Jazz in itself is not struggling. That is, the music itself is not struggling... It's the attitude that's in trouble. My plays insist that we should not forget or toss away our history.

If you want to support a writer, produce the first five plays he writes.

Blacks have traditionally had to operate in a situation where whites have set themselves up as the custodians of the black experience.

I done learned my mistake and learned to do what's right by it. You still trying to get something for nothing. Life don't owe you nothing. You owe it to yourself. - Troy -

I believe in the American theatre. I believe in its power to inform about the human condition, its power to heal ... its power to uncover the truths we wrestle from uncertain and sometimes unyielding realities.

I think that's the core of black aesthetics: the ability to improvise. That is what has enabled our [black people's] survival.

You get to the point where your demons, which are terrifying, get smaller and smaller and you get bigger and bigger.