What happened to Haiti is a threat that could happen anywhere in the Caribbean to these island nations, you know, because of global warming, because of climate change and all this.

Mel Gibson is my friend. I love Mel. He's not the person that I hear people are often trying to diminish. Whatever his challenges are in life, he still remains someone I'm very close to.

New Orleans is a city whose basic industry is the service industry. That's why it makes its money. That's - it brings people to the city. People come to the city and experience the wonders of this extraordinary city and everything else. The question is that, how do we create jobs which are the jobs that have pay, that - living wages?

The world is dealing with issues of immigration, deindustrialization, and poverty.

My theatrical background was in the great work of the South African playwright Athol Fugard.

Hollywood is designed to check the box office on Monday morning and see: "How'd we do? How much?" It's another facet of this whole culture of accumulation and consumption. Black people are caught up in it, white people are caught up in it, white actors, black actors, female actresses - everybody's caught up in it.

President [Barack] Obama is a man who had certain advantages because of the civil rights movement.