You can't be from Montgomery, Alabama, and not have a background in the church. It's at the core of who we are as a people.

You cannot live to please everyone else. You have to edify, educate and fulfill your own dreams and destiny, and hope that whatever your art is that you're putting out there, if it's received, great, I respect you for receiving it. If it's not received, great, I respect you for not.

Where I'm from, you learned about God before you learned to read and write. Our faith is what grounds us.

I'm glad that I get to take my final walk as the princess of 2012. ...there's nothing wrong with winning an Oscar!

Every character I get to play has some element of who I am, but there's no fun in playing yourself. At least, for me, there isn't.

One thing I've learned is be comfortable in your skin, and more importantly, be comfortable in your shoes.

I think that young women and little girls need to see that they don't have to be the damsel in distress. They don't have to not show their strength. They don't have to be whatever the stereotype is or the tropes that we go to in our minds.