Top 188 Quotes & Sayings by Mahershala Ali
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American actor Mahershala Ali.
Last updated on December 23, 2024.
To get to play someone who was in some capacity the King of Harlem, that meant something to me. Deep within my bones. I was inspired by the energy that I knew to be a real thing.
'Mahershala' is my nickname.
Who is that person that comes around and says, 'You are OK, you are worthy, you are special?' That makes all the difference in the world for many of us. Those are the people we appreciate the most.
I haven't gotten to do the leading man thing, so I would love to do that!
It's a lot of wonderful things about the Bay area and Oakland that I absolutely love. I wouldn't change being from there by any stretch.
I believe that everything has a shelf life.
Cottonmouth is the result of having to react to his circumstances. He had to, in some ways, take control of the situation and own his circumstances. But as a result of that, he became a person he didn't intend to become.
In my humble opinion, the ages 22 to about 27 are the most critical years of your adult life. It's your time to gestate in the cocoon of becoming.
At a certain point in my career, I was probably having a difficult time 'holding space.' So you get a character that has to be commanding in order for him to resonate and make sense.
Marvel has such a huge slice of the pie.
I don't really compare any of the characters I play; I try to go into them being very open to what the characters can offer and what I can bring to them and then bring a being to life.
I found myself sort of becoming a character actor, though I don't know if that would be my natural makeup.
I owe a lot to my time on 'House of Cards' because, up until I booked that show, I had been working consistently for 12 years, but I wasn't working on anything that mattered in the way 'House of Cards' did to its audience, to casting directors, to directors and producers. The show hit this sweet spot.
I really wasn't into comic books growing up.
The call for diversity is about recognizing that in order to be in the conversation come awards season, it goes back to the content that is being produced.
You can't watch 'Daredevil' or 'Jessica Jones' or the Marvel films and not be aware that the villain has to be awesome. I've always wanted to have more space. And the scope, morally, is more broad for the villain than the hero.
You want entertainment in general, every aspect of it, to be more of a reflection of the diverse world that we live in.
I think if you have any desire to be a leading man or to really carry some of these stories, there's this relationship that has to be cultivated with an audience. People have to be able to say your name.
In thinking about it, the villains often have a little bit more range because their morality is different. You can have just a really good time as an actor, and there is just more there that you can explore on that side of the story.
Like so many families, we were dealing with limited means. We weren't poor at all, but we had some challenging times financially. When my stepdad got laid off... we were really trying to find our footing for a couple of years.
I was a sports kid.
I don't have a wallet. I carry my driver's license and a couple of credit cards in my phone. That, and a money clip.
We live in diverse communities with all sorts of people from all sorts of different backgrounds. The more our entertainment can be a reflection of the world we live in, the better it is for all of us.
I have to say goodbye to things in order to take on bigger things that I've always wanted to do.
Your life, your circumstances change, and you have to continue to grow as a person, and once you have means and opportunity, you have to make different choices to protect what you have.
My father, Phillip Gilmore, was very talented. He was getting seriously into dancing. He was on 'Soul Train' and won $2,500. But the Bay Area was too small for him. I don't think he had the space to do what he needed to do.
I really enjoyed working with Mariah, Alfre Woodward's character, because she's a wonderful actor, and I felt we had a natural chemistry that was reflective of real family members.
I think selfishly, as an actor, we always want to do more.
If you convert to Islam after a couple of decades of being a black man in the U.S., the discrimination you receive as a Muslim doesn't feel like a shock.
If you're throwing someone off a roof, you're throwing them off the roof. It's there. You don't have to do anything extra with that. The audience is obviously going to react to that because it's such a heightened thing to do. But in the other moments, you really look for ways to craft those, because they're more important, honestly.
The real guys that I knew were really cool people, who I played basketball with and traveled with on teams and knew their families and knew that they love their family. They just happen to do something that wasn't all the way legal, but it was a part of their life, and you knew that they hustled.
I have had that same experience where there are several people who have come up in my life at the right time and have made critical contributions to how I see the world and how I see myself.
Cultures and races are mixing in a very organic way in the world, and that should be reflected in film and television.
Understand that we are all co-creators of our respective destinies.
