Sterling K. Brown: It's always the case that the minority has to navig...

People are starting to understand the other side's perspective and that's where empathy can sort of begin - once you quit judging other people but just understand where they're coming from.

Sterling K. Brown

perspective judging people

I try not to get too high off the highs or too low off the lows.

Sterling K. Brown

lows trying

I have . . . a deep concern with the development of a literature worthy of our past, and of our destiny; without which literature certainly, we can never come to much. I have a deep concern with the development of an audience worthy of such a literature.

Sterling K. Brown

destiny development past

My wife [ Ryan Michelle Bathe] is the engine that makes our family drive. In the midst of everything she's able to juggle many more balls at one time and more often than not is able to tell me where I'm supposed to be. Sometimes I forget myself.

Sterling K. Brown

balls able wife

Dialect or the speech of the people is capable of expressing whatever the people are.

Sterling K. Brown

dialect speech people

Just as important I believe, is Black America can look back at the show and say, "Wow, I think I now understand why a lot of white people were appalled at the acquittal of O.J. Simpson."

Sterling K. Brown

white believe thinking

My character [in This Is Us], Randall, was adopted. He'd never met either of his biological parents so he seeks out and finds his biological father after 36 years. So that's where we find my character at the beginning of the show.

Sterling K. Brown

character father years

Unfortunately I feel like a lot of the issues that the show [OJ Simpson ] was dealing with are still very much in the forefront of the American consciousness and the world consciousness today. Police misconduct was at the heart of the defense and Johnny Cochran did a masterful job at putting that defense at the forefront of the jury's conscience as opposed to the double homicide of Ron [Goldman] and Nicole [Brown Simpson].

Sterling K. Brown

issues heart jobs

We've seen many Black men lose their life over the past couple of years. Not only just heard about it.

Sterling K. Brown

couple men past

We've actually seen Black man murders [in] many a major city in the United States - New York City, St. Louis, Missouri, from Cleveland to Baltimore. It was those sorts of incidents that were very much prevalent in the forefront of that jury's conscience that allowed them to believe that this man [O.J. Simpson] could have been set up.

Sterling K. Brown

new-york men believe

We've been married for 10 years. We have a five-year-old boy and an 11-month-old boy and life is good. It's a constant juggle but it is so incredibly fulfilling when you get a chance to look into each other's eyes at the end of the day and say, "We made it through another one."

Sterling K. Brown

life-is-good eye boys

[ This Is Us] is a character-driven dramedy, in which you will laugh. You may have to pull out your tissue box from time-to-time. But it will sort of reaffirm your desire to move forward in life. It's a very hopeful show.

Sterling K. Brown

forward-in-life character moving

Interestingly enough, I feel what the show [OJ Simpson] was able to accomplish in a really masterful way is that White America could look back on the show and the documentary and say, "We understand why Black people were effusive at the acquittal of O.J. Simpson."

Sterling K. Brown

white america people

I'm pleased it turned out the way that it did, because I know lots of other people who did fantastic work and did not see this particular kind of recognition [like Emmy].

Sterling K. Brown

recognition people way

Always have an attitude of gratitude.

Sterling K. Brown

always gratitude attitude

Empathy begins with understanding life from another person's perspective. Nobody has an objective experience of reality. It's all through our own individual prisms.

Sterling K. Brown

empathy perspective experience life

Life has to be everything. It can't be all sad. It can't be all peaches and cream. Because the lows have you appreciate the highs. And the highs give you perspective on the lows. If it's not everything, it becomes flat or mundane.

Sterling K. Brown

you sad perspective life

I'm a little kid from St. Louis, Missouri, on the inside.

Sterling K. Brown

inside little kid missouri

When I finally got the chance to do 'The People v. O.J. Simpson,' my peers embraced me with the same attitude. They didn't make me feel small or insignificant. They treated me as a peer. It was a wonderful experience.

Sterling K. Brown

me experience attitude people

I want to be remembered for a body of work so that when the next guy comes up, he could think of Sterling K. Brown in the same way that I think of Andre Braugher and James Earl Jones.

Sterling K. Brown

think body work way

It's always the case that the minority has to navigate two different worlds. Women have to know how to live in a man's world. Gay people have to know how to live in a straight world. Black people gotta know how to live in a predominantly white world.