One of the things I have an allergic reaction to playing, especially as a black actor, is the mandatory kind of best friend/cop/detective type. You will never see me in that movie.

We've had so many faith-based movies that I think are sub-par; I almost want a new phrase for them.

It's because films like 'Selma' are so rarely made that we end up putting them under the microscope. One, maybe two, a year. As a white person, you don't have that. You have the gamut. No one says to Oliver Stone, 'Another film about Vietnam? White characters again?'

Although I am a Christian, with what religion has become - a tool for so much of the bad stuff - I just say to people that I'm a person of faith.

In my time since moving to the United States, I've found that there is a dearth of great writing for black people. There are stories that depict us in a way that isn't cliched or niche, and that a white person, a Chinese person, an Indian person can watch and relate to. Those are the stories I want to be a part of telling.

I consider myself a human being, a Christian, a father, a husband, so many things, before being a black person.

If you're going to play human beings, and you're going to play them three-dimensionally, you have to show every side of them.

For me, I actively look for projects that showcase people of color.

There are many, many communities, many ethnic minorities, many civilizations that have been brutalised by others and you have to move on. You cannot perpetually stay in that place of blame, otherwise it's just a downward spiral.

I had always known that I couldn't play Dr. King purely out of my own ability as an actor. When you look at him give those speeches, you can tell that he is taken up by something other than himself. He is flowing with an anointing that is directly from God.

I know I had my equivalents in Adrian Lester and Lenny James when I was at drama school. I remember David Harewood doing 'Othello' at the National, and Adrian Lester having done Cheek by Jowl's famous 'As You Like It and Company' at the Donmar. Not necessarily performances I saw, but just the fact they happened was massively encouraging.

I find that male directors are more interested in what the film looks like as opposed to what the film is about emotionally. My job is not to make the film look pretty, and I don't feel drawn to making myself look pretty within the film.

I'm one of a generation brought up on television whose acting is more 'naturalistic', whereas with some of the older generation it's more heightened. But I think there's room for both styles.

A film centered around the Second World War with a predominantly white cast would not have the pressure on it that 'Red Tails' has.

We start 'The Butler' in June and that's incredibly exciting for me because I get to work with the amazing Forest Whitaker again. It's a phenomenal script and a great, great role - I play his son. Oprah Winfrey is his wife and my mother. My character is a radical civil rights activist.

We can't afford to deny our past in a bid to be empowered. But what we can do is contextualize the past.

I love tennis, love it!

Love is sacrifice.

I like to think of myself as a physical actor.

I love that as a black person I've experienced not being a minority. I think that's helped me to combat the minority mentality people can have here, which can stop them scaling the heights.

Considering that I'm British and I talk the way I do, I love it when a director takes a chance on me.

I was sometimes called 'coconut' when I was at school.

I've been an actor for 14 years now and a lot of that time was spent in theatre and television. Then I moved to L.A. to try and build upon that and it's starting to pay off!

I think until Britain acknowledges just how much of a presence black people had here before the Sixties, then there are certain stories that are not going to be inclusive of what I have to offer.

I don't have a tailor, but I do love clothes.

I seem to be able to disassociate my insecurities. I know a lot of actors - some of the best actors in the world - can't bear to watch themselves and I have to say I can't relate to that.

Getting to do what I think was my fifth BBC drama with Nikki Amuka-Bird - we've done 'Shoot The Messenger,' 'Five Days,' 'The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency,' 'Born Equal' and now 'Small Island' - was another highlight for me. And filming in Jamaica was great, too.

One of the things the BBC does better than anyone is period drama.

I admire many actors, though I don't think there's anyone whose career I would want to mirror sort of by the beats. What I'm really looking to do is constantly defy expectations. I'm very curious to see if you can actually have a character actor and a movie star's career combined.

I hear God as an audible voice.

Asher means 'happy and blessed' which embodies my eldest. Caleb means 'stubborn and tenacious dog' and I can't even tell you how much that is my little boy! It was a useful warning.

There are a lot of challenges I undeniably have faced as a black person both in the U.K. and in the U.S. that contrived to make me feel lesser than what I am.

I wasn't one of those kids who grew up watching movies thinking, 'That's what I want to do when I grow up.' I didn't really particularly know I had an aptitude for it.

I've never, ever taken a role for money purposes or for some bizarre notion of what may be the kind of career move that would open things up for me. If I don't believe in it, I can't do it because I won't be good in it if I don't believe in it.

The only way I get a leading role in a studio picture is if Ryan Gosling can't play it, which is clearly the case with 'Selma.' If this was a non-colour-specific character, it wouldn't be me. It just wouldn't.

The kinds of stories I want to be a part of telling are about delving into what it is to be a human being.

I will, till the day I die, be an advocate for the d-word: diversity.

As artists, our primary function is not to be educators - but we are at a time in history, where for us, our history needs to give context for stories that we hope to tell down the road.

I know that I am not owed the right to make movies. I know God has given me this privileged position, and I have to work dog-hard as an actor to make the films the best they can be.

You really want to keep ringing the changes - you hope that your work and your choices make people excited about where you're going next and that that might be somewhere unexpected.

People in the industry thought it was laughable that I should be going up for things that didn't clearly state what race the part was intended for.

The fact that I was black and desirous to do my work, the other kids would call me a coconut, as if I were somehow attempting to be white. The bullying was real: I'd get punched, spat at, terrible things.

I've just seen that there is a really amazing perspective that we're missing by not having more women directing.

We're all, whether we like it or not, gonna have to deal with bereavement at some point in our lives, and it's something I think, as a society, maybe we shy away from.

I'm not for one second condoning the actions of terrorists at all, but I do think there's a kind of terrorism that the media carries out on its own citizens, certainly in this country - and it's fear.

I think that any channel, whether it's Fox, CNN, or whatever, if they were truly giving a 360-view of what's going on, we would be better equipped to not slap judgments on people we really don't understand.

I truly think a long career is to keep the audience guessing and not being able to be boxed, and for me, I'm not hell-bent on playing the lead in things as long its an interesting character with phenomenally talented people, and it's a script that I feel is genuinely innovative, creative, and potentially interesting for an audience.

I try as much as possible not to utter a single line that I don't believe in.

What I try to do with my career as an actor is what I've learned in the theater: I am rigorous with myself as to whether I'm telling the truth, and I try to surround myself with filmmakers and content creators who are also interested in the pursuit of the truth.

If you look at your companies, and half of your staff are not female, and a decent percentage of them are not people of color, then you are part of the problem because you need people working for you and you need people in positions of leadership who can exercise their bias and who can exercise their perspective.