actors-from-san-francisco

"I’ve been told, ‘you’re not a Muslim, you’re a disgrace to Pakistan, Pakistan won’t accept you,’ but I do come from a Middle Eastern background and I am Muslim, not the way my parents are, but by practice. My sister covers her head, she’s modest, married, and has kids. My mom covers her head and prays five times a day, I pray two times a day but I’m still a practicing Muslim."

"I am a practicing Muslim, so I kind of have an internal conflict sometimes. One of the biggest main sins it's hard to be forgiven for is adultery — having sex without marriage is a sin and doing it multiple times a day as an escort is one of the major sins that you will not be forgiven for, and I am fully aware of that, but yeah, I still pray."

"It can be considered by many to be foolhardy, especially when you’re messing with what’s considered a sacred text. But it’s also an irresistible challenge, isn’t it? It evokes so many different wild and outrageous and beautiful images that anyone who loves both novels and films can’t help but imagine what it would look like on the big screen. In this case I’m glad they took the challenge on. I think Marquez is glad too. Apparently he’s seen it and he’s responded favorably to it, he likes it. The trick is, as you aptly point out, is how to do it but how to do it well. Because it’s not an easy translation to make, and certainly nearly impossible when you’re talking about a great novel, which this is. The best you can hope for really is to capture the essence of the book, and I think the film has done that, which is good news."

"Well it was a bit of a conundrum because his actions in his kind of business had a real ugliness. It's power and violence and murder and mayhem and menace. And yet, I thought it was a mistake as an actor to predetermine or prejudge whether he's a good guy or a bad guy. You can't go into any characterization with that opinion or attitude or approach because it's sudden death. What it will convey ultimately is a one-dimensional character – the figure in the black hat that you've you seen countless time…"

"Film and television essentially feel the same when you’re doing it, because it’s the same technical approach. All the homework is the same. The homework for each medium is all similar, but the gratification in a live theater context is much higher, because it’s immediate. It’s far more dangerous, because there are no retakes. It’s electric, it’s an actual chemical transaction that occurs between you and the audience. Whatever energy you’re throwing out to them they throw it right back to you, and it kind of feeds on itself in this vacuum…"

"Silent wars are fought on mental battlefields."

"No harm done – don’t feel harmed, you won’t be. Moving towards living stoically, fought these feelings of inadequacy when I started on this path at eighteen. No looks didn’t vex me, looked within’ and everything that happened, suited me. Tailored all life is."

"The phrase “be realistic” used in any form is a micro-aggression."

"Reservation's mandatory for them to keep out vultures. Portrayed images, makes it hard to get to know us. That's one reason why other cultures don't approve of us, in an ancient world made of star crossed love."

"Knowing’s a blessing, relaying it is the curse."

"As influences faces growth, some will want my buzz cut. Growing bolder in my vision but I often feel stuck."

"I'm from the city rich desire to live in. Glass on the floor from breaking out of this prison / prism."

"The only thing holding down my soul is my soles"

"When it all falls down, it’ll fall into place."

"Accountability is mankind’s greatest obstacle. All our challenges stem from that."

"My daddy was a thug; momma was a hippie. Now you got me, product of Bayview-HP"

"If opportunity doesn’t call, call opportunity and keep calling until someone answers."

"People will say "there's no money in music", that's not true, there's no money in music to people who aren't educated on how to make money."

"Where are we going? Where are we headed? Because believe me, it isn’t always the police. There’s two sides to every story, three if the truth’s told. In the backseat, headed somewhere unknown. All alone, my innocence will soon be seized. No permanent friends, no permanent enemies just permanent interest. Its time to fight the powers that be; let em know, we can’t have peace until niggas get a piece too. We’re taught our only option’s to be deceased. Look, I’ll be what you need me to be just know. Where I’m headed could be a rocky road. Shit, this old world is crumbling fast, a new one coming slow but fsho, you better exercise control before THEY take control, ya dig? Rebel with a cause and THEY hate it…"

"Fear only goes as far as belief."

"I pressed play then came a long way from the Mac Book / I heard Raginder on “A.D.H.D.” then scribbled him down in my black book / Thinking one day he’d collaborate with a no name, named Marcus O / with one goal, sign Violinder so then he’ll call my imprint home."

"Officially I've been crowned as Hip-Hop's Historian."

"Hire someone looking to work, they’ll work for the next check. Hire someone who believes in the work and they’ll work for a lifetime."

"Passion looks like anger to people who aren’t passionate about anything."

"How you see me? Tell me how you see me. When mirrors only reflect what you want to see. Believe me."

"My closing statement to the senate and the council is...youth need art this truth is, not hard to swallow. I see many artistic people wallow in sorrow off belief. They aren't good enough to be. Give us a chance let us write our own histories. In a world conforming us instead of conforming for us. Kids ain't dumb just bored of the same old junk. Formulated highlight text, define learning. Is it confined to enclosed spaces eight hours a day? If it is I know why the caged bird sings."

"When I wake up, I gotta cake up and if you owe me a dollar I'm taking no pay cuts."

"Marcus Orelias, come with me or get left."

"Rapping bout the hood, in the hills is blasphemy, rapping from the hills to the hood is luxury."

"I’m hearing stop the violence but that can’t be. As long as we don’t look at ourselves, as a society"

"Anytime you travel through life, [emotional] baggage is apart of the journey. It’s not about not having baggage, it’s about learning to travel lighter and lighter."

"Tightly clenched fist don’t catch blessings."

"You can burn the bridge with the intent of hurting the merchant but remember in the end only the village suffers."

"No weapon is as dangerous as an idea. A weapon will kill you in that moment. A bad idea can kill you for a lifetime."

"I have a gift. I am a human alarm clock. I wake people up to themselves. You can hit the snooze and ignore me but eventually, you’ll have to wake up."

"The universe will never allow you to fail."

"Use only that which works, and take it from any place you can find it."

"Man, the living creature, the creating individual, is always more important than any established style or system."

"Thoughts are things."

"Don't think, feel....it is like a finger pointing a way to the moon. Don't concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory!"

"A good martial artist does not become tense, but ready. Not thinking, yet not dreaming. Ready for whatever may come. When the opponent expands, I contract; and when he contracts, I expand. And when there is an opportunity, "I" do not hit, "it" hits all by itself."

"Possession of anything begins in the mind."

"Make at least one definite move daily toward your goal."

"Boards don't hit back."

"When I look around, I always learn something: to be always yourself, and to express yourself, to have faith in yourself. Do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it."

"Faith is a state of mind that can be conditioned through self-discipline. Faith will accomplish."

"In life, what more can you ask for than to be real? To fulfill one’s potential instead of wasting energy on [attempting to] actualize one’s dissipating image, which is not real and an expenditure of one’s vital energy. We have great work ahead of us, and it needs devotion and much, much energy. To grow, to discover, we need involvement, which is something I experience every day — sometimes good, sometimes frustrating. No matter what, you must let your inner light guide you out of the darkness."

"All types of knowledge, ultimately mean self knowledge."

"You have to keep your reflexes so that when you want it — it’s there. When you want to move — you are moving. And when you move, you are determined to move! Not accepting even one inch less than 100 percent of your honest feelings. Not anything less than that. So that is the type of thing you have to train yourself into. To become one with your feelings so that, when you think — it is."

"In Jeet Kune Do, it’s not how much you have learned, but how much you have absorbed from what you have learned. It is not how much fixed knowledge you can accumulate, but what you can apply livingly that counts. ‘Being’ is more valued than "doing"."