To make a movie is very grueling at times. Long, long hours and cold weather.

I've never gotten any complaints about my headscarf from a man. You can be sexy with a head wrap!

Being strong can be also feminine. I don't think feminine equals being weak. Being strong is very sexy.

Sometimes when you don't care, people are attracted to that.

Like the guy I was dating. White, liberal, educated. I went to meet his family and I think that they probably didn't know they had a problem with it until he walked in with me. And they definitely had issues. Mom had issues with it. Could not, didn't want to see her son. And I don't think she had anything against me. But it was about her son bringing me home. And I felt that for the first time. I was like, 'Wow, that's deep.' It's really simple: I don't fit their picture.

The inspiration for this movie [Something New] was this Newsweek article that came out a couple of years ago that talks about 42.4 percent of black women in America aren't married. Black women are shooting up the corporate ladder way faster than our black male counterparts. And (black men) are either dating outside their race, in jail or dying. And so if you want to have a family, you want to be married, you have to look at other options.

My dad is a director/producer and my mom is a dancer; she performed with Alvin Ailey, but I didn't even think about becoming an actress.