My mother always told me growing up I had a punchable face. Little did I know she was predicting my television career.
Michael EmersonWe go where our family goes. We go where our friends are, and because our social networks are so segregated by race, we end up with what we have. We also find that, you know, if you're immigrants, you're not part of that history.
Michael EmersonThere are roles that are terrifying because they're large or you may feel that they're out of your line, but I'm never terrified once the actual work begins. Once you begin rehearsal, then it's small building blocks. It's solving little problems one at a time.
Michael EmersonSo there was great clashes when, you know, if you believe you shouldn't remove your shoes and someone's taking their shoes off, how can they do this? That actually was such a big clash in this case that they had to put a curtain down the middle of where they would worship.
Michael EmersonSo one of the profound things we found when studying these congregations, the mixed ones, is just how much overlap and interracial ties that develop not only with the people in the congregation, but they start meeting each other's families, and their friends, and they go to each other's neighborhoods if they live in different neighborhoods, and at work they meet people they wouldn't otherwise met, and so it creates a whole new definition of what the group is.
Michael EmersonOnce in a while you get people that maybe because of economic reasons, or have a social network, they get attracted. But it's a very tiny percent so that when we look at, you know, who are pastors and who are the head clergy of these congregations, they're overwhelmingly white, just a few African Americans, and those folks are usually called to what were formerly white congregations, or they started interracial church from the get-go.
Michael Emerson