We can't afford to deny our past in a bid to be empowered. But what we can do is contextualize the past.

I'm one of those actors who says, "Point me toward the work that matters to me and I don't care where you're putting it. Television show. Movie. Projected on the back of someone's garage." If that's where the work is that's exciting to me and moving, I want to be there.

Female directors, directors of color are a big thing for me, which are both important voices and potent voices that need to be heard. That's how I want to engage myself as an actor going forward.

We can't afford to deny our past in a bid to be empowered. But what we can do is contextualize the past.

Sunday at 11 o'clock is the most segregated hour in America. You have black churches; you have white churches; you have Hispanic churches. It's not really reflective of the world we live in, by and large, in America.

People have compact to go beyond our own culture and upbringing to a degree that I think we don't acknowledge enough really.

The perception of Africa, whether in the U.S. or in Europe, is of a continent that needs help, and cannot pull itself up. That is just not true.