I think girls have to play a little hard to get because we come with so much bravado.

Man, after all my grandma put into me learning the piano, that was a hard day, telling her I was telling jokes for a living.

In our music, in our everyday life, there are so many negative things. Why not have something positive and stamp it with blackness?

With Django Unchained, when you're dealing with slavery, it's like a gymnastics routine with the highest amount of difficulty. Quentin Tarantino is not going to do a movie that's just going to lay there and be safe. There's going to be twists and flips.

I went to college on a classical piano scholarship. My grandmother made me practice one full hour a day. Every day. Man. I thought all she wanted was for me not to have any fun. Next thing you know, you have a career in music. Now, not everybody's going to go on and be Mozart or Michael Jackson. But music makes you smarter.

You gotta have the balls to go out there and be funny, man.

It's hard to be a celebrity nowadays. It's not about your track record anymore. If you have a great movie, you're good. If not, people are ready to write you off. I think the only ones who are really winning are people like Will Smith. People go, 'Oh, it's Will Smith. I've got to see him, whatever he's in.'