Joe Morton

“I think many villains have the burden of not being very human.”

“When I first saw Dick Gregory on television, growing up in Queens, it was startling and amazing, because nobody else was doing what he was doing.”

“I want to put something on the screen that audiences have never seen black actors do before, roles that will widen views of who African-Americans are.”

“One of the beauties of working in Shondaland is that they make an effort to get to know who you are, so they're not giving you something that's going to be so far out of your comfort zone.”

“If we're still talking about the same thing 40 or 50 years later, then that means we're not doing anything about it.”

“I entered Hofstra University as a psychology major.”

“There are lots of stories about my culture that I think bring a whole other perspective to who we are and where we have been and how we got here that I think need to be done.”

“Republicans in the South... are trying to find ways, not so much to block black and brown people from voting, but to block black and brown people from getting people they want elected, which is a far more subtle thing to do.”

“I don't know of any actor in any television show that I have ever seen who's given monologue after monologue in a television series.”

“It's funny: We have so many shows and so many channels and so many things to occupy people as entertainment, especially with a show like 'Scandal,' which is clearly a hit, with a lot of heat around it - but every once in a while, people will say, 'What are you doing?' and I'll say 'Scandal,' and they'll have no idea what I'm talking about.”

“My tendency is to be quiet and to stay focused and in character. Not the entire time, but certainly to stay focused while I'm on set.”

“By the time I graduated, I was the drum major, the highest-ranking officer, and third in my class.”

“I think the thing is with a movie that has this much science fiction in it; you need characters who are more science fact, if you know what I mean, than they are human.”

“If you want someone who is sort of still, has a bit of an edge, is older, you get Morgan Freeman. If you want someone who can carry a gun and still play a father, you get Danny Glover. My category is 'that guy who happens to be black.'”

“Dick Gregory used every syllable, every metaphor, every joke, every march, every incarceration, every hour of his life, to embarrass this country into providing a more perfect, perfect union.”

“I think theater is the strongest place to find what's missing in entertainment. Unfortunately, it pays the least.”