Charles S. Dutton Quotes

It just seemed to me to be a great story, set back in its time but something that seemed to have relevance for our time. Now that the film is coming out, it looks like we're back in another time where repression of expression is all the rage.

The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.

You work your butt off and somebody says you can't have your record played because it offends them. Tyrants are made of such stuff.

When you live under the power of terror and segregation, you can't ever start a work of art.

All I wanted was to be a regional-theater actor, to be in a company. I thought it would be a great life. I don't think I understood how difficult it would be.

The prisons were now everywhere filled with Friends and others, in the city and country, and the posts were so laid for the searching of letters that none could pass unsearched.

After 'Rock On!,' when I started acting, and I sang in the film, people asked me, 'What was the need to sing in your film?' and things like that. I really don't have an answer for it. In terms of what made me do it? It just felt like the right thing to do.

There is this preconceived idea that I would follow the likes of Michael Owen, Jamie Carragher, and Gary into the media because it's a really good life. But football is my life.

Radio is so heavily programmed; you have to fit into a certain box. So it's harder for anything different to get through.

I've experienced some really very obvious, direct homophobia - when I was still trying to be an artist, behind the scenes, being told to be less gay, be less feminine.

Due to hate, fear, and oppression, the North Koreans cannot help themselves.

While I don't claim that I feel no pressure, I have strived to take up only those scripts that appeal to me. I've been lucky that the ones I chose were also liked by audiences.

This era of political correctness out there needs to go.

As a kid, I was playing a character, so the film was not on my shoulders. I did 11 films out of which three were appreciated and remembered. At that time no one was following my career, so it was easier. But now when you are a mature adult, it's a different experience.

Having been subjected to the pigeonholing of Hollywood myself, I realized that once you become a studio-approved director, your chances of ever making your own film again are zero. You make the films that the studio wants you to make.

Justice, particularly for the oppressed and marginalized in our society, never comes without great effort and sacrifice.

I don't feel like I have anything to prove to the fans in England - but I know that in England they did not see the best of me.

It seems to me that we are living in an increasingly unfree society.

I don't want to criticise my country, but there are times I feel Sting and myself have been treated unkindly.

One of the problems we had was trying to live up to this bubbly image. All the music was supposed to be bubbly. That's what people expected from us. But that was very limiting.

The image of an actor plays a huge role in deciding if he or she can experiment with roles.

I'm happiest when I'm acting, and I've dedicated my life to it. Still, as much as I love acting, at the end of the day, I want to be remembered as a great person, first, and as a great actor, second.

It's harder to make something good when you can't curse all the time.

During the last years of Mayakovski's life, when all poetry had ceased to exist . . . literature had stopped.

Once form has been smashed, it has been smashed for good, and once a forbidden subject has been released, it has been released for good.