being female, of being black and being dark-skinned – which is very important – and coming from a working-class background. It’s a constant awareness.

Does that weigh on you?
No, not at all. I don’t have any sense of ‘I f**king hate being this person!’ It’s material for my writing. I think it’s an amazing position I’m in, that I view the world from.

On Twitter, one of your followers wrote about a piece in The New York Times where they recommended your show, but illustrated it with a picture of your lighter-skinned co-star Danielle Walters, and the follower was criticising it as “another form of erasure” Was that upsetting?
You know what? It’s not upsetting at all.

Isn’t it? That makes it almost worse that these things no longer upset you.
Yeah, I think it is worse. The thing is no-one is setting out to hurt me, it happens a lot. For example, at awards shows, you get gift bags and I always get white people’s make-up, because they don’t think about it. Then the minute you highlight it they’re like, “Oh my god, I’m mortified, I’m so sorry!”

So it’s insidious…
Yes, and actually it is unacceptable now and I think this has got to stop.

In the same piece, the writer talked about how her support of you was based on “[your] singularity in representing dark skinned black women in British TV”. Is being a role model something you want?
You know what, not really. I don’t think anyone [does]. Viola Davis is one of my role models. I don’t think she wants to be a role model. For me that’s what probably makes her all the more of a role model. As long as people get that I’m not going to hurt anyone, but I’m going to do what I want – if that is what you see as something to aspire to, then great. But it’s not really my job, I’m not paid to be a role model, I’m paid to make TV shows.

There’s a lot of responsibility that comes with it…
I understand that by creating this show, I have filled a gap. I didn’t see myself reflected on TV, in the media at all. And now there’s going to be a bunch of young girls that have that and it’s going to make their lives a bit easier. That makes my heart swell, but I’m not going to let that affect me. I like living a very normal small life, I like pretending that I’m not on TV. I love to just sit here, watch everyone and no-one has a clue.

When it comes to role models, we’re about to lose some pretty big ones as the Obamas leave the White House next week. How does that make you feel?
When someone proposed Michelle Obama being president, I was like, ‘Oh my god, that’s amazing!’ There were so many negatives [when Trump was elected], I couldn’t stop crying. My mum told me to get over it but I couldn’t because people were being personally attacked. You could have easily had that life, it could have been you. A woman walking around America, someone grabbing her f**king genitals. But it’s a global thing, we’re here with Brexit. It’s a very sad time but the positive is that in times like this artists rise, protesters rise.

Stylist speaks to Chewing Gum's Michaela Coel: on speaking her mind, sex clubs and upsetting the status quo