You look at the part in '12 Years A Slave,' you finish that script - I mean, it's a powerful story. You go, 'Man, I have to play a bad character in this.' And then you go, 'Well, do I want to play a bad character and contribute to a good story?'
You don't make a decision about being a writer. There was a point, aged 21, when it became clear that this is who I am. The choice is how good you are going to be at it and how hard you are going to work.
If there are no films or plays of interest to me, I don't go. I know how to go to a museum or a library or pick up a good magazine or I can watch the sun set. I know how to live. There's a whole creation out there full of magic and wonder to be explo...
I am getting some good offers still. Some nice things are coming my way just as they always have, so unless I lose my inspiration or there is too much drool to wipe, I will keep going.
A businessman admits that he 'let go' an employee because he was a Sunni Muslim. You simply have to look after yourself, he explains. I am shocked, like a good Westerner should be.
Sometimes you don't have the time to prepare yourself for looking good in front of the mirror with what you're wearing. And then when you go to work or go out, you don't like it. I spend a lot of time preparing.
You want the good life? You live where white people live, you go to school where white people go to school, and you shop where white people shop.
And I liked pluralist Australia. I got a taste for pluralist Australia. I like, I like Australians and I can't believe that they're going to go to hell because they tell a good dirty joke, you know.
No matter how good you are, you're going to lose one-third of your games. No matter how bad you are, you're going to win one-third of your games. It's the other third that makes the difference.
People are beginning to understand there is nothing in the world so remote that it can't impact you as a person. It's not just diseases. Economists are now beginning to say if we are going to have good markets in Africa, we're going to have to have h...
I'm only at the beginning of my career, but I feel successful in that I haven't sold out in any way, shape or form. I feel good about the choices I've made, and I don't feel like I've let go of any of my values.
If I'm president, there are going to be government vans that drive around and pick up people who shouldn't be wearing certain clothing. Talk about lack of civil rights - I'm sorry, I'm pulling you right off the street, and we're giving you clothes th...
I personally believe that there's going to be a good case for the government preserving some type of guarantee to make sure that people have the ability to borrow to finance a house even in a very damaging recession. I think there's going to be a goo...
If I see a great performance on television, onstage, in the movies, I go to work the next day with a renewed energy and less fear. These great artists take me out of my life and make me want to go there.
I have a terrible fear of travel. Just before we go, I start to panic and tell my wife I don't want to go. It's ridiculous. But actually it's only when it's somewhere I've not been to before.
Have four things going. I have stand-up comedy, two television shows and I'm working on a play. I like to work, and I fear that something could fall through. You know what they say: 'The show must go off.'
When I go in front of an audience, I'll admit I sometimes have a certain amount of fear in me, because maybe the people are not going to accept what I'm doing today. That's bad for any artist, especially if what you're doing is not in line with what'...
When I was going for my graduate degree, I decided I was going to make a feature film as my thesis. That's what I was famous for-that I had my thesis film be a feature film, which was 'You're a Big Boy Now.'
When I first became famous, I didn't know if I could go where I wanted to because I didn't know how people were going to act. Some folks would scream and holler, and I didn't know what to do with that.
I walk the streets, take the train, it's real simple. Some actors create their own mythology: 'Oh, I'm so famous I can't go places, because I created this mythology that I'm so famous I can't go places.'
I have to have faith that we're going to succeed in transforming where we get our energy from. The big worry is whether or not we're going to do it before it's too late. And I think nobody knows the answer to that.
