Everything that I’ve gone through informs me and my opinions in a way, I guess because I am a child of segregation. I lived through it. I lived in it. I was of it.
I never did one thing right in my life, you know that? Not one. That takes skill.
I’m not as angry as I used to be. But I can get in touch with that anger pretty quickly if I feel my space is being invaded or somebody is not treating me with the respect that I think I want.
Because of where I come from, I never thought I’d see in my life a black candidate running for President.
I kind of realize that I have a tendency to choose the kind of films I watched when I was a kid and would go home and pretend with my friends that we were in those movies after we saw them.
Those that have loved longest love best.
Michelle Obama is Superwoman. What can’t she do? That’s why people love her. She can be on the Supreme Court and anywhere else she wants. She can be the president. She’s history and she’ll stay history because she is so amazingly smart and together.
I used to like watching Helen Mirren’s early films, because she was always naked. It’s titillating.
I understand the rural South, because I spent a lot of time in it when I was a kid. My grandfather’s brothers were farmers. I spent time on the farm as a kid with them, walking through the fields, working, and hanging out.
Not everything’s made to win an Academy Award.
I’ve played a lot of different cops in a lot of different law enforcement agencies.
Young guys don’t tend to want to portray people who have frailties or are less than macho.
I think the biggest challenges for franchises are keeping them fresh and exciting, and most times, you need a good bad guy to make that thing continually work, and sometimes they don’t.
If you are a Jedi, just understand something: people are going to be chasing you. The Jedi Council of every city you enter is going to be chasing you. I’ve been accosted by the Jedi Council in Rio and everywhere else.
I’m pretty focused on what I do. I think directing is a very specific talent, and I’m not real big on putting puzzles together, which is basically what a film is.
Sometimes one of my ways of choosing movies that I want to do is if it’s the kind of movie I would have gone to see when I was a kid, and this is a movie I actually did go see, as a kid. And I think it will be exciting for audiences to see now.
I’ve made a way to allow myself to do big films, small films, dramas, comedies, action films, horror films, or whatever interests me, as a movie-goer. I like watching myself in movies. I want to choose movies that allow me to enjoy myself, the way that I want to entertain myself.
I sit at home and read books. I watch movies. I watch television. I go and play golf. I don’t go to nightclubs. I don’t go out to dinner that often. I’m not a big party guy.
I read, watch television, watch movies, hang out with family. I like my clothes and I have great cars, and I drive those. But for most people, it’s like, “That’s boring. You don’t club? You don’t party?”
I see myself as a storyteller. So, when I read something, I see the story, and I see it on screen, in my head, in a certain way. I always want to see it and see me in it.
Painters get up and paint. Writers get up and write. I like to get up and act. It’s not a big deal. It makes me happy.