Samuel L. Jackson

I voted for Barack because he was black. 'Cuz that's why other folks vote for other people - because they look like them... That's American politics, pure and simple.

People go to movies on Saturday to get away from the war in Iraq and taxes and election news and pedophiles online and just go and have some fun. I like doing movies that are fun.

All movies aren't fun some are hard work. You try to do something and convey a set of emotions that have to do with some real life kind of stuff.

I kind of realize that I have a tendency to choose the kind of films I watched when I was a kid and would go home and pretend with my friends that we were in those movies after we saw them.

I grew up watching those blaxploitation movies. Ron O'Neal, Richard Roundtree, Jim Brown, Pam Grier. For the first time, I saw 'The Negro' get one over on 'The Man.'

I look at myself as an audience member. I still love movies, and I still go and sit in the back of the big dark room with everybody else, and I want the same thrill.

Not everybody goes to movies to get their life changed.

I actually think I have an audience member's sensibility about going to the movies.

I hope Obama gets scary in the next four years, 'cuz he ain't gotta worry about getting re-elected.

I tend to play characters that I can infuse with certain kinds of humour. Even the baddest guy can be funny in his own particular way. I want the audience to engage with the character on some deeper level so that they leave the cinema still thinking about him.

I walk the streets, take the train, it's real simple. Some actors create their own mythology: 'Oh, I'm so famous I can't go places, because I created this mythology that I'm so famous I can't go places.'

I'm a good son, a good father, a good husband - I've been married to the same woman for 30 years. I'm a good friend. I finished college, I have my education, I donate money anonymously. So when people criticize the kind of characters that I play on screen, I go, 'You know, that's part of history.'

My dad was an absentee dad, so it was always important to me that I was part of my daughter's life, and she deserved two parents, which is part of the rationale behind us staying married for 30 years.

I'm not as angry as I used to be. But I can get in touch with that anger pretty quickly if I feel my space is being invaded or somebody is not treating me with the respect that I think I want.