Quotes by Dee Rees - Page 2

I had originally written 'Pariah' as a feature, and we shot the first act as a short film, and then we used the short as a marketing tool to fundraise for the feature.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Marketing
Shot
Short
Feature
Originally
Tool
Copy Quote
I'd go to lesbian parties. I felt like I wasn't hard enough to be butch, but I wasn't wearing heels and a skirt - I wasn't femme - so I felt like I was sort of invisible.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Felt
Femme
Heels
Invisible
Butch
Wearing
Lesbian
Parties
Skirt
Copy Quote
I grew up listening to Mary J. Blige's music. When I initially met her, it was like, 'Oh, wow. I'm meeting this woman whose music was the soundtrack of my college years.'
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Mary
Wow
Blige
Initially
Meeting
Soundtrack
Copy Quote
Filmmaking in general is my second career. I thought that writing wasn't practical, so I went to business school and got an MBA, and I worked three years in grant management.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Business School
Filmmaking
Management
Grant
Practical
Copy Quote
You don't get to hand footnotes to the audience or explain what you were trying to do and what it's supposed to be. Everything has to be on the screen, and it has to be clear.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Explain
Copy Quote
Each moment is defined by a multitude of histories, the past constantly converging upon us, perpetually decaying and reforming itself on the steady pulse of now, now, now, now.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Defined
Pulse
Steady
Constantly
Itself
Decaying
Histories
Perpetually
Moment
Multitude
Reforming
Copy Quote
I was interested with exploring the idea of who gets to be in possession of the land - how it's sometimes impossible to go back home, how family can be the thing that drags you down.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Exploring
Possession
Copy Quote
A producer has to want you. And if the producer trusts you and asks for your vision, it frees you up so much, not having to explain or fight for every decision. You're allowed to create.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Explain
Producer
Trusts
Copy Quote
The best thing in the world is to put two characters who hate each other side by side. Or put two people who love each other far away, so they have to reach for each other with their looks.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Far Away
Two People
Copy Quote
Writing is really freeing because it's the only part of the process where it's just you and the characters and you are by yourself in a room and you can just hash it out. There are no limitations.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Character
Rooms
Writing
Copy Quote
When I first came to New York, I was surprised by all these out teenagers who were openly on the street being who they were. That intrigued me because I was 27 and still struggling with being myself.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Being Myself
Intrigued
Myself Me Being Myself
Myself Me Street
Openly
Struggling
Surprised
Teenagers
Copy Quote
People have almost been lulled into complacency because there are no signs over the water fountains. But the signs have been in the policies. There's still housing discrimination and wage discrimination.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Complacency
Discrimination
Housing
Water
Almost
Lulled
Policies
Signs
Wage
Copy Quote
With friendship, it's hard sometimes - you don't outgrow your friends, but you do question how people are friends to you in different ways and how it's okay to cultivate other relationships outside of that.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Friendship
Different Ways
Your People Sometimes
Cultivate
Outgrow
Copy Quote
Contemporarily, we struggle with people worried about representation sometimes. It's a burden, as artists, that we take on that limits the work. It limits the characters people play. It limits the roles they want to do.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Burden
Limits
Representation
Worried
Copy Quote
Ultimately, the people [who] are going to help you make your film are the people who believe in you and believe in the story. And as long as you stick to your guns, hopefully what you come out with will be what you imagined.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Believe
Gun
Long
Copy Quote
For kids who are struggling, who are of faith, just reconciling yourself to the fact that God loves you, accepts you for who you are, is a big step in the healing, especially when your biological family is unaccepting of you.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Healing
God Faith Family
Accepts
Biological
God Family Faith
Reconciling
Struggling
Copy Quote
If I can go three grandmothers back and find a slave, that means someone else can go three grandmothers back and find a slave owner. When you interrogate your histories, it forces you to rethink who you are and where you are.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Slave
Grandmothers
Owner
Histories
Rethink
Copy Quote
When you choose the hard things, it takes longer than you think to get it done, and if you choose the hard thing and have a very particular way you want to do them and are uncompromising in that, then sometimes it takes even longer.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Particular
Uncompromising
Choose
Hard Thing
Longer
Particular Way
Takes
Copy Quote
