A classic is a classic for a reason. Let's try to create new classics. The idea of repeating ourselves drives me a little crazy.

A classic is a classic for a reason. Let's try to create new classics. The idea of repeating ourselves drives me a little crazy.

I write to music, and Nina Simone is always on my playlist to write to. I mean, shes inspiring. She's truthful and real and raw.

My parents are amazing. When I said I wanted to go into film, they didn't understand it, but they were incredibly supportive. But growing up, I absolutely did have that feeling of, "Wow, somebody just gave me up." That was infused in The Secret Life of Bees too - the protagonist wanting unconditional love from her dead but much-imagined mother.

Sports also teaches you that it's about the team, and the better your teammates are, the better they make you.

A Different World was run by black women, Debbie Allen and Yvette Lee Bowser. Lead writer Susie Fales-Hill was a hero of mine, because she was 28 when she was running one of the top shows on television. Going to work every day and seeing black women in charge made that normal to me.

I'm very shy. But as a director and especially a female director, absolutely: How I used to walk on the court is how I walk on set. And I have to - I mean, I'm controlling 150, 200 people, and everything is on me.