“Let me tell you something: The only thing that separates women of color from anyone else is opportunity. You cannot win an Emmy for roles that are simply not there.”

It feels really good to embrace exactly who I am and be my sexy, to be my sexualized, to be my woman.

And this is what was fascinating to me about ‘The Help’; they were ordinary people who did extraordinary things.

If the opportunity is not out there for you to play it, then you don’t see it.

If the opportunity is not out there for you to play it, then you don’t see it.

If the opportunity is not out there for you to play it, then you don’t see it.

They say the two most important days in a person’s life were the day you were born and the day you discover why you were born.

They say the two most important days in a person’s life were the day you were born and the day you discover why you were born.

They say the two most important days in a person’s life were the day you were born and the day you discover why you were born.

I think sometimes what people miss about black people is that we’re complicated.

Any actor will tell you, as soon as your ego and your vanity come into the mix, it destroys your work. Completely destroys it.

I want to span different genres. I want to be able to transform. I want to be able to be sexy, and funny, and quirky, and all the other things that I am. And I feel that the best way that I can achieve that is by producing.

That’s why there’s so much bad acting out there, because you could see actors watching themselves.

I am not a glam woman – this definitely is a mask I put on for the public.

Self-deprecation is not an answer to keeping one’s balance. I think that it’s very damaging.

Ordinary people who are just kind of just going about their lives are transformed into heroes because they have the courage to put their voices out there. And I think that’s a powerful message in this time of political strife.

[I listen to] “Uptown Funk”, Bruno Mars, sometimes even Nina Simone and Adele. Whatever comes up, whatever floats my boat, whatever makes me tap into something in me to just decompress – I listen to that.

Everything that creative people think and do is from the heart.

My mother was given to a typical question: “We have always done this. Why should we do anything else?” But my wife’s typical question was “We have always done this. Why don’t we do it another way or, better still, why not do something else?”

My style when I was younger was still unique to me. I didn’t necessarily dress by the trends, but I was always aware of what was trendy at the time and how I could apply it to my own sense of style.

Get rich by taking something common and making it uncommon.

Keep a note pad and pencil on your bedside table. Million-dollar ideas sometimes strike at 3 A.M.

I love jotting down ideas for my blog, so I doodle or take notes on all kinds of stuff that inspires me: the people I meet, boutiques I visit, a florist that just gave me a great idea for an interior-design project, things like that.

In order to be creative, you don’t have to be original.

Creativity is the ability to introduce order into the randomness of nature.