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We spend so much time bantering about the words when the real open conversations might very well be our actions. I worry about our rhetoric.
Anna Deavere Smith
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Anna Deavere Smith
Age: 74
Born: 1950
Born: September 18
Academic
Actor
Actress
Film Actor
Playwright
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
University Teacher
Writer
Baltimore
Maryland
Anna Smith
Anna Devere Smith
Anna Deveare Smith
Time
Open
Words
Bantering
Action
Conversations
Wells
Rhetoric
Might
Actions
Well
Conversation
Real
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Worry
More quotes by Anna Deavere Smith
I am interested in personal stories because that's when people become expressive, spontaneous and heartfelt.
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The American idea is as promising, imaginative, and full of the unexpected as the land itself. The land represents freedom - the frontier, the ability to make a new future with your own bare hands.
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Listening is not just hearing what someone tells you word for word. You have to listen with a heart. I don't want that to sound touchy-feely it is not. It is very hard work.
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I see myself as not a typical theater person, but a person who uses the theater as a place to meet people and explore ideas.
Anna Deavere Smith
Use your time to bathe yourself in the gift. Move your hand across the canvas. Go to museums. Make this into an obsession.
Anna Deavere Smith
Suddenly in high school, I'm in a predominantly Jewish atmosphere. Jewish people were my gate to white America.
Anna Deavere Smith
I happen to be a hopeaholic. I tend to look at problems as an opportunity to do some work.
Anna Deavere Smith
You know, interesting minds usually do hold more than one idea at a time.
Anna Deavere Smith
For me, first of all, I love people, I love ideas.
Anna Deavere Smith
My work is about giving voice to the unheard, and reiterating the voice of the heard in such a way that you question, or re-examine, what is the truth.
Anna Deavere Smith
Many people are afraid to talk about race because it's so emotionally loaded. We don't have the vocabulary to talk about it. Every day, our vocabulary seems more and more inadequate.
Anna Deavere Smith
When I got out of acting school, I was lucky to have gotten any job at all. A lot of people hiring African American actresses - it was right after 'Roots,' and for society, not me, it was great. Nice richly dark-skinned people was the fashion, and I was not.
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You are an explorer. You understand that every time you go into the studio, you are after something that does not yet exist.
Anna Deavere Smith
I went as far away from home as possible in terms of the development of my imagination.
Anna Deavere Smith
We who are in the arts are at the risk of being in a popularity contest rather than a profession. If that fact causes you despair . . . pick another profession. Your desire to communicate must be bigger than your relationship with the chaotic and unfair realities . . . We have to create our own standards of discipline.
Anna Deavere Smith
A lot of acting techniques are very self-oriented.
Anna Deavere Smith
You can't teach talent. You can't teach inspiration. You can teach people critical facilities. You can give them techniques. You can teach discipline. And you can teach them about the business.
Anna Deavere Smith
I mean, I think that - as an actress, in particular, I'm basically a fool, and I see the world upside down.
Anna Deavere Smith
Racism has been for everyone like a horrible, tragic car crash, and we've all been heavily sedated from it. If we don't come into consciousness of this tragedy, there's going to be a violent awakening we don't want. The question is, can we wake up?
Anna Deavere Smith
Be more than ready. Be present in your discipline. Remember your gift. Be grateful for your gift and treat it like a gift. Cherish it, take care of it, and pass it on.
Anna Deavere Smith
