Vidya Balan Quotes

I wasn't sure if I wanted to put that out there so blatantly, so that before you listen to me you know that I'm Asian. But I thought it was sort of cool to embrace the Korean half of me, which I love.

Jews have had to carry around their own sense of self in a carpet bag and I think perhaps too much emphasis might be being put on nationality and on the other hand patriotism, that sort of thing.

I don't like identity. We accept identities in Israel. We make them holy. But what does identity really mean?

I come from a place where I find it hard to identify with a label.

I'm very happy to have the heritage that I do, but I'm not wanting to be 'the Latino actor.' I just want to be 'an actor.'

I don't wear much make-up in my non-working life, though I love to dress up and put on a face for a special occasion. As I get older, I see less of the fantasy 'Indian' self I inherited from my father, and I see my mother looking back at me.

I'm hoping that what I am or what I'm not ethnically doesn't limit me in anyone else's eyes. I guarantee you it doesn't in mine.

I feel like I've started to create my own culture of being a voice for something, and that's what people want to know about. I love that because I am a woman and because I a rap, and I look the way I look, I can connect with the demographic of people who feel like they have a voice in me.

I think it was hard for people to cast me as an ethnic, as an Asian American woman.

There's drama in everything. That's why I love movies. Like 'Welcome to the Dollhouse.' I'm a 350-pound black man, and I could understand what it was like to be a little white girl.

I like to consider myself an actor who just happens to be Hispanic.

Sometimes I have a very fleeting emotional dance with a fleeting phrase, like 'half-Mexican.'

I'm proud of my roots. There are not many Asians in the music industry so it's important for me to tell people where I'm from.

I was very sure I did not want to be the stereotype of what Indian people are seen as, which is Bollywood and henna. That's all great! It's what we are, and I love it. I love saris; I love music. I love henna; I love dancing, but that's not all we are.

Your look changes depending on your confidence, and then your beauty changes. When I first came to New York, all the people were saying, 'You look so Asian because you have a different eye shape.' They didn't really understand because they didn't really see that many Asian models.

I don't consider myself an Iranian comedian; I consider myself a comedian who happens to be of Iranian descent.

We all had to dodge the idea we were spokespeople for our races. Like, 'Hey, it's the Mexican Guy! The Filipino! The Chick!' We've always stood up to it and said, 'Fine, bring it on and we'll show you how we rock.'

Mustafa Ali is who I wanted to see when I was growing up. I'm not wearing anything on my head; I'm not saying anything in Arabic. I'm just going to come out as Mustafa Ali.

I am a black woman, and I'm proud of that, but as a showrunner, I want to think about what makes me unique beyond my race.

Being Native American, we were different than everybody else, but I never felt like I was different.

Growing up, I didn't see anybody with my skin color or my background. I didn't know it was possible to have a Middle Eastern actor in a lead role.

I wasn't, like, pretty enough to be the ingenue; I wasn't 'character' enough to be the goofball sidekick. I'm kind of ethnically ambiguous.

Most of us, when imagining an All-American, wouldn't picture a man who looked like me. Not even I would.

It's okay, it's cool to be Indian and there are cool people that are Indian and doing really well. It's okay to be brown and cool.

Years ago, I couldn't get arrested in commercials because of my look: 'Is he Jewish, Hispanic, or African-American?' I ended up doing voiceover work, which has been great. Honestly, I can't complain.