If you really want to be competitive in today's market you have to be in movies that make money.

There's a place in me that can really relate to being the underdog. I'm always fighting to overcome the obstacle. I can really understand what's that about.

I would say a magical thing happened on when the big 40th birthday came. I felt like a light kind of just went off, and maybe that's because I felt like at 40 I had the right to say and be who I wanted to be, say what I wanted to say, and accept what I didn't want to accept.

There have been so many people who have said to me, 'You can't do that,' but I've had an innate belief that they were wrong. Be unwavering and relentless in your approach.

What's hardest for me to swallow is when there is a love story, say, with a really high-profile male star and there's no reason I can't play the part. They say, 'Oh, we love Halle, we just don't want to go black with this part.'

I'm not the girl for superhigh fashion because I don't have the right body. When I want to get dressed up, I'm a Roberto Cavalli girl.

I guess you could say I have bad taste in men. But I no longer feel the need to be someone's wife.