"Not only is this work a masterpiece, but it's also adapted into a film that is also separately a masterpiece. I don't think it's necessary to do a straight telling of the story. "
"There is not an inherent gorgeousness to classical music itself. We find it gorgeous because we find ourselves represented in it. We have not been successful at making it relevant for everybody."
"The tragedy in this movie is that at the heart of it is this unrequited love story, which is a very, almost adolescent kind of pain. But that pain is magnified by the pain of the catastrophe in the background."
"Am I just here because I'm Black or am I here because I'm talented? I tend to be the only black person in the room. I see that changing."
"All of the aspects of identity that he outlined, I also embody. So by being able to realize his words, I’m able to be very closely in conversatoin or community or connection with his aspirations."
"I think my role as director is to unlock something specific, more specific, so there's a sort of universality to what you feel from the music."
"You get to enjoy that really amazing experience of the audience responding to to what you've offered. But you cannot bite it. You have to you have to keep a distance from it and and be privileged to be...
"I did resonate with how his family labeled him a peculiar kid. I experienced that growing up, not from my family, but the neighborhood."
"A singer goes through so much; they have such a big job to do. And I respect what they go through. I can't do it. Yet there are things that the pianist does which is equally impressive and important for me."
"Early on we decided we didn't want to be soap-boxy and so we wanted to kind of enter into a space that allowed for allegory and some sense of magic or something that almost like Aesop's fable."