Before Charlottesville, it might have been easy to dismiss the plot of 'Mudbound' as no longer relevant. Now, I feel like audiences will be more receptive to the material - and to interrogating their personal histories after watching it.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Plot
Receptive
Relevant
Dismiss
Histories
Copy Quote
There's a line that runs between everyone and their ancestors, and you cannot sever that. Maybe disassociate from those ideas but not how you are connected to them. But, you can realise how you've benefited and change how you raise your kids.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Connected
Ideas
Ancestors
Line
Maybe
Raise
Realise
Runs
Copy Quote
For me, books were my source of affirmation. Alice Walker, Audrey Lord - it was these authors who wrote about their experiences. It was this weird thing where I was censored in terms of what I could watch but not in terms of what I could read.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Affirmation
Audrey
Censored
Lord
Weird
Where Me Weird
Alice
Books
Could
Read
Watch
Experiences
Terms
Walker
Weird Thing
Copy Quote
I'm not a writer that writes every day. I just kind of have ideas. I jot them down when I have them, and when I have enough, I just start. And for me, I start more around noon, and I'm all about feeling. Once there's a theme, I can't not write.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Enough
Ideas
Noon
Theme
Me Day Every Day
Writer
Enough Me Day
Me Day Start
Every Day
Feeling
Jot
Just Kind
Start
Copy Quote
For me, Sundance always felt big. It's not the only way to make your way, but for me, it was definitely that critical link between struggling artist, kind of working on my own, to actually working professionally and being connected and being seen.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Connected
Sundance
Always Your Me
Me Way Always
Link
Professionally
Struggling
Copy Quote
My first job was at Proctor and Gamble in Cincinnati, my second job was at a pharmaceutical company in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey. My third job was at Palmolive. And I realized, three jobs in three years, maybe it wasn't the job. It had to be me.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Berkeley
Gamble
Jersey
New Jersey
Pharmaceutical
Cincinnati
First Job
Heights
Copy Quote
I definitely felt the desire to, like - I definitely knew there was an elsewhere. I definitely knew that, like, if I were going to be free, I needed to be away from, kind of, like, Nashville and kind of get out of the South and get out of the country.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Elsewhere
Nashville
Copy Quote
Both grandfathers fought in different wars. My mother's father fought in World War II, and then my father's father fought in Korea. And they're both these country boys, one from rural Tennessee and one from rural Louisiana - and they never went back home.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Louisiana
Tennessee
World War Ii
War Home World
Boy
Wars
Fought
Grandfathers
Rural
World War
Copy Quote
'Mudbound,' you know, is about home. 'Mudbound' is about what it means to be a citizen, and 'Mudbound,' in fact, is set in this post-reconstruction era that we haven't really explored. You know, not since 'Sounder' have we even really explored that experience.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Sounder
Since
Citizen
Set
Era
Explored
In Fact
Copy Quote
I just want to tell stories that are meaningful and have inspiration to them; people can watch it and take away something, or maybe they'll just think about themselves differently or think about the world differently. I just want to create characters that live on.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Inspiration
Meaningful
Stories
World People Live
Copy Quote
I just want to tell stories that are meaningful and have inspiration to them; people can watch it and take away something or maybe they'll just think about themselves differently, or thing about the world differently. I just want to create characters that live on.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Character
Inspiration
Meaningful
Copy Quote
We have to create a range, and we have to let there be possibilities. And basically, by showing there are different types of people, you write down the monolith. You stop having to represent for all black people when you allow there to be different types represented.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Range
Be Different
Represent
Different Types
Possibilities
Showing
Types
Copy Quote
I've always liked to write, but I never thought I could make a career out of it. I went to business school because in the '80, it was the thing to do. I thought that marketing was a way to be creative in business, but quickly learned all creative stuff happens at the ad agency.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Creative
School
Writing
Copy Quote
In some communities it is - like, for me, coming out with my parents, they were not accepting; they were not understanding. So it depends. For kids in New York and L.A., maybe it's different, but for kids in Iowa, for kids in Tennessee, it's still something that's not really talked about.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Depends
Iowa
Tennessee
Me Parents New
Communities
Talked
Copy Quote
Shooting on film is great because it imparts discipline: What do you need to see so you're not finding it in the camera. When I'm shooting, I have the scene in mind, where I'm going to have certain lines. I learned to overlap and to shoot more than I think I need. That was the learning curve.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Discipline
Learning Curve
Shooting
Curve
Overlap
Copy Quote
