Haaz Sleiman Quotes

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.'

Having brought diversity to the air in the way that we have with Kerry Washington and Viola Davis toplining their shows, and then shows like 'Fresh Off the Boat' and 'Black-ish,' have been very important. I look forward to continuing in that vein.

No matter what happens, we couldn't let people say Asian-American actors can't act.

I don't know what issues concerning identity have helped contemporary fiction evolve to what it is now. All I know is that the range of voices that are being heard and published is a lot more diverse than when I was coming up.

People of color and women are increasingly being shown on-screen. For things to be whitewashed just doesn't make sense.

'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.'

I look forward to the day when indigenous actors can play Hamlet and Ophelia and not just Othello and Desdemona.

The challenge facing America in the next century will be the shaping, at long last, of a truly common public culture, one responsive to the long silenced cultures of color.

While books expand horizons by exposing us to worlds outside our own, children also need to see themselves, their experiences and their cultures reflected in books they read. Unfortunately, for too many children, this is not the norm.

In England, you feel like a member of the revolutionary guard the minute you even mention race. But I do think that the OscarsSoWhite phenomenon will have to reflect back on England. What people are essentially saying is that they want to see more diverse stories. It's not about putting three black people in the back of the shot.

Poitier opened the doors to so many artists, not just black artists. There is a line that goes from black to Latin to Asian with regards to roles.

You cannot collectively, as a society, decide that you are only going to represent one part of a minority. It's like saying you've represented black people on television because you aired an episode of the 'Cosbys.'

It's important to tell the story you're telling in the right way, which might involve black people or people of whatever heritage or ethnicity - or it might not.

Point-blank, there is not enough diversity in media.

When I speak of diversity, I don't mean replacement of white comics. I don't mean acceptance by white comics. We comics who weren't born into the white guy paradigm of 'funny' don't need a handout. We don't need a PC push. We don't need 'a look.'

I get that people want more diversity in TV and film, and I stand by that. I stand in solidarity with better diversity in TV shows, especially for Asian actors. I agree with that 100 per cent.

It should be very normal to see people of different races and ethnic minorities playing different parts.

There's so much diversity on TV. It's actually reflecting American culture.

We need more diversity - we need more African-Americans on screen, Latinos, Asians, different religions. We have to be better about reflecting what our world looks like.

I wish that all different types of people of all races and all upbringings were all equally represented in this industry that influences so many people.

I was always a wrestling fan, and being an Arab kid who grew up in Canada, there was no representation for people like me.

You want entertainment in general, every aspect of it, to be more of a reflection of the diverse world that we live in.

My wish would be for positive representation and more diversity coming from Hollywood.

I will say that equity overall is an important issue and one we are constantly looking at. In a perfect world, the entertainment and media industry and the content on our screens would reflect the true American scene.

I think diversity has to happen on a storytelling level, not just on a casting level.