Regina King was always destined for greatness.
On Friday, Jan. 15's all-new E! News' Daily Pop, Victor Cruz surprised the Oscar-winning actress with one of her earliest interviews. The clip featured a young Regina, who was promoting Poetic Justice in 1993.
"I'm looking forward to starring roles now," Regina said at the time. "I'm hoping this film will springboard me into those roles much more, positive, stronger roles. Maybe I can portray a positive, you know, black woman."
Little did young Regina know that she'd become one of Hollywood's most influential actresses. Her first reaction to the clip?
"First of all, I look at my face and I see my son! Like, oh, my gosh," she reacted. "Like, I feel like I'm looking at my son when he was 13 years old, which is crazy!"
As she continued, the Watchmen star joked that she's happy her "voice dropped."
On fulfilling young Regina's dream, the 50-year-old actress—whose birthday is today, Jan. 15—said, "I think so. I think so and beyond. I think that that, you know, young lady that I'm looking at right now never saw that this couldn't have been a possibility. So, yeah."
In addition to her Oscar, which she won for her work in If Beale Street Could Talk, Regina has four Emmys and a Golden Globe under her belt. She's since expanded her resume by directing the 2020 drama, One Night in Miami.
"Feels good. This was a story that I had never seen before," Regina relayed. "I've never seen four men that have things about them that remind me of all the men that I love in my life, Black men that I love in my life."
One Night in Miami follows a fictional meeting between Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown and Sam Cooke.
While Regina acknowledged that they're all "icons," she said she "saw them as men first."
Be sure to check out this exclusive interview in honor of Regina's 50th birthday!
One Night in Miami is out on Amazon Prime Video now.