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.

I always say that, like a scientist or anyone, you always want to be the problem-solver. You feel like, if you solve the greatest mystery or the greatest problem, then that makes you brilliant. It's the same thing with an actress. You want to be able to really tackle a character and make it a fully-dimensional human being who is complicated, funny and all the things that a person could be.

All you really need to do is shift people just a tiny bit for change to happen. It doesn't have to be huge and humongous.

I’m a black woman who is from Central Falls, Rhode Island. I’m dark skinned. I’m quirky. I’m shy. I’m strong. I’m guarded. I’m weak at times. I’m sensual. I’m not overtly sexual. I am so many things in so many ways and I will never see myself on screen. And the reason I will never see myself up on screen is because that does not translate with being black.

When your passion and drive are bigger than your fears, you just dive.

I did want to mark the fact that it was the first African-American to win the Lead Actress category.I thought it was so progressive.

I think that I'm coming off as the biggest alcoholic in the world.