I've been chasing some paychecks. Modeling. I don't discriminate against paychecks. I've got to pay the bills.
I grew up in the Ukraine and then I went to Paris in 1996. I went there because there was a modeling agency that invited me there to work so I thought, 'Sure.'
I'm not just a model who plays volleyball, or a volleyball player who supports herself modeling. I'm a female athlete personality.
I started modeling and after a while the photographer Bruce Weber introduced me to Joel Schumacher, who cast me in my first film, and I just fell in love.
I started acting when I was 17. I started modeling when I was 13. It helps in the way that you don't get fazed by cameras too much.
I've been lucky enough to have been given a platform through modeling, so now I can use it as an activist.
When I started modeling, it was like, 'Oh, she's too dark,' and I kind of looked at them like, 'You're too daft.'
Because modeling is lucrative, I'm able to save up and be more particular about the acting roles I take.
I'd always enjoyed acting, but modeling was so time-consuming - and lucrative - that I didn't pursue it.
I approached flying with full enthusiasm and even won a scholarship. Fate, it seems, had other plans and after completing my course, i ended up modeling.