John Ridley Quotes

As a writer, as a storyteller, you have to have your emotions close, and the older I've gotten, the less I've worried about not displaying emotions.

I don't know when I made that active decision to be a writer or to try to write, but I know I always liked storytelling.

When it comes to fighting for freedom, those who are willing to fight should not be limited by our bigotry. Only rewarded with our gratitude.

For every horrific event, something beautiful happens.

Facts tend to take the punch out of a good hate rant and are therefore left best unsaid.

It is time to celebrate the New Black Americans - those who have sealed the Deal, who aren't beholden to liberal indulgence any more than they are to the disdain of the hard Right. It is time to praise blacks who are merely undeniable in their individuality and exemplary in their levels of achievement .

For children, diversity needs to be real and not merely relegated to learning the names of the usual suspects during Black History Month or enjoying south-of-the-border cuisine on Cinco de Mayo. It means talking to and spending time with kids not like them so that they may discover those kids are in fact just like them.

My kids will find me walking around the house talking to myself and think I'm going crazy. I like to read the scripts out loud and really get the rhythm for the dialogue.

There's something very special about knowing what you want to do and knowing the story you want to tell, but finding it together.

With fear of stating the obvious: Freedom belongs to 'We the People,' not 'They the Politicians.'

We see films all the time, whether they have access to all kinds of intellectual property or artifacts, and the one thing that they don't get is story. So I think whether you're talking about a biopic or an action film or a science-fiction film that has all the CGI in the world, if you're not trying to connect with an audience, it doesn't really matter.

Whatever you do, whether you're doing a television drama or a romantic comedy, you want to be relevant, to some degree.

I think I'm an overly emotional person. I feel a lot, but I don't believe that's unique to me or that's how I am able to do the things I do.

I've written films that are violent. I'm not big on sitting and watching violence.

Gay marriage will be universally accepted in time. But if I may be so bold as to say to gays and lesbians, don't wait for that time to arrive. Just as my father and his generation did not 'wait' for their civil rights, nor should you. The toothpaste ain't going back in the tube. The tide has turned.

At an early age, I knew there were a lot of things I couldn't do. My father was a doctor, and my mother was a teacher. I knew I wasn't good in numbers, and I knew I wouldn't work well in overly structured environments.

I understand politicos gotta make bank. But cloistering with the Hollywood elite is not how you prove you're a man of the people.

As a coping mechanism, or as a way to make a little hard count by shilling demons in the shadows, I try not to belittle the thought process of the conspiracy theorists. As a cocktail waitress in Vegas once schooled me: never get down on anybody else's hustle.

I've no desire to start a movement, to be the first name on an open petition, or to be the poster child for disgruntled writers.

When I was young and I look at the things that I wrote - I don't think that was the word they used back then, but they had a hipster sensibility. They were a little irreverent.

Bigots are actually funny to me in the way that people who still wear parachute pants give me a chuckle.

Even I haven't downed enough L.A. Kool-Aid to believe that somehow Hollywood movies are an overt instrument of morality.

I can tell you from personal experience it gets a little tiring having to make the rounds on cable shows to explain 'what's up with black folks.'

Much as banks don't care where your money's coming from, the Electoral College is all 'don't ask, don't care' when it comes to votes.

Quite simply, quite plainly, just by virtue of his being, Barack Obama is America. The first true American to lead our nation.

I'm sorry, but chick fights are sexy. If you don't think so, you're either an uptight woman or a lying man.

Barack Obama is the New Generation and the hot light of a dawn that goes way beyond clever talk of morning in America.

There is not a country on earth whose people don't deserve to be free and safe.

I want to explore different topics and present them in slightly different ways.

I never wanted to show up and just say, "Okay, what are we doing today? Let's wing it!"

When people come in the door and they have something, discovering and exploring the character is a real joy.

You can treat faith as part of people's it's lives.

Depending on which side you're on, maybe the police are too objective and need to be a bit more subjective.

I don't think it's good when entertainment tries to proselytize and I don't think people ultimately want someone showing up in their living room and just hectoring at them all day long. But if you can create a space where people are caught up in something - whether it's a drama, a comedy, a romantic comedy, or science fiction - that's when people give over their minds and allow their emotions to flow.

When entertainment works the best, you're creating an apparatus to convey emotions.

We all hope that the police and prosecutors are objective. That's their job, but sometimes it's not true.