I think 'Mudbound' reveals the interconnectiveness of our stories. You can't separate out threads of history and race as economic construct. 'Mudbound' makes it very plain. Race is about commerce; it's not an actual thing. It's a fiction that was created to basically divide resources unequally.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Commerce
Actual
Construct
Divide
Plain
Reveals
Separate
Threads
Copy Quote
The only advice I can give is to surround yourself with people who are friends and people who believe in you and your material and who are going to help you take it to the next level. It doesn't mean you don't listen to criticism, but you listen to it and edit it, and you figure out what you can take.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Advice
Criticism
Next
Next Level
Surround
Surround Yourself
Believe Yourself Surround Yourself
Believe Surround Yourself Yourself
Edit
Figure
Surround Yourself Believe Yourself
Level
Material
Copy Quote
When I first started going out to lesbian clubs, I felt a very binary recreation of hetero culture. There are butches and femmes, and I felt like I was neither of those things. I'm in a turtleneck and jeans and just learning to be comfortable in that space. I realized I don't have to be a certain way.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Learning
Space
Binary
Certain
Clubs
Comfortable
Culture
Felt
Jeans
Recreation
Started
Certain Way
Lesbian
Neither
Realized
Turtleneck
Copy Quote
With 'Pariah,' at the time, I had just come out. I had a coming out experience, and I was writing about it, transposing my experience as an adult: What would it have been like if I had been a teenager in Brooklyn? The funny thing was people thought I was from Brooklyn. I had to be like, 'No, I'm from Nashville.'
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Brooklyn
Nashville
Funny Thing
Copy Quote
In an industry that's uncertain and when you're in a lot of situations that are anxiety-causing, to have someone there who has your back unconditionally and cares for you and the material and would give anything to make sure everything is OK, makes you feel so much better. It gives you a sense of security as an artist.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Uncertain
Your Better Feel
Cares
Copy Quote
I started out at Procter & Gamble marketing panty liners, so basically selling women insecurity. I thought there must be more to life than this. Then I was on set for a Dr. Scholl's commercial, and I asked one of the execs, 'How do you get a job behind the camera?' and he said, 'Film school.' So I quit and applied to NYU.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Film School
Gamble
Insecurity
Marketing
Nyu
Selling
Applied
Asked
Basically
Camera
Commercial
Dr
Quit
Copy Quote
I had this thing where I only wanted to work on original material, no adaptations, and obviously, that changed. I really wanted to have the resources and have the space and the time to tell stories that I've really cared about. I've kind of changed my approach, but I've gotten to do that, to tell stories that I really care about.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Adaptation
Time Work Space
Cared
Copy Quote
The only advice I can give those who want to sell thei films is to surround yourself with people who are friends and people who believe in you and your material and who are going to help you take it to the next level. It doesn't mean you don't listen to criticism but you listen to it and edit it and you figure out what you can take.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Believe
Mean
People
Copy Quote
I very much related to the idea of sexual identity and how it doesn't have to be black and white. When I first came out, there would be butch people in baseball caps, and that wasn't me, and then there were girls in heels and dresses, and that didn't feel like that was me either. But after a while I learned there's a lot of ground in between.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Girl
Baseball
Black And White
Copy Quote
I remember one summer I played, like, with the granddaughter of this known Klan member. Like, all summer we caught cicadas. And we had grown close, and so it was, like, time for her birthday party and I said 'Oh, like, what time do I come for your party?' And she's like 'Oh, no, you can't come to my house 'cause my parents don't like black people.'
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Birthday
Birthday Party
Black
Caught
Granddaughter
House
Party
Remember
Said
Summer
Time Your Remember
Played
Oh
Close
Grown
Her
Parents
Member
She
Copy Quote
What I love in working on film is just working with actors. It's one thing to write scenes alone over a keyboard and to imagine the actions and reactions in your head, but it's a completely other thing to hear actors speaking your words, to see their bodies bringing the fullness of emotion, need, desire and pain to life right in front of you. It's amazing.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Desire
Pain
Writing
Copy Quote
I look at Woody Allen's prolific career of 30 or 40 films, and I'm watching the clock. I'd love to work at a clip of a film a year. We don't get the benefit of the doubt, particularly black women. We're presumed incompetent, whereas a white male is assumed competent until proven otherwise. They just think the guy in the ball hat and the T-shirt over the thermal has got it, whether he's got it or not. For buzzy first films by a white male, the trajectory is a 90-degree angle. For us, it's a 30-degree angle.
Dee Rees / Screenwriter
Careers
Thinking
Years
Copy Quote

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