I know some things when I start. I know, let's say, that the play is going to be a 1970s or a 1930s play, and it's going to be about a piano, but that's it. I slowly discover who the characters are as I go along.

As soon as white folks say a play's good, the theater is jammed with blacks and whites.

Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing.

All of art is a search for ways of being, of living life more fully.

I write for myself and my goal is bringing that world and that experience of black Americans to life on the stage and giving it a space there.

I think all in all, one thing a lot of plays seem to be saying is that we need to, as black Americans, to make a connection with our past in order to determine the kind of future we're going to have. In other words, we simply need to know who we are in relation to our historical presence in America.

I found out life's hard but it ain't impossible.