Theater doesn't bring money in general. That's not why you do it. If you go into theater for money then you've really gone into the wrong business.

I was a little girl with a pot belly and Afro puffs, hyperactive and overdramatic, and I found the theater and I found my home.

I want to thank all the shoulders of the strong and brave and courageous women that I am standing on.

Pedigree matters: if you break your shoulder trying to open a door, it's much harder to play the game once you get in the room.

The only thing I've ever wanted to do in my entire life is to be on Broadway.

...and if you hear something you know, please sing along. No wait - I take that back - you can't sing along - this is about me now - this is my show.

The authentic Gullah dialect is actually very clipped, and so it would sound almost Jamaican and be very odd to an American audience's ears. It's not the typical Southern dialect that we're used to.

Whatever is the scariest is almost always what I end up choosing.

Music was all over my house, and all over literally my genetic house, and my house in the literal sense. So I kind of couldn't avoid it.

I think for a lot of people that are in performing arts, it's easy to fall into the trap of starting to confuse what's real life and what's not, because to your body it's all real.

It's easy to spend - especially in this day and age - to spend your time not being in the present. It's very easy to be way ahead. What's tomorrow and the day after that?

You have to draft a catcher, because if you don't have one, the pitch will roll all the way back to the screen.

Mental pleasures never cloy; unlike those of the body, they are increased by reputation, approved by reflection, and strengthened by enjoyment.

Speech recognition is utterly crap for writing fiction. If you try reading a novel aloud you'll soon figure out why - written prose style is utterly unlike the spoken word.

Inoculate yourself from dangerous bozos.

I think in the future I will end up doing a gospel album.

I like bootcut jeans in a plain style with a nice line.

Usually as humans and especially as a man, we look at things in context. It's like, oh, I know what that is, that's this, or this, there's that.

"All roads lead there child. You should know that." "Detention?"

My goal now is to dance all the dances as long as I can, and then to sit down contented after the last elegant tango some sweet night and pass on because there wasn't another dance left in me.

We must realise that prophetic cry of black students: Black man you are on your own!