Quotes from Samira Wiley

I have a responsibility as a potential role model that I take very seriously.

The way it works at Julliard is that you just perform with people who are in your own class.

When you're in prison, the progress of the outside world doesn't necessarily translate inside prison walls. You don't have any rights; it just doesn't progress along the same timeline.

For a New York actor, there are two things you look forward to - getting your SAG card and being on 'Law and Order.'

I'm definitely caught up in the Kool-Aid of true-crime stories.

I remember when I got into Juilliard - which was just crazy to me, that I would be studying at a school like that - the choice to cut all my hair off was really symbolic for me.

My mom is super fabulous, and I remember her telling me at 13, 'You can start wearing makeup now.' And the funny thing is, I didn't take her up on it!

Whether you watch 'Law and Order' all the time or not, everyone knows what it looks like. Everyone knows what the courtroom looks like, what the police precinct looks like.

I eat a lot. I probably eat more than anybody that I know. I'll go on set and get a plate of bacon, a bagel, an omelet, boiled eggs, fresh fruit, oatmeal, fresh juice, potatoes, basically anything that's there. I don't mean that I alternate between these things. I'll eat all of this for breakfast.

The actors that I admire are able to step into so many different roles.

I'm a big lover of Shakespeare. In fact, the only plays that I've ever done professionally in New York have been Shakespearian.

There was this girl who went to my school, and she did a Nikki Giovanni poem, 'Ego Tripping,' and it was just different from everyone else's. It wasn't flat recitation. It had an energy and a life to it. And it made me sit up in my seat, and my eyes got wide, and I really felt inside myself, 'She's making me feel things. I want to do that.'

I'm actual thankful for the amount of responsibility that has been handed to me. I feel very honored.

Like any actor, I want to be able to have a long career and show different characters and a range.

You take so much on as a therapist: you just sit there and listen to people talk with you, and you're trying to help people, and it can be draining.

My mother, actually, is a therapist.

I think that therapy is great and can be incredibly helpful.

I'm not a writer; I'm an actor. My job is to take whatever character I'm given and - especially because I have the responsibility of being a black actress, and I know young black girls are looking up, and everyone's looking to what's on television - to just try to give whatever character I'm playing as three-dimensional a portrayal as I can.

When I was younger in the theater, I didn't really feel like I got much recognition from the powers that be. I got a lot of small roles - I never got the standout roles.

I do get recognized, more and more every day.

To be honest, whenever I go to shoots, or I'm on set, it really makes makeup special and allows me to have so much more fun with it - I don't wear it on an everyday basis, because I like my skin to breathe.

I love horror movies.

I was obsessed with Lil' Bow Wow growing up, and you couldn't see the white of my walls because they were plastered with his photos. This is even more embarrassing: I had a notebook full of facts about Bow Wow and different pictures. I basically made a biography notebook about him and his life when he was, like, 13.

You have people who are so passionate and touched by my work, which is so humbling. But other times, it's a little overwhelming. If I'm just trying to go to the bodega and get some coconut water, I have to put on a hat and some glasses - those kind of things.