“It felt impossible.”

That is how Richards High School graduate Sabrina Said described the idea of pursuing a career in television as a Palestinian American woman.

She had no obvious mentors to seek for help. But she had a dream and a drive to reach it.

“I would have to be my own mentor,” she decided.

Said chased the dream all the way to New York City, working as a production assistant for shows such as “Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown,” “Watch What Happens Live! with Andy Cohen,” “Jersey Shore” and “Christiane Amanpour: Sex & Love Around the World.”

But she regularly found herself the only Arab person in the room while working on those programs.

“That was a difficult time for me,” she said.

Of the bunch, “Parts Unknown” proved a special experience for Said. Bourdain, the late chef, explorer and documentarian, has been lauded for how he portrayed Middle Eastern culture.

And producers on the show regularly

came to Said with questions.

“That’s the kind of culture there was, the kind of company it was,” Said said. “Those were big productions. It meant something to me.”

But there is still a long way to go in television at large. Even the shows striving for better representation would turn to her with questions about Lebanon, for instance, though Said’s heritage is mostly Palestinian. What companies really need is a more diverse group of people working on these programs, according to Said.

“It’s the only way to change things,” she said. “You have to get in the room. ... You speak up. You have to, even if it’s hard.”

Finding her voice

Before graduating from Richards in 2010, Said spent two years in the Oak Lawn school’s Unity Club, one of those as its president.

“She was a very hard-worker and a go-getter,” recalled Rahaf Othman, the Richards social studies teacher who sponsors the club. “I knew from the beginning she should be on the executive team.”

The Unity Club tended to attract “mostly kids that weren’t the white kids,” according to Said. She joined primarily to learn about other cultures.

“It was a good, multifaceted club,” she said. “Ms. O gave us so much agency.”

Othman said the club has been around for more than a decade, and Said is the reason it has a community service component to it. She pushed for that, Othman said.

“She’s so outgoing,” Othman said. “She thinks so out of the box and has that sense of humor. … I’m not surprised what she went on to do. I always knew she was going to rock whatever she got involved with.”

Said got the opportunity to study improv, sketch writing, acting and writing for television for two years at Chicago’s famed Second City, though she admittedly knew little about the comedy institution in her backyard before she got involved with it.

While her experience at The Second City was at times “amazing,” it was another instance in which Said felt isolated in a world where she had no template for success. And both comedy at large and The Second City in particular have faced a reckoning in recent years amid reports of institutional racism.

“At that time, you definitely felt like they only wanted to hear some voices,” Said recalled of her time there, circa 2014.

She also had no clear path into the world of television, despite her training. Said comes from a family of business people. No one close to her had ever been involved with entertainment, and so her decision to pursue it came with a lot of questions. Among them: How?

“It’s like you want to work on Mars,” Said said with a laugh.

But her parents love media and culture, and they encouraged her to “go for it.” They also probably knew they had little say in the matter.

“I’ve always been a pretty fierce, independent woman,” Said said. “They knew I was going to do it.”

Before she did, though, it was off to Korea to teach English for a year. Again, a desire to learn about other cultures was at the forefront.

To this day, she encourages anyone who can to visit Seoul.

“It was beautiful,” she said. “They were so welcoming.”

Coming home, opening the door

She got her break in television in August 2017, when she was hired by the production company Zero Point Zero, which worked on the Bourdain program and others.

After a little more than a year in the world of New York television production, Said came back to Chicago. Her long-term plan is to continue heading west and get involved in scripted television in Los Angeles. But she needed to take care of her mother for a while. Then, the pandemic halted most production in L.A. Said found a silver lining in the break.

“I got to spend time at home that I needed,” she said.

She also reconnected with the Union League Boys & Girls Clubs, where she previously interned and still works as a freelance writer. She also found a television opportunity in Chicago, working as a production associate on “Judge Mathis.” She continues to make connections in the industry, confident there is a spot for her when the dust of COVID-19 settles. And she is holding the door open for anyone who may follow.

Said was originally reluctant to take part in profiles Richards put together in April for Arab American History Month, because at the moment she just feels like another person living at home with her mother. Othman did not see it that way.

“She broke a major glass ceiling,” Othman said. “She’s willing to mentor, opening doors for others. She’s definitely making a difference, no doubt about it. … It makes me very proud.”

The main reason Said ultimately agreed to take part is that she does not want to see another student with ambitions like her own feel this is “impossible,” as she once did.

“It’s a lonely journey,” Said said. “I want other people to see this. We have to help each other. If you have any inkling to do this, you’re the only one who can do this. … Don’t let it go. The industry needs you.”

Said suggested anyone interested in the entertainment business take the time to read scripts and books, particularly celebrity memoirs that offer some useful insider info on the industry. Podcasts are good for that too. But the best is taking a class in anything that is a potential passion, she said.

“Taking classes definitely showed me, ‘you love this; you’re not just thinking about it,’ ” Said said.

Despite the work she has already done, much of Said’s path is still uncharted. While working for a few household names in television has been fun, her creativity wants something down the road she can call her own. The closest approximation of her dream project may be Aziz Ansari’s Netflix hit “Master of None,” which she said does a great job of showcasing his heritage while exploring other cultures. She wants to share her perspective with the world, too.

“I’d create a show,” she said of the dream. “I’d be in it.”

And she’s not about to let anyone tell her it’s impossible.

Bill Jones is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.