Malorie Blackman Quotes

There needs to be more film directors of colour. They bandy about the word 'diversity' a lot, but when I say 'of colour,' I mean Asian, black - I mean people of all colour. We need to have those voices given the opportunity, not told that their films will not be distributed or will not sell well abroad.

We need more people working in the publishing industry itself who are people of colour.

You can't have too many books featuring people of color, just like you can't have too many books featuring white people.

I want to be able to let people who aren't used to seeing a Santa of color say, 'Wow, there he is.' It's time for America to diversify.

I think all races are represented in America much more than in many other places, but it's also nice to remind people about that ethnic mix. I would like to see more black models and women from different ethnic backgrounds, but I also think that when you are casting, you just choose the most beautiful girl you can find.

London's not a white city. So why should our catwalks be so white?

'Black film,' that term allows studios to just marginalize a movie and say, 'We've made our black film. We've made our film with people of color in it,' as opposed to, 'I just feel like people of color should be in every genre.'

When I do a picture and it's 90% black, like 'Bird,' I use 90% black people.

It's not enough even to have one black Barbie... because black women are not a monolith.

I have lots of hopes for black actors in general, whether they be on TV or on stage or in movies, and that is that we move beyond the tokenism of what it means to be black in a particular set of circumstances.

I have a responsibility to diversity onstage, but one of the things I've heard about our production of 'Boys' is that it's a bunch of white guys. Well, race is a component of this play. You can't just drop people in willy-nilly and say, 'Well, we're going for diversity.'

I knew there were calls for diversity in children's lit, but you always wonder as a person of color, how diverse is too diverse?

I like representing different kinds of black people - showing they exist.

I grew up figure skating, and in figure skating there is only a handful of black people at the time figure skating with me.

As the editor at the Village Voice, I always tried to find writers of colour.

If I go to the museum and see white bodies, black bodies, Asian bodies, Latino bodies, then I will expect to see those things every time I go. That matters a lot.

'Chels-emojis' are in the works. I use emojis heavily in life, and I think a lot of people do. There are a number that are frustratingly absent - you know how there's kind of a generic white man and a generic white woman? I just want to put a generic black man and a generic black woman.

Theatre has always been better disposed to colourblind casting than telly or film. Given that most television is contemporary, and it reaches 56 million people, I am disappointed there still isn't more representation.

Naturally we need black men to give this movie serious credibility.

Casting ethnic characters is a very hard thing to do, but it's important. It's also interesting.

As far as diversity's concerned, there's me, there's Al Madrigal, there's Aasif Mandvi. But I'm not walking around feeling black all the time. That would stress me out.

The world we live in is like a Benetton ad. It's changed, and we have to appeal to a broader audience. You want younger kids of every race to be able to see themselves in the movie.

Do I feel that white directors have to tell only white stories? No. Do I feel that black filmmakers should only tell stories about black people? No. If we say that, then that means Asian people cannot write about anybody but Asians. I don't think a woman should only write about women.

Studio heads seem to be getting the message that there is not only an audience out there, but there is a desire for people to see people of colour in central roles and in authoritative roles.

For me, I actively look for projects that showcase people of color.