Quotes About Diversity

I would be stupid to say no to Bollywood. It is the biggest film industry in our country.

Many of my friends are not in the film industry, and I feel like it's healthy. It's not totally by choice. It is, perhaps, people I connect with.

When I started out, at 19, I was told, by the media and the film industry to do a certain kind of films and work with certain kind of stars. Coming from a non-filmi background, I did not know how to go about it, as there were different people trying to push me in various directions.

When the women in any other film industry are almost equal to men, in Malayalam only one or two women are among the crew.

My father is the son of a farmer so its a little difficult for me to make him understand the fashion and the film industry.

Film music, over the years, has taken from everybody.

Film was something I didn't really think about when I was young, because if you looked like me, you weren't a film star.

I love filming in New York. I love New York movies, too. I just like it when people can take New York and make it their own, because there are so many different New Yorks.

Filming in London is brilliant.

I consider myself as a director's actor, so I'm open to work with filmmakers from across the country and even abroad.

You want somebody who's capable of being diverse in the characters they play, and you want a big name that's going to bring attention to the filmmakers and to the project.

I only want to work with interesting filmmakers.

When you're told that as a filmmaker of colour, the stories you want to tell aren't commercial enough, then you start thinking, 'I'm going to tell them anyway.'

Do I feel that white directors have to tell only white stories? No. Do I feel that black filmmakers should only tell stories about black people? No. If we say that, then that means Asian people cannot write about anybody but Asians. I don't think a woman should only write about women.

We've been fighting our whole lives to say we're just human beings like everyone else. When we start separating ourselves in our work, that doesn't help the cause. I've heard it for years: 'How do you feel being a black filmmaker?' I'm not a black filmmaker, I'm a filmmaker. I'm a black man, I have black children. But I'm just a filmmaker.

I think a lot of black filmmakers have done very well.

As a filmmaker, I don't want to limit myself to one kind of movie.

All too often, white documentary filmmakers are the ones telling the stories of people of color.

My take on it, like a filmmaker or actor, is if you have much more colors within your creation, eventually people will appreciate what you're doing, and the other stuff is secondary, like critiques or even awards or anything else, as long as people enjoy it.

Black filmmakers - I'm grateful for them.

Most women I know are not actresses, but they work for the U.N. or are documentary filmmakers, anthropologists.

I am not against two-heroine films.

When I grew up where I grew up, things were very, very different, and nobody had a filter. And that's what brought us together.

It's funny because when I got 'Jarhead' and 'Avatar' and all those movies, 'Leprechaun' still to this day airs on BET. I was thinking, 'Will they just let it go? I finally have a body of work that can speak much better to what I can do than just Leprechaun.'