“Is you are a writer, you are someone from a very early age who observes and absorbs the world. That never stops, whether you are observing or absorbing your family dynamics and then that kind of stretches out and you start looking at the world and systems in the world and how these things work.”...

“You need a technical skill to be a professional performer. Rehearsal is the time to try things out. A director once said to me “Don’t come into my rehearsal room with a performance. I want to see you trying different things every time. If it doesn’t work, I’ll tell you and then we can try something else. Don’t settle on a performance on day one.” Don’t be so hard on yourself. Try things because you never know what you’ll discover along the way.”...

“Don’t doubt yourself so much. Trust your instinct. I’ve had to learn that over the years. As a younger performer you can’t judge your talent. You only judge yourself from what other people are saying. Sometimes, they are not very kind. It is fine to be critical but to be constructively critical.”...

“Actors can’t retire. We can only stop what we are doing when we can’t remember words anymore. Then we shape shift into something else and I would probably become a director or a teacher.”...

“Actors are always very hard on themselves. They always want perfection and of course we forget that we are only human. Working in film they always cut and you do it again whereas on stage you can’t. If you fall over a word or you stumble, you just have to keep going.”...

“As a writer, you have to be unafraid of criticism. It is incredibly hard but it is very important and to learn within that diminishment of fear, and it comes over time, when the criticism is important and valid and there to help you deepen and improve the work and when it is maybe not coming from the nicest place. You’ll start to be able to hear the difference but to not shy away from critique because critique is very important.”...

“I think reading is fundamentally the most important thing a writer can do. To read as widely as possible. And when you are writing, don’t read crap because the crap will show up in your own work. Read good people who you admire and challenge you. Don’t leave a book because it’s difficult. It’s important to know that not all reading is for pleasure. Some reading is there to challenge you. It’s good to be challenged.”...

“Each night, each audience, you play a different show. It is never the same show or rather that is my role as a performer. I can’t recreate last night. I have a framework and I just have to communicate the story. That is what an actress have to do.”...

“Write everyday. I think it’s something every writer must take seriously. I think when you are in your 20’s, if you are lucky, and if you are middle class and you have certain automatic privileges already, your life can be quite unfettered and there is a lot of time in which you can write. Those are the important years to read widely and write as much as possible as you can because life change.”...

“We have got to start telling stories about people who are part of history that are being forgotten and not written.”...

I never, ever do a film and just kind of move on. I think of them as children of mine, and you don't give birth to a baby and just leave it on someone else's doorstep. You see it all the way through college....

There's a nimble quality to the way a television actor can work. When that muscle gets strong it's a very valuable thing....

And what my mother meant when she said you can’t eat beauty was that you can’t rely on how you look to sustain you. What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion for yourself and for those around you. That kind of beauty enflames the heart and enchants the soul...

You can't rely on how you look to sustain you, what sustains us, what is fundamentally beautiful is compassion; for yourself and for those around you....

No matter where you are from your dreams are valid.”...

Funny enough, every role that I have had, I try to tone down my accent or speak with better diction...

Rehearsals are set up so that you find out all the nuances about your character. You never want to beat yourself up. It's about finding the right direction, and most of the time, the right direction is not what you think is the right direction. That's why the director's there: to guide you there....

It's a part of most actors to want to be in an animated feature; to extend the legacy of your career....

Until you are somewhat comfortable and confident and embrace who you are as a person, you can't possibly love somebody else because you don't like yourself that much....

Progress can cause profound suffering...

We Will Be Fine. We Will Absolutely Be Fine...

A proverb is an exploding atom of wisdom...

Ever since they left Thies, the women had not stopped singing. As soon as one group allowed the refrain to die, another picked it up, and new verses were born at the hazard of chance or inspiration, one word leading to another and each finding, in its turn, its rhythm and its place. No one was very sure any longer where the song began, or if it had an ending. It rolled out over its own length, like the movement of a serpent. It was as long as a life....

Real misfortune is not just a matter of being hungry and thirsty; it is a matter of knowing that there are people who want you to be hungry and thirsty...

Je préfère devenir aveugle, être brûlée dans un incendie ou mourir par petits morceaux que d'adresser la parole à ce bouc. Ce que j'ai fait à son Vendredi, je suis prête à le refaire. Ces gens-là ne sont ni des parents, ni des amis, ils sont prêts à lécher le derrière des toubabs pour avoir des médailles, tout le monde le sait. Ne pleure plus, lève-toi, on s'en va. Moi j'ai assez vu leurs figures!...

However long it stays in the river the tree-trunk will never turn into a crocodile....

"Real misfortune is not just a matter of being hungry and thirsty it is a matter of knowing that there are people who want you to be hungry and thirsty."...