If you can handle the fact that people are going to be mad at you when you do what you think is right, you'll be alright.

Sitting at the table during Color Purple and looking up and suddenly realizing I was acting in front of Steven Spielberg, was pretty cool. It was pretty good.

I fear waking up one morning and finding out my life was all for nothing. We're here for a reason. I believe a bit of the reason is to throw little torches out to lead people through the dark. When you're kind to someone in trouble, you hope they remember and are kind to someone else and so on. Soon it will be like a wildfire.

I won once [an Oscar]. So it can't be that racist.

Chocolate and candy. That's what we brought in to our friends. We worked in East Berlin with other artists who were smuggled out to come work in the Western Bloc. It was extraordinary because people in East Berlin just wanted to know what was happening. Music. Fashion. The news. All of the things we get every day.

My mother's great. She has the major looks. She could stop you from doing anything, through a closed door even, with a single look. Without saying a word, she has that power to rip out your tonsils.

When you are kind to someone in trouble, you hope they'll remember and be kind to someone else. And it'll become like a wildfire.