All I ever wanted to do was sing. What happened was more.

I learned quickly that almost any time a third world face became prominent on TV, we became responsible for the whole minority community.

I like to think I opened doors for other women, although that wasn`t my original intention.

I`m always getting involved in the wrong relationship. I do that very well.

[on filming Hurry Sundown (1967) in St. Francisville, LA, home of the Ku Klux Klan, amid death threats to the cast and crew] You can cut the hostility here with a knife. I`m not a fighter. I usually smile and then go into my room and cry my eyes out. But down here, the terror has killed my taste for going anywhere.