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.

We have two boys. After George Zimmerman was found not guilty of killing Trayvon Martin, we had to explain to our older son, who was 12 at the time, how that could happen. Instead of hugging and consoling him, my husband pulled out a documentary about Emmett Till and showed it to him and started to talk about how the justice system works in this country - and how it often doesn't. From that conversation, our son wrote a short story about Trayvon Martin going to heaven to meet Emmett Till.

I write to music, so every script I have has its own playlist. Music just opens me up to the emotions that I'm writing.

Growing up the way I did, it was tough being one of only a few black people in the town and in school. What my upbringing got me is never feeling completely safe emotionally. Never knowing when something racial was going to pop off based on how I look. So that's something I've carried with me personally and is reflected in my work.

I want my work to always be hopeful, in the end. You're giving me two hours, and, in Shots Fired's case, 10 hours of your life. I don't want you to ever leave something I've done feeling worse than when you came in. I hope the work can be aspirational, and aspirational doesn't have to be corny at all.

When killings of black by policeman happen, there's the victim, there's the family, there are the police, there are the politicians, and there is the community. Everybody is affected. Everybody has a point of view. We really wanted to dig into that and get to know all these different people that are changed by it.

I grew up with white parents and until after college, it was a lot of confusion, especially because I grew up in an all-white area. So I never looked around and saw anyone who looked like me.