74 Quotes by Gugu Mbatha-Raw

Don't worry about society's conditioning and the labels that are put on you by external forces. Hold onto your true self.

But when you become a slave to a public persona and don’t feel comfortable without it, it becomes a shield and it shouldn’t come at the expense of your self-worth.

It is important to be conscious of the message that you're putting out there. It takes a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get a movie to the screen. I do feel a certain element of responsibility to say something worth saying with it, as well as entertainment.

I definitely grew up to Nina Simone and a lot of Ella Fitzgerald. And I loved Amy Winehouse. I loved that sort of soulful singer.

At home I wear my own clothes, no makeup and don't do anything exciting with my hair. I get to borrow pretty dresses for the red carpet and have experts do my hair and makeup.

You've got to find a way to relate to people. I just did an improvised episode for Joe Swanberg's new Netflix show, 'Easy,' and it was a huge learning curve for me and taught me so much about fear and courage. But when you're present in the moment, the audience, it's incomparable.

I am an only child, so I relate to the intensity of that single-parent, mother-daughter relationship.

It's odd doing a movie, and then a year and half later having to go to a premiere and talk about what you did, and get dressed up and have your picture taken.

I was always the one leading the way in terms of wanting to do acting, singing and dancing. I was lucky that my mother had a very well-adjusted perspective of the world and never pressured me to do anything I didn't want to do.