Nia DaCosta

“I just want to tell good stories in ways that will shine light on lives rarely seen on screen, because stories can push humanity forward.”

“We are used to filmmakers telling us what it means to be black in America and we're always instructing it, like we're teaching a lesson. I didn't want to do that.”

“I think body horror is really important.”

“We should be able to make different kinds of movies, so I'm really happy I got to make 'The Marvels' because it's like, I genuinely can just make a movie that doesn't have to traffic in Black pain. And I feel like a lot of black film-makers are asked to or expected to do that.”

“I love gore, I love body horror, I love all that stuff.”

“As I came into myself as a young Black woman, I realized there's a whole type of person and human experience that is just not onscreen. That really pushed me towards what I do now, which is tell stories about people you don't often see stories about.”

“Part of what I love so much about writing is learning about people who are unlike myself and going to places in my writing that I don't know very well.”

“I like to call myself Marvel trash. Actually, my friends call me that. I will go see all the movies. Even if it's bad, I'm like, 'Well, there are some good things about this.'”

“Something that you learn in film school is write what you know. I used to take that really literally. Like, I'd be like, OK, I'm a black woman from New York. I like brunch. Like, this is my write-what-you-know sort of - you know? But then I realized the better way of looking at that is write what you know emotionally.”

“I went through the 1970s in film, and I was so inspired by what I saw and by filmmakers like Scorsese, Lumet, Spielberg and Coppola. They made me think I could do anything I wanted with film.”

“I like to let people introduce themselves.”

“Every signal you get is like, 'Motherhood is the barrier to women's success.'”

“When it's about enhancing the psychological terror, go for it.”

“I was absolutely always aware of how my race and gender affected how people treat me.”

“In the real world, we create monsters of men all the time.”

“Horror's just better in a room full of people that are just freaking out.”

“I am much more interested in the reality that, no matter what laws are in place, abortions will happen. Once someone decides and realizes that there are so many barriers to access, what will they do?”

“In my community, everyone was daring each other to say 'Candyman' in the mirror five times.”

“We should be able to get better, even if it's in the public eye - which a lot of our counterparts who are black women did not get to do.”

“You have to be respectful of the stories you're telling. You can never use the real-world trauma as a sort of crass entertainment.”