Anna Deavere Smith Quotes
Quotes to Explore
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When belief in a god dies, the god dies.
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Even when we have physical hardships, we can be very happy.
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Luck marches with those who give their very best.
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The beauty of kids is they don't care who you are, which is why people like the Obamas like them so much - they treat them like normal people.
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After spending three years of my life looking into this, I am more convinced than ever that the U.S. government's responsibility for the drug problems in South Central Los Angeles and other inner cities is greater than I ever wrote in the newspaper.
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I've got quite a good poker face. I'm known for being able to keep my emotions very much in check: no one knows how I'm feeling. I can be winning or losing but keep it very much the same.
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I have been doing so much. Speaking engagements... producing... developing a half-hour sitcom... working on a movie... leading acting workshops all over the world... and hosting 'My Black Is Beautiful,' an empowerment TV show I'm doing on BET for women.
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I have the necessary lack of tact.
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Frankly, we actresses are so much in a hurry. We feel we have very few years to shine in our career, so we neglect our personal life. But for me, both aspects are equally important. I don't want to grow old and have regrets.
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I'm definitely not a super great guitarist. Ultimately, I just write a lot of love songs.
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All kids are selfish. I wanted to do homework and do my thing and call my agent. My mother's needs weren't in my mind at that moment.
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The key to fashion is, you don't want to look like you're trying. You've gotta be natural.
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I used to have all these plans and think 'Ah, I have my whole life figured out', but then I realized no matter how much I plan: life happens! So I find myself living day to day trying to do my best, embracing every moment as a learning opportunity and chance to get to know myself a little more.
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Orthodox Christianity, by playing upon the emotions of man, is able to accomplish wonders toward keeping him in order and relieving his mind. It can frighten or cajole him away from evil more effectively than could reason.
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Once you've built the big machinery of political power, remember you won't always be the one to run it.
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Certainly, grades only matter so much when you're in Hollywood. But I became an utterly motivated, devoted, committed student. I was a good student because I was convinced that it would somehow help me in my quest to become a filmmaker.
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I realize how myself and other people have started to almost fool ourselves that it's more important to us and more real than the real world, the offline world, and we value looking at our phone and pixels on a screen more than connecting eye to eye with a human being, which is terrifying to me because we're becoming robots.
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In the public, it seems to be painted that when minorities get pregnant, they need to get abortions, especially when it comes to teen pregnancy. It's like, when black girls are pregnant, it's like a statistic, but when white girls get pregnant, they get a TV show.
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To be a good citizen, it's important to be able to put yourself in other people's shoes and see the big picture. If everything you see is rooted in your own identity, that becomes difficult or impossible.
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When I set out to make 'Bourne Identity,' my main goal for the franchise was to create something where it feels like you're in the action. You're not just passively watching it from far away. That's something that I have constantly aspired to do - even in 'Swingers,' to feel like you're Jon Favreau; you're not just watching him.
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Bilingualism lets you have your cake and eat it. The new language opens the doors to the best jobs in society; the old language allows you to keep your sense of 'who you are.' It preserves your identity. With two languages, you have the best of both worlds.
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A girl's sense of her womanly self depends only in part on how closely she has followed her mother's example in attire and actions, or how much she loves or hates or respects her. It is from both parents that a girl gains her basic identity.
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Identity is an assemblage of constellations.
