Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
We don't have a lot of black superheroes.
You can't protect your children from life.
African American culture is American culture.
Black Lightning, Jefferson Pierce, is the American dream.
My wife asked me to marry her. But we did not jump the broom.
I thought I was an actor until they pointed the camera at me.
You change the landscape in Hollywood with action, not words.
I think my big break was getting out of Richmond, California, alive.
Nina Simone, to me, singing about black culture - she's unparalleled.
I've worked in a mortuary and seen the consequences of what guns and knives do to people.
What I saw in Black Lightning, Jefferson Pierce, even the villains, are aspects of myself.
I never like to do storytelling where everything is just copacetic right after that episode.
I feel like I have a responsibility to be true to who I am as an artist, first and foremost.
I had been pulled over quite a bit by police officers, especially in Santa Monica and Culver City.
To me, Jefferson Pierce represented every side of me. I knew that I would be able to flesh him out.
I remember, as a kid, wearing the Batman costume for Halloween and feeling empowered by that as a kid.
If there's a responsibility, it's just to be honest in what I've experienced and to put it in my work.
Jefferson Pierce is the epitome of what black men are: He loves his wife, his children, and the community.
Oftentimes in a marriage, you really don't have to say anything. You can sort of have a conversation without words.
America has a strange relationship with its racial memory. Death has always been a constant companion of black people.
I know and understand the result of extreme violence in my own life, in my friends' lives, and so I know what violence really is.
I have two little black boys. And a film like 'Do the Right Thing' can help illuminate the times for them with great storytelling.
If the only thing that was interesting about Jefferson Pierce is that he is African-American, I don't think we'd have much of a show.
As an artist, I write and I do what I know and what creatively comes out of me, and I think that other artists should do the same thing.
Michael Schultz's 'Cooley High' is a classic. Oftentimes, we don't get to see films about coming of age, especially for young African Americans.
I came up seeing what a lot of young brothers see in this world, and you learn to deal with people with a long handle spoon in order to survive.
I never saw a true representation - an iconic hero - for myself. It just got boring, reading about all these really powerful and heroic white guys.
If anyone sees anything in 'Black Lightning' that seems foreign to them, then they haven't been paying attention. This is a uniquely American experience.
It's less about Trump and more about the people... If the American people are willing to elect someone like that president, then that's more of a problem.
I tell my children, some people can be more talented than you. Some people can be faster, stronger, but there is never a reason for anyone to outwork you.
Often, African-Americans' work is accepted as if we did something artistic by happenstance. It's almost like, 'They make TV shows the same way they dance. It's just natural!'
If I'm walking down the street or taking my kids trick-or-treating, and I see some young girls or boys who are dressed up like Black Lightning, that, to me, would be success.
I don't walk around all the time thinking of myself as African American, but oftentimes in Hollywood, you are reminded of that in ways that can make you question your viability.
When you're given a certain amount of power - like, you're a writer and an employed writer, and you put pen to paper, and people are going to read what you write - that's power.
If you bury me in a grave, don't ever come visit - because you won't find me there. You'll find me in the books that I've read, the music I've listened to, and the art I've created.
I was determined to make a movie - about families and a love story - that black women would be proud to see and which would depict them as being smart, loving, sensitive, sexy, and funny.
Black folk have been 'the other' in shows and movies and in life for quite a long time. Not from our perspective, we're not 'the other,' but from other people's perspective we have been 'the other.'
I always approach storytelling with the idea that the audience will get it. They understand almost better than we do, because they get to watch it from an entirely different perspective with new eyes.
It's one thing to be a comic book fan, but when you have to create a character and put him in a suit and keep the story grounded in reality, the challenge sometimes is making sure he actually uses his powers.
If I see one kid dressed up like Thunder or Lightning or Black Lightning, I'll feel like I influenced the culture in a very positive way. That's the endgame for me. If this happens, my mission will be complete.
We all want to make money and have a good life. But if your passion is writing, and you want to write a novel, I don't think you should sit in your home and wait for someone to give you the opportunity. You write it.
There are so many families who do not come up in a traditional household. African Americans, Latins, and, I'm sure, whites as well, but there are a lot of men missing in African American communities and in Latin communities.
What we tend to do in our shows, especially with 'Love Is_,' is to show the humanity of characters so that people can see themselves, one, and so that other cultures can see that we have more in common than we have not in common.
It's a wonderful thing to see 'Wonder Woman' directed by a woman. That did have an affect on the character, the , and the nuances of that film. That's the same thing my wife, Mara Brock Akil, and I are doing taking on 'Black Lightning.'
When you see a superhero that looks like you and lives in and fights in a neighborhood that is sort of like yours, it's empowering to a degree that makes you have hope. That is the power of storytelling, and that is the power of images.
My mother, Betty, was an entertainer - she opened up for James Brown, Ike and Tina Turner - and I had an uncle who would work as a chef in a restaurant, 6-foot-3 or 6-foot-4. I was young, so he could have been shorter, but in my mind, that's how tall he was.
There are so many slices to the African-American experience. I mean, I have the whole ghetto pedigree. My mom was in jail, I didn't have any money, and I didn't go to a fancy college. But that's not the type of story I want to tell or feel the need to tell on film.
In popular culture, there is this notion that African-American men and women can't get together, and we're having these issues. I think it's an American problem because I know a lot of white women and men who are having just as many issues trying to find 'that person' as anyone.
A lot of African Americans, especially men, deal with this as a part of life. I've been pulled over by the police in my life, and I think I've only gotten a ticket once. It's just a part of everyday life, and it doesn't matter if you're in the car with your children or by yourself.
I think that people in America, unfortunately or fortunately, are just discovering different aspects of the humanity of African-American people. And so I think with that discovery comes, 'Oh, you could be a superhero; you could be president or whatever it is that we thought you couldn't be.'