#violadavissource

-Viola Davis, on being worthy of success.

“The black artist cannot live in a revisionist place. The black artist can only tell the truth about humanity. Humanity is messy. People are messy. Caucasian actors know that. They understand that. They understand that when you bring a human being to life you show all the flaws as well as the beauty. We, as African American artists, are more concerned with image and message and not execution. Which is why every time you see our images they’ve been watered down to a point where they are not realistic at all. It’s like all of our humanity has been washed out. We as artists cannot be politicians. We as artists can only be truth tellers.”

annalise keating → how to get away with murder |season 1|

When you’re working as an actor, you don’t think that when you get out of school, it’s going to be so hard to get a job. Just to get a job. Any job. Whatsoever. You don’t think that people are going to see you in a certain way.

•|Viola Davis|Touch of Evil|The New York Times|•

"Do not live someone else's life and someone else's idea of what womanhood is. Womanhood is you. Womanhood is everything that's inside of you." (x)

Viola Davis on her past bullies wanting to be her friend

“I think that it happens in most actresses’ careers, that you get parts that are a little beneath your talent and your skill set. I’m a character actress. A lot of those roles were two, three days on a movie, five days on a movie, eight days on a movie… and the character doesn’t even have much of an arc. But you do it because you want to work and you’re hungry. And so you dive into it. But you certainly aren’t challenged. It leaves you wanting more. But all of a sudden the tide has changed. With the movie ‘Fences,’ now I’m No. 2 on the call sheet, next to Washington. I’m there every day. I’m in every scene. I’m battling it out, I have a huge arc, and now all of a sudden, I feel alive in a way that I didn’t before. But there was certainly a time in my career, many many years, where I was not challenged. Theater has been a different story for me, but movies and TV, absolutely — not challenged. There’s been a role here or there that has woken me up, but that’s about it.” x x