There's so much power in allegory, to form ideas and learn lessons that you can actually take and apply to real life. I think that's why I originally really loved fantasy and reading.

What would America be like if we loved black people as much as we loved black culture?

Don't denounce our pain as savage. What's savage is the cruel inhumanity and brutality of the police. Condemn that.

If you work hard, it will pay off.

My mom reminds me that all things are possible.

I wonder how many college tuitions could be paid off with the amount of money spent by Minions on advertisement.

It's hard to find black roles that are just whimsical and fun and colorful. And I think, in many ways, that can be just as powerful in making commentary about race through movies.

I love all kinds of art. I mean, I love sketching and acting and music.

The internet has allowed me to just be authentically myself, as opposed to having to perpetuate a certain image, and so I'm lucky that I don't have to fit into a certain box.

I think there's this great disconnect between youth culture and politics, which is a product of how our capitalist system works.

My activism does not need proof to be real. It exists in the work of my bones against weight in the morning.

It's worth noting that everything - from the Internet to electric cars, genomic sequencing, mobile apps, and social media - were pioneered by startups, not existing companies.

I knew I always wanted to sing.

I want to make new and interesting music out of pop music in a way that isn't ironic. I want to stay sincere to the source material but at the same time manipulate it and take it to a new world.

Being an actor, you are recognized for being somebody else, whereas these books are distilled from me.

Intellectuals cannot be good revolutionaries; they are just good enough to be assassins.

You have to be intimate with a person to know that person.

I like pencil skirts because they hug me in all the right places.

If the gospel isn't good news for everybody, then it isn't good news for anybody.

Think of your moods as a thermometer that takes the temperature of your life, if you just want to be happy all the time, it's like wanting to break your thermometer.

Beethoven's last quartets were written by a deaf man and should only be listened to by a deaf man.