Uzo Aduba

My mother is a fighter. After she battled polio and learned to walk again, the doctors told her she would be a cripple her entire life. Instead of accepting defeat, she refused this fate and went on to become the West African Women's Singles tennis champion in college.

When it comes to inmates, we have boiled them down to just the few things we know about them - their crime, their current life situation, their identification number. But the reality is they were something before they were their crime.

You think the only thing looking at you is this steel thing, but behind the camera is this living, breathing person operating the camera whose job it is to watch you.

I loved 'Ghana Must Go' by Taiye Selasi. It's about a first-generation African family living in America that has to return home to Nigeria when their estranged father passes away.

I dream in color, and I have visions of feelings and energies that I would love to feel.

I left my home in Massachusetts after college to move to New York City to pursue my dreams of acting. I took roles for free. I waited tables. I didn't care because it was work.

People were stopping me on the street to say, 'Oh my God, it's Crazy Eyes!' Which is kind of a funny thing to have people shout at you on the street.

I try to play serious scenes a little funny and the comedy a little serious.

My parents wanted us to be well-rounded individuals and really have the American experiences as richly as one can.

I'd read a lot of scripts, and I remember reading 'Orange Is the New Black,' and it was at the head of the pack. I remember thinking, 'Wow, that is really good. I would love to be a part of that.'

My finding of myself as an artist, which I think in itself helped me to find just who I am and how I want to express myself, is entirely - in conjunction, of course, with my family, particularly my mom - founded on teachers.

If you're already somebody who's feeling different, you'll do everything in your power to fix it because children will do everything in their power to fit in and assimilate.