A successful man has the following qualities: A smile that doesn't die; patience; fearless mind; love; self- confidence; love for everybody.
It was easy for me to show the films to the studio and the network and say, "This is who I'm hiring. "
I'm a huge Dirty Dancing fan. I feel like I should be reading [William] Shakespeare, but I'm watching Baby not be in a corner.
My parents [are my hero]. They've helped me be who I am.
It sounds kind of flighty, filmmaker-y, but I believe films are a piece of art. They are meant to be what they're meant to be, and sometimes the artist is informed by the film of what it needs to be.
A lot of work was done with one of my best friends and editor, Spencer Averick, who's edited everything I've ever made from the very, very first documentaries; the very, very first films I made were docs, so we learned the form together.
Is there deeply embedded change within our industry? And I would say, as a black filmmaker, it's easy for me to focus my attention on black work, but true change would include brown work, and it would include work by Asian-Americans, and it would include natives, and it would include women, and it would include more LGBTQ voices.
Today I will be the master of my emotions.
For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
Your dream is a good one. [. . . ] The desire that is the very root of life itself: To grow until all the space you can see is part of you, under your control. It's the desire for greatness.
All your acts affect all the people, people that you don't even know. So we have to live with responsibility. We have to live knowing that we're not the only ones here and you're affecting somebody else always.