My mother told me, “Show them what you got,” and I did. A kid was dancing in the spot, but I thought I was better and voiced it. I was doing background work on an Oreos commercial with the iconic musician Chubby Checker. I got my first main role in a commercial by sheer fluke. Budding young actors Edwin and Aldis Hodge. It was like that with the majority of our activities as children. The most important thing was that we were kids first and the industry was just something fun we could do as long as our grades were As and Bs. We found a talent manager, Marianne Leone. It wasn’t really my thing, so my mother took my brother and me to New York City and we stumped the pavement. We went to the Barbizon School of Modeling and Acting for a short time. My mother had no clue how to get me started, but I would quickly come to learn that she would always find a way to make things happen for her children. In the midst of the uncertainty of life, I told my mother I wanted to be inside the box (otherwise known as the television) when I was watching kids acting on The Cosby Show. We looked for shelters in New York, but ended up staying at an old neighbor’s vacant home in New Jersey until we could get back on our feet. It wasn’t the most ideal situation, but we’d later find ourselves homeless again when the house burned down less than a year later. My father ended up driving semi-trucks across the country, while my mother got a job in accounting and moved us to our grandmother’s house. My mother and father fell on hard times after they left the Marines. She slept with us in the back seat of a 1980s white Oldsmobile to keep us warm at night. I remember being on a two-week car trip, which was fun in my eyes, but we never knew our mom was really trying to figure out how to get us into a home. The crazy thing about it all is that my brother and I never knew we were homeless. I’m living in a moment where I can look back to the days of being homeless and not knowing where my next meal would come from. An early photo of Edwin and Aldis Hodge with their father. Our relationship is stronger than ever now. I learned about the true idea of forgiving at a young age. Our communication wasn’t really there for many years, but I loved him just the same. He and my mother divorced when I was eight. He got caught up in the drug game for a moment and my mom wasn’t having it. My father, Aldis Sr., wasn’t around much in the beginning. The children of two Marines, we came from a broken home and it was only the will of my mother which led our family to the success we enjoy now. It’s something my mother, Yolette Hodge, would reiterate to my brother, Aldis Hodge, and I since we started our careers in New York City. Without a strong foundation, a house cannot stand.
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