I feel mushy these days when I think about art and artists and the work that lies ahead for us. There's good work to be done and there's joy to be found in it, I think.

I've passed along some advice that Oprah [Winfrey] gave to me: When something bad is happening, it's not happening to you; it's happening for you.

We've had these bursts of cool years here or there but that's not change. That's a trend. You only hope that this could be the beginning of true change.

By the end of the documentary [ '13th'], you really understand what prison is, what the prison industrial complex is, where this whole Black Lives Matter movement comes from, the history of resistance, the history of how politicians have used criminality over the decades for a particular political gain. It's to give people an understanding of it so they can make their own decisions about how they want to be in the world.

I think when we get to a place that this is not the story, that everyone's story is a part of the story, then we can say this has changed. Until then, these are steps to change if they're consistent.

[ Hollywood] is a patriarchy, headed by men and built for men.

All the films I do, I write the scripts, I direct.