A Quote by Huda Kattan

For the longest time, I just felt like I had to be really, really harsh to be taken seriously as a CEO. — © Huda Kattan
For the longest time, I just felt like I had to be really, really harsh to be taken seriously as a CEO.
When I was made CEO of Reynolds the first time, someone asked me what it was like to be a female CEO. But I said, 'I don't know what its like to be a male CEO, so I can't really answer that question.'
I went to a mosque in Philadelphia with [my wife] in December 24, 1999. And we we went to this mosque in Philly, and I just had such a strong reaction to the prayer. And I was really emotionally - I felt really grounded at that time. And so to be in this prayer and the imam is doing the prayer in Arabic and I don't understand a word of Arabic but I just remember these tears just coming down my face and it just really connecting to my spirit in a way that felt like I needed to pay attention to that.
I just really wanted to be taken seriously in my music and I feel like I've done the reality shows and I've loved it, but sometimes you just need to pull away and take time for yourself.
The key to me, in religion, is just to treat it like it doesn't really matter. We have a Pope, we don't really believe him, we don't really listen to what he says, we don't really take him seriously. That's what has to happen with religion. It has to be marginalized and in the Islamic world, it's not marginalized, it's taken literally.
I just think it's really funny and entertaining. I mean, I don't necessarily take them really seriously - I don't even think a lot of really good films get seen. But I don't think that's what it's about. I mean, how amazing was Ellen Burstyn in Requiem For A Dream ? Especially as she was acting with herself most of the time. I don't understand how a performance like that can't win. I was so affected by that movie that I had to turn it off. I felt as if I was on drugs and my heart was about to leap out of my body.
I would really like to take on something that really surprises people and shows that I want to be taken seriously as an actress. Also, creatively speaking, that sounds really fun.
I think for the longest time I used to be kind of embarrassed that if I hung out with someone that had a really, really strong personality, I would end up accidentally catching myself talking like them.
I think, probably when I was 15 or so, I was going through a really hard time with my family, and I just felt really helpless - I didn't know how to put anything I was feeling into words, and I was really confused, and I felt like nobody would hear me, but I didn't even know what to say.
In school, I really felt like I didn't fit a type. I think everybody had a hard time putting me in a category. They all sort of realized, 'Hmm, you don't really look like a soprano. You're not really a character belter.'
And you probably remember all of those papers and documents that they had published in the newspapers. And, you know, when you look at that, it really was their own little jihad that they had going. It just wasn't taken very seriously then.
Being in New York, and meeting really amazing, talented, eccentric, and bold people, and just feeling really excited about life, got me really revved up and I just felt like everything was at my fingertips - that I could try anything. I really felt invincible. It was such a shift.
I really like the director [for Weeds]. I don't know if you've spoken to him yet but he's really, really intelligent. He was just really kind when I met him and nice and really told me why I should play the part...and kind of really didn't argue with him. He's just really, really smart and assembled these really great people. I felt like he really knows how to enlist his intelligence to get you - I don't know - he's really hard to argue with I find.
Definitely I had a lot of times where I was really hard on myself. Really frustrated. But I never felt like I had someplace else to go. Just had to stay here and deal with this.
It was like the first time I'd ever seen Hollywood just really not do the right thing. We filmed Free Willy in Mexico. I'd come in a really nice car from my hotel, and we'd have to drive around all the crew that was sleeping in the parking lot. People making their breakfast on the ground. It was because there was a whale there that was in a little tank. It just felt gross. It felt really bad. They didn't free that whale for, damn... at least 10 years later. The poor whale had horrible psoriasis all over him, and his fin didn't work.
I went and met with Tim Burton for the role of Batman. But I just couldn't really take it seriously; any man who wears his underpants outside his pants just cannot be taken seriously.
21 years as CEO is a long time. I was and probably still am the longest serving CEO in America. Certainly I am in the media industry, bar none.
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