John David Washington

Actor

1984-07-28

Quotes by John David Washington

• The injury that ended my time in football turned out to be serendipitous. I tore my Achilles while training for a pending tryout with the New York Giants, and when it snapped, so did my career, basically. That's what led me to gain the confidence to get into the acting world on my own terms.

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• So many people - DPs, writers, and the assistants that go on to be directors and writers - come from the School of Spike Lee. He's almost set up an Institution of Spike Lee.

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• Spike Lee really gave us a platform, men and women of color.

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• I'm connected to a Wesley Snipes, and I'm connected to Giancarlo Esposito because of the history of films that we've all been a part of with Spike Lee.

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• I felt a little anxious/nervous representing a real person in a Spike Lee film.

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• I've had the acting bug since I was, like, five. But growing up, I saw how people treated me differently when they knew who my father was, even the stuff I did on the field. Sometimes I'd rush for 100 yards, and the headline would be, 'Denzel's son runs for 100 yards.' That's where the suppression of that bug came from.

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• Football is the ultimate team sport. You're dependent on 10 other people on the field to have success on a particular play to get to the common goal, which is the win. On a set, we need everybody doing their job and pulling their weight.

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• It's a thankless job for police officers, period, but specifically for men and women of color protecting and serving.

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• There's some men and women out there that are doing their job the right way. They're protecting and serving complete strangers in their communities the right way. And it's a thankless job. Obviously, there's a lot of information out on cops not doing their jobs correctly, but the ones that are should be celebrated.

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• Movies are magical. It transcends a lot of hate or human faults in real life because of the fantasy of it all.

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• Ask me trivia on 'Sex and the City,' and I will know it. I rewatch it every year. Samantha? Charlotte? Those are my girls.

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• Like acting, undercover detective work requires a lot of performance. There's just more pressure because it's life-or-death situations.

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• On a Spike Lee set, everybody seems to want to be there and is motivated to work in unison and do the best they can.

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• I hope people will see how harmful words are and how irresponsible we can be when saying the wrong things at the wrong time to certain people.

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