Quotes from Joe Morton

If we're still talking about the same thing 40 or 50 years later, then that means we're not doing anything about it.

Basically, the actor's job is to pay attention to the script.

Republicans in the South... are trying to find ways, not so much to block black and brown people from voting, but to block black and brown people from getting people they want elected, which is a far more subtle thing to do.

It's important to me to play men who use their brains, not just brawn.

There are lots of stories about my culture that I think bring a whole other perspective to who we are and where we have been and how we got here that I think need to be done.

Because of 'Terminator 2,' you get not pigeonholed but circled as one of those guys who can understand their way through a movie like that and hold it down.

When I was growing up, all these superheroes were white. On some level, you put that out of your mind... but as you get older, you realize it's a very one-sided affair. So I'm very glad to see that these movies are becoming more diversified.

Actors are very often people who are placed in a position where they think they have to be grateful for the job and have no control over what they play and how they play it. I was not taught that way. I completely disagree with that. I think that you have more control than you think.

I make it a habit of never trying to judge what an audience might think, only because all points of view are too close, because we're doing it every day, I think that the actor's point of view is sometimes too close to what the material actually is.

I know who Dick Gregory is; I knew what his accomplishments are. I certainly knew him as a comedian and an activist.

'Turn Me Loose' was Off-Broadway, and now we are making a concerted effort to figure out how to get it to on Broadway.

Dick Gregory used every syllable, every metaphor, every joke, every march, every incarceration, every hour of his life, to embarrass this country into providing a more perfect, perfect union.

When it comes to certain portions of our history, we've just forgotten it all.

When you give your children certain life lessons, and they come and ask you for additional advice, you say to yourself, 'I've done my job,' and you'll continue to do your job.

Even if you have something that you can contribute to society, very often society doesn't view you that way. Because when you are The Other, the first response by the mainstream, if you will, is to ostracize.

If there's no craft there, then once the looks go, there goes your career.

There's nothing better than an educated actor - not only educated in his craft but educated in the world.

I think it talks about that there needs to be some proactive attack against drugs infiltrating our culture.

I don't live on the West Coast, so when I come out to work, I rent a house.

It's important to know, whether you're pro or anti the current president and what he's doing, that he's doing what he thinks is for the betterment of the country because his interest is to make this country a better place.

It's a very different thing when you're creating the world as opposed to when you're just part of the world. I love the detail of it, the problem-solving of it, and I love working with actors.

If you can keep a character fresh and alive for, let's say, six months, working eight nights a week, then you can do anything. You have honed your technique and your skills to such a degree by that point that you are ready to take on all kinds of challenges.

When I first came into New York City, what I did was, I didn't have very much money, and I couldn't afford pictures or a resume, so what I used to do is I would tear off the back of a matchbook, and I'd write my name and telephone number on the back of the matchbook.

I don't know of any actor in any television show that I have ever seen who's given monologue after monologue in a television series.