Kenny Leon

I don't know how racists live with their racism. We need to take the road of love. I don't think folks are born that way; it's learned and taught out of fear.

I always say film is art, theater is life and television is furniture.

I'm not one to spend my life asking the question, 'Is there racism in America?' Certainly there is. But I want to do something about it.

I grew up a poor kid in Florida, and I was always in Florida living with my stepfather and my mother, and we used to, every year, sit down and watch 'The Wizard of Oz.' And I think to this day that's probably the foundation for everything I've done since.

When I'm acting, I'm just worried about that piece of the pie, contributing to the whole. But when you're directing, you... get the vision out of your head and on the stage.

As an older generation, we need to give all our young people love and the possibility of realizing their dreams. For instance, if I get really political, the fact that some people can't go to college, can't even think about college, that's not American; that's not right.

I've always liked that idea of a diverse group of audience members sitting together, rubbing up against each other and taking on the life of a culture that doesn't belong to either one of them.

President Obama became our first African American president, and for me, it is the stuff of which dreams are made.

Great theater continues to bind us, one to the other, and most of us will travel far and wide to see a good story told well.

I love the idea of live theater the best because you are sitting there with the community in the dark, looking at the light, and that's really - you can't get any higher than that.

I love film because you have the last word. I never get that on stage because you've got to really believe; you've got to get the actors to trust you, and they have to believe in you, and then hopefully they will when you open the show.

I've directed 'Raisin in the Sun' five times. You keep discovering things. You keep on seeing things in the script that you never saw before. That's what great pieces of art do.