The sentiment that I had a little trouble with was the idea that, "You change the school, you change the community." I couldn't wrap my mind around that.

It's harder to work with people who are not as dedicated to their craft. It also leaves you a better actor when you finish the project, since you always feel like you've learned something.

Any actor will tell you, as soon as your ego and your vanity come into the mix, it destroys your work. Completely destroys it.

There's not one woman in America who does not care about her hair, but we give it way too much value. We deprive ourselves of things, we use it to destroy each other, we'll look at a child and judge a mother and her sense of motherhood by the way the child's hair looks. I am not going to traumatize my child about her hair. I want her to love her hair.

We as artists cannot be politicians. We as artists can only be truth-tellers.

I think sometimes what people miss about black people is that we're complicated.

I get so excited when my daughter says something new, which she is doing every day. I can leave the house for a few hours, come back and meet a totally different person. That's very exciting to me.