It’s time for people to see us, people of colour, for what we really are: complicated.
VIOLA DAVISActing, it’s the disappearance of self, disappearance of your own needs and your own wants and the kind of embracing of the character that makes it work.
More Viola Davis Quotes
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When you pray, God puts people in your life to lead you when you cannot lead yourself.
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We grew up in abject poverty. Acting, writing scripts and skits were a way of escaping our environment at a very young age.
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I think sometimes you have to see a physical manifestation of your dream. Otherwise you have to hope, pray and try to conjure something in your mind to feel like it’s possible.
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If the opportunity is not out there for you to play it, then you don’t see it.
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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.
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Sometimes you see how humanity can rise above any kind of cultural ills and hate that a person’s capacity to love and communicate and forgive can be bigger than anything else.
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I talk to women all the time and try to impart wisdom.
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Even when I get the fried-chicken special of the day, I have to dig into it like it’s filet mignon.
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I guess they say, “Necessity is the mother of invention” because you have two stark choices when you find yourself in a really desperate situation. You can either fold and cave-in to it or you can become really passionate about getting out of it.
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And that’s what people want to see when they go to the theater. I believe at the end of the day, they want to see themselves – parts of their lives they can recognize. And I feel if I can achieve that, it’s pretty spectacular.
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They say, ‘To serve is to love,’ and I think to serve is to heal, too.
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I am not a glam woman – this definitely is a mask I put on for the public.
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Creativity only resonates if you infuse real life into the work.
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That is a huge need for a lot of women, even in 2016. You can have the most ambitious career woman, and at the end of the day, she’s like, ‘I just want to be a mom.
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I’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.
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Tyler 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!
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When your passion and drive are bigger than your fears, you just dive.
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I don’t have any time to stay up all night worrying about what someone who doesn’t love me has to say about me.
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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.
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You cannot live to please everyone else. You have to edify, educate and fulfill your own dreams and destiny.
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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.
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When you see what the deficit is, then you have to do something about it.
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As an artist, you’ve got to see the mess. That’s what we do. We get a human being, and it’s like putting together a puzzle. And the puzzle has got to be a mixture, a multifaceted mixture of human emotions, and not all of it is going to be pretty.
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Knowing the only way out is education, even if you don’t have parents that are extraordinarily wealthy. I understand that I have to be an active participant in [my daughter’s] education in order for her to thrive in the world.
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That’s why there’s so much bad acting out there, because you could see actors watching themselves.
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Ultimately, it’s not your job, as an actress, to satisfy people’s expectations or image of who you should be. Even in your life, you are just who you are.
VIOLA DAVIS