Top 45 Rick Famuyiwa Quotes

For those of us who grew in the early hip hop era, that music shaped us in a way to be in a position to express ourselves.

When I first started working on ‘The Wood,’ these people couldn’t grasp the concept that, one, there is a black middle class, and, two, Inglewood is a part of it.

I loved films like ‘When Harry Met Sally’ and ‘Annie Hall,’ but these were very specific, white Manhattan experiences. You don’t see a single person of color anywhere, but somehow these films are universal. As a filmmaker and creator, I was frustrated with that idea.

I think ‘The Wood’ was probably more concerned with the parts of Inglewood that aren’t usually seen on film – the areas that were middle-class, or upper-middle-class – and that idea that these worlds do exist, and should be accepted as part of Inglewood itself.

Lots of people knew who Kevin Hart was a decade before he hit it big.

Ultimately we’re all moving towards a time when the races will be more and more mixed and we will all be brown to some extent.

It would have been more comfortable for us as a society if Anita Hill wasn’t as intelligent, poised, and credible as she was.

It wasn’t that long ago that I was coming up, but it feels almost ancient that you had to go to the library and you had ‘World Book Encyclopedias.’

I think the younger generation’s view on race is slightly more evolved. It’s a category far down on the list of how they see themselves.

I don’t know, my parents were pretty open about a lot of things, especially my mom. And any kind of little crazy thing I was into, she was very supportive of. You know, whether it was BMX bike racing or being in the Boy Scouts or surfing or anything else, she always seemed to sort of support it.

In high school, I was into a lot of different stuff, and I did ride skateboards.

I felt like Inglewood, being the place where I originally found my voice, would be the place where I could sort of redefine my voice.

Why is it when a woman makes a film or a movie stars a female cast it is labeled women-centric because it is not white, male and middle-class men?

What should be driving the conversation is: What’s the story? What’s the movie about? Is it a compelling story? And if it is, then you make it regardless of the color of the people behind or in front of the camera.

I felt like I was Ferris Bueller. I wanted to be those kids in ‘The Breakfast Club.’

We all would shudder if what we did, no matter what, in our 20s and early 30s were publicly displayed on a national stage.

Magic has lived an extraordinary life as a champion athlete, passionate activist, and highly successful entrepreneur. The impact of Magic’s life on the game of basketball and beyond is undeniable.

There are constant challenges about what’s ‘mainstream.’ These kids in ‘Dope’ are as mainstream as the kids in ‘Superbad’ or ‘The Breakfast Club.’

I always wanted to make a coming-of-age film, or something about growing up, like ‘The Wonder Years,’ ‘Stand By Me’ or ‘Diner.’

Inglewood is a microcosm of Los Angeles. It’s a city by the airport. It’s the first city when you’re coming into L.A., and the last city when you leave.

I met Forest Whitaker on ‘Our Family Wedding’ and we struck up a real bond and friendship.

It was titled ‘Confirmation’ very purposefully. I wanted the film to be about that process – about how Judge Thomas and Anita Hill were thrown into a situation that was difficult for anyone to navigate, no matter what the truth was. It’s hard to know what the truth is.

Because of technology, there’s no longer the social shaming that goes on if you’re a black kid walking into a record store to buy Nirvana.

Good or bad is what we tend to want to affix to people, but we’re all complicated.

‘The Wood’ was sort of like ‘American Graffiti’ for me in a lot of different ways.

There’s this responsibility you feel to present a certain thing that kind of respectability politics. I think that became the only accepted way of defining black culture. I started to become too aware of ‘How does this look?’ instead of ‘Who are these characters?’

These actors who were in ‘Dope’ are the actors I want to continue to collaborate and make films with from here on out.

I don’t know if I’ve seen in the Constitution where it says if there’s an election year, then we take a break until after for us to do the business of the American people.

I want ‘Flash’ to reflect the world we live in.

But at the end of the day, the lottery of birth shouldn’t determine your value to the world.

I think we’ve now gotten to this point where we’re growing more and more distrustful of our institutions, be they government or corporations or otherwise.

The biggest part of what Anita Hill did was take away the stigma of coming forward, and it took a lot for her to do that. We don’t have these conversations, because of the fear that people won’t believe you or you’ll get attacked if you come forward. She came forward anyway and continued to tell her story.

You might go into ‘Dope’ feeling you already know what this movie is because, all right, there’s kids, they’re from Inglewood, oh, it’s drugs.

Anita Hill has changed the history of how we deal with each other in the workplace. But it also was an interesting episode in how race and the history of race converged in this moment and got used and twisted and interpreted in all kind of ways.

I can understand being in such a public place and having your intimate private life examined.

There are so many instances where kids who have talent and intellect have to navigate the world of low expectations and resources. We have to nurture those gifts more.

That’s the one drawback of trying to keep up with technology, is that it changes quicker than films can come out.

Gangs are a part of living in Los Angeles, but you can exist in Inglewood or Culver City or anywhere else, without joining one.

I was always this weird outcast kid.

We’ve all seen these projections of how society is going to look in 50 years. We’re all going to have to deal with each other culturally.

All films are a challenge and they are a harder challenge when dealing with characters of color.

Kendrick Lamar is from Compton, but his Compton and how he expresses that is completely different than NWA and Eazy-E even though they were from the same environment.

The thing you gotta understand about L.A. is that everything is suburbia. Los Angeles isn’t set up like San Francisco or New York.

Inglewood for me was where I really found my voice found sort of the core group of friends that I still have to today.

It’s insidious how Hollywood warps your values without you even realizing that it’s happening to you. You get a little whiff of success and it whets your appetite, and before you know it you’re going right down the road they’ve laid out for you.