I believe that parts of people like John Garfield and Moms Mabley, the parts of them that I needed to be able to do what I'm doing, came into me. There's a very nice feeling that there are many, many spirits inside of me looking after me . . .

Art and life are subjective. Not everybody's gonna dig what I dig, but I reserve the right to dig it.

In the dark times, if you have something to hold on to, which is yourself, you'll survive.

If there wasn't something called acting, they would probably hospitalize people like me.

Sometimes experience trumps assumption.

I don't have pet peeves like some people. I have whole kennels of irritation.

I have the strangest time to get cast in anything. 'Ghost' was the same thing. Six months I had to wait for them to decide they had seen everybody possible. Why not? What limits me? I'm black? Oh, am I black?