They say, ‘To serve is to love,’ and I think to serve is to heal, too.
VIOLA DAVISThey say, ‘To serve is to love,’ and I think to serve is to heal, too.
VIOLA DAVISI’m a sitting duck. No, seriously, I mean I wish I could say more, but I’m a sitting duck because I can’t get ahead of them [cyber experts]. They’re far ahead of me. That’s what I learned: how vulnerable we are. It’s a big, silent monster out there. That’s what it feels like.
VIOLA DAVISI can’t deal with actors! I can’t deal with myself. We’re neurotic and miserable… I love doing what I’m doing, but while I’m doing it, I’m miserable.
VIOLA DAVISEach role has its own different challenges.
VIOLA DAVISTyler Perry’s ‘Madea Goes to Jail!’ Which, I have to tell you, of everything that I’ve ever done in my career, that’s the only thing that’s perked up the ears of my nieces and nephews. That is it, that’s done it for them. That made me a bona fide star in their eyes!
VIOLA DAVISI don’t want anyone putting any limits on me.
VIOLA DAVISActor is just a strange profession, it really is, that you could be in front of the same people for years, and all of a sudden one thing happens, and it finally clicks.
VIOLA DAVISIt’s time for people to see us, people of colour, for what we really are: complicated.
VIOLA DAVIS[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.
VIOLA DAVISSometimes you take a job for the money, sometimes you take it for the location, sometimes you take it for the script; there are just a number of reasons, and ultimately what you see is the whole landscape of it. But I can tell you from behind the scenes – that’s what it is, as an actor.
VIOLA DAVISI’ve been to acting school and I think that at the end of the day, when you just focus on the work and you’re comfortable with who you are, that at some point someone’s going to recognize your talent and give you an opportunity.
VIOLA DAVISLet 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.
VIOLA DAVISRelationships change us and make us grow.
VIOLA DAVISDo not live someone else’s life and someone else’s idea of what womanhood is. Womanhood is you. Womanhood is everything that’s inside of you.
VIOLA DAVISAny actor will tell you, as soon as your ego and your vanity come into the mix, it destroys your work. Completely destroys it.
VIOLA DAVISI 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.
VIOLA DAVIS