Quotes from John Singleton

Cinema was my rite of passage.

My formative years would be in South Central Los Angeles. It was a really volatile environment, but, I always say, when you're living in the hood, you don't live this life where you're crying every day, downtrodden every day.

We have these rules, the 'hero rules.' Like, a hero doesn't slouch. A hero walks proudly with his head up. A hero walks with a purpose. A hero's always a gentleman.

I love comics. I like to do everything I used to do when I was 14-years-old.

I'm a competitive guy.

At heart, I'm a dude from South Central Los Angeles. We roll the way we roll because we had survival tactics; we had to learn how to adapt. That's just me.

I already have legitimacy as a filmmaker and now I'm trying to do stuff that's just fun. Until I find a cool tangible subject again that I want to tackle.

The cinema saved me from being a delinquent. I could have been, but I didn't get caught up. I never was going to get arrested or anything.

It's cool for me because I'm a director, but I'm also a teacher. I'm a lover of cinema, and I love working with people who are hungry and have the energy to really do better work.

Producing, in television, we're in the business of voyeurism.

I like to be an idea person. I like to pull different people together and find new talent.

I try to keep focused on the things that really make me happy and just do those same things.

Ja Rule not doing '2 Fast 2 Furious' changed Ludacris's life.

I can't watch a movie and watch just two minutes and turn it off, then go talk to my girlfriend.

One of the biggest regrets of my whole career was turning down an offer to direct on the first season of 'The Wire.' That would have been so perfect for me.

Now, I'm so relaxed that I have to make myself nervous. I feel better when I'm second and third guessing myself over everything. I play with the mice in my head, all the time.

In 'Boyz N the Hood,' every female character was three-dimensional.

I wanted to dress cool, and get all the ladies.

I already have legitimacy as a filmmaker and now I'm trying to do stuff that's just fun. Until I find a cool tangible subject again that I want to tackle.

It's cool for me because I'm a director, but I'm also a teacher. I'm a lover of cinema, and I love working with people who are hungry and have the energy to really do better work.

I'm not a Beverly Hills dude.

What's interesting when you see 'Black Panther' is you realize it couldn't have been directed by anybody else but Ryan Coogler. It's a great adventure movie, and it works on all those different levels as entertainment, but it has this kind of cultural through-line that is so specific that it makes it universal.

There's hardly any precedent for a guy like me to have the career that I've had. Because I grew up the way I grew up, I'm an in-your-face kind of guy. I developed that as a defense mechanism to survive in the streets. I do that in Hollywood in the service of my passion.

I like John Hughes movies.