I think prejudice has gotten to a point where a lot of people hold biases in their mind and don't even realize that they're doing it, because it's deeply ingrained in the fabric of what it means to be an American.
I've always been super expressive, and I've always liked to express myself any way I can.
I want to be in some Willy Wonka-type weird stuff, a role where I'm an alien. Anything that's new and challenging and real. I like real stuff.
My two little twin brothers have autism, so I grew up around it and misunderstood it for a long time.
The prison industrial system, things like that are cleverly put in place to attempt to marginalize a certain group of people - and it's not only black, it's replete across the American society.
I was born in San Bernardino in summer of '91 and grew up in Riverside, San Bernardino, and Victorville.
They say every five years the atoms in your body become a new set of atoms.
We used to do sock puppet shows for my auntie back in the day. Me and my friends would do accents of Englishmen, and we would sip tea and act like we were rich in front of the family, and they thought it was just hilarious, the level of perception that we had about things that we'd never experienced.
For me, life is like an act within itself. Everything I do is an act. Where I'm going is an act.
It's a hard thing when you've got guns pointed at you, to still stand up for what you believe in. Jimmie Lee and his family did that, and several others.
Have you ever heard of 'Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?' I would like to play Sidney Poitier's role - I love that role.
I feel like with every performance that I see, I get better because I've always thought - while I'm watching people perform - of what I would do.
I'm in this music duo called Moors.
It's been constant grinding and trying to secure work that I care about, tireless auditions and meetings. I've been fortunate that a lot of cool doors have opened to me, chiefly meeting great people who were inspired by what I've done and what they feel I could bring to their projects.
I'm influenced a lot by my family. I have a big family.
My biggest strength is I'm courageous, or if I am afraid of something, I do it anyway. I do what I feel. It's nothing personal against anyone, so that courageousness has been very good to me.
I'm from Victorville - it's about an hour-and-a-half away from Los Angeles, up in the desert. They call it Victimville because it's kind of violent. It's a beautiful place, though. It's quiet.
I've been fortunate to get involved with 'Short Term 12.' I was just a young teenager on the Internet, clicking on anything that had the word 'actor' in it. One day, someone called me in for a movie audition.
Music is something I do full-time in real life. I was doing music long before I was even thinking about acting.
When you're talking about an authority figure oppressing against people, it's the people that hold that authority figure up. If you want to get free of this bondage, then we need to think about ways to free ourselves rather than looking to the oppressors to free us.
