Jonathan Majors

"One of the things we deal with as a theme is legacy—thinking about the future of oneself, the future of one’s family, one’s culture. How they’re going to survive, and how their survival will be viewed by those in the future. In doing so, I had to really think about my past and the past of my people. I’m a member of the African diaspora, and what we have experienced, I had to tap into and use that…I quickly understood that me growing up in Texas, my grandparents living through Jim Crow America, my parents living through Jim Crow America, to a degree, my aunts and uncles; those are all very different experiences. There’s a difference in being raised somebody who’s gone through that and actually being a person who dealt with that...."

"…art is inherently political. Period. First thing someone does when they colonize, where they conquer or they take something over, the first thing that they do—top of their list—is destroy the art of the people. They must destroy their art, because that is their humanity. That is their liberation. That is the essence of them. That is the spirit of a people, of a culture, the art that they make. When someone is being conquered, when someone is being taken over, when something is being erased, that’s the first thing that goes..."

"…Nerds come together, please, unite. Let’s all unite, it’s on. For me, that was very important, that Atticus is, and it’s coming to me now, a “yes and” character. Yes, he is that and he is this, and that’s the beautiful part about it. Yes, he’s this war hero. Yes, he can shoot a gun and run fast and take punches, but he also is a nerd. Those things are held at the same level. This man, this Black man, holds multitudes, and uses all of those things as a weapon. He weaponizes his mind. That is a beautiful thing and that was very important for me to let breathe and let live in the series."

"From people who are supposed to look after you, in the absence of a father. I was f---ed up"

"And now we can all get busy and continue to connect and grow and learn from it, because it’s something that was in our family"

"There are no excuses, but by getting help, you begin to understand things about yourself"

"I'm standing there and the verdict comes down. I say, 'How is that possible based off the evidence, based off the prosecution's evidence, let alone our evidence? How is that possible"

"I'm really blessed. I'm surrounded by people who love me, who care about me. But this has been very, very, very hard, and very difficult, and confusing in many ways"

"I wish to God I knew. That would give clarity. That would give me some type of peace about it"

"I'm an athlete. I'm a sportsman. I know my body. I know how it moves. I know my strength, or lack thereof, you know? None of that was employed on her"

"From my experience, from my point of view, a young Black man in any situation with anyone honestly, if the authorities get involved in any way, there's going to be conversation, conflict, trauma"

"I'm a great man. A great man. I do great things for my culture and for the world. ... The woman that supports me needs to be a great woman"

"I was attempting, and I did a terrible job at it apparently, I was attempting to motivate, to enlighten, to give perspective as in to what it is I was hoping to get out of the relationship"