At that moment in time when we feel like the other, we were not the person embraced, not one of the cool kids, not in the club - when you're that person, it makes you feel smaller, and when they persecute you as a result, that's a difficult position to be in.
I'd always wanted to do a Marvel project, and I'd always imagined getting to play one of the superheroes because it's such a hard thing to get. It's the parts that only go to a few people. The flip side of that is the antagonists are pretty awesome.
What you see in 'Daredevil' and 'Jessica Jones' isn't the Hell's Kitchen of today; it's a version of what it was like.
It's about very talented writers, directors, producers, and actors being in a position for their projects to be supported, but there's just not enough black projects being made.
I think #OscarsSoWhite is about there not truly being enough people of color represented.
There are not enough going into production so that we can tout them. Look at 'Precious'... In order for them to stand out, they have to get made in the first place, and that's just not happening enough.
I loved going to superhero films growing up - you come home, and you pretend to be those people, and it ends up informing much of what you aspire to be. And that's what I will say is important about the genre.
There are instances where you're in a space with someone who has been extraordinarily successful, and they don't necessarily connect with you as another person. You can be a prop for them to deliver their stuff, and you're just another element in the scene.
As young people, you want to see people who in some way look like you to some degree, because it makes it a little easier for you to aspire to take on the qualities of those people.
Social media has colonized what was once a sacred space occupied by emptiness: the space reserved for thought and creativity.
To really be conscious of how long the journey is, be patient, push yourself, persevere, and always be working on your craft while waiting for your break. That's what I'm still working on, having done this for 20 years now.
There was a sadness over me, a melancholy. That's always been a part of me - those are some of the things that lead you to the arts.
I do believe that there are creative chakras or different sorts of energy centers.
I wanted to take on my full name, which was sort of a crazy thing to do considering that we're in Hollywood.
Hollywood has to be a better reflection of the world we live in.
The people that I admire have a wonderful balance of self-belief and humility.
For my characters, it's important to get really specific about what they listen to. Because it affects how they move in the world.
I watch a lot of home stuff; I like seeing things go from one thing to another and get fixed up.
People are really paying attention to the comic-book genre, and there's a lot of time and attention being invested in these projects with a wonderful sense of quality control.
My friends in college, several of whom are still my closest companions, would tell you that I was almost obsessed with becoming - fixated on creating - the future that I envisioned for myself: one of expanding to know my fullest self, which I have in no way achieved.
Come on, we would be foolish to say that there's never been African-American leads in some capacity, people of color in some capacity, leading shows or what have you. But it hasn't happened enough and in a manner that is an accurate reflection of the world that we live in.
I always hope to be a better person tomorrow than today.
It's still amazing, but when I was growing up, Harlem was the Mecca of black culture. I was so inspired by it, the aspirational feeling you'd get spending time there. Experiences that were really specific to that place.
'Luke Cage' is about a reluctant superhero who lives in the shadows in Harlem. He has to decide if he's going to step up and fight for the heart of the city and defend the people against Cornell 'Cottonmouth' Stokes, my character, who kinda wants to keep everything in order and intact. I'm the criminal element in the story.
I love hip hop. It's such an appendage for me. It's something that's always shaped my experience out in the world.
When you have these surprise breakout films that do well, that have good performances in them, it puts a lot of pressure on the Academy to recognize those projects, so it's more of a conversation about what is greenlit.
Related Authors
Arnold Schwarzenegger Quotes
Austrian
Actor
Benedict Cumberbatch Quotes
English
Actor
Bruce Lee Quotes
American
Actor
Clint Eastwood Quotes
American
Actor
Daniel Radcliffe Quotes
British
Actor
Dwayne Johnson Quotes
American
Actor
Jeff Bridges Quotes
American
Actor
Johnny Depp Quotes
American
Actor
Kevin Hart Quotes
American
Actor
Kevin Spacey Quotes
American
Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio Quotes
American
Actor
Rob Lowe Quotes
American
Actor
Robert Pattinson Quotes
English
Actor
Sylvester Stallone Quotes
American
Actor
Will Rogers Quotes
American
Actor
Zach Braff Quotes
American
Actor