I never planned to win an Oscar. When I auditioned for Ray, I was just thinking about what a great project it would be.

I really wanted to just be a musician. I didn't want to be anything else, but I was funny and all that.

I would say my grandmother would be like my personal god.

Every two, three years there is a movie about the Holocaust because they want you to remember and they want you to be reminded of what it was. When was the last time you seen a movie about slavery?

Guys don't adapt as well as women do to getting their heart broken for the first time. It's tragic. I really wanted to be in love, get married, have kids and buy a wood-paneled station wagon for the family. But it didn't work out, and, boy, it wrecked it!

What we do in New Orleans, man - we party!

I didn't have a knee-jerk reaction like some people did to the language and the violence. My stepfather was a history teacher at Lincoln High School in Dallas. So, I was already familiar with the N-word and the brutality of slavery. What I was drawn to was the love story between Django and Broomhilda and how he defends and gets the girl in the end. I thought it was just an amazing and courageous project.