To me the industry has always said that the lovers and haters and principal characters will always be white in Hollywood, and black people will always be appendages of those kinds of dramas, or they will be comedic outlets. It will never change.

I think once you have films in certain festivals you begin to have name recognition, and there are possibilities. Especially for independent filmmakers, it's always good to try the international market because it doesn't have the same kind of baggage.

If you never did anything for your own freedom, you're not worth a human being in my view.

Most young people now are very vulnerable as to what the American film aficionados are going to say. They care too much about a system that has no room for them. It's really a serious issue for me, because to me it's, how do I survive beyond a film that was disgraced or praised?

When you don't work together you can't emerge as a force. It becomes what some call a "lonely struggle" and individual self-destruction.

When the system does not recognize me I'm not devastated.

I really do not care what the white world is doing. I care about black people building the monument on slavery.