Lucy Liu

I always admired Wonder Woman and the Incredible Hulk – but I don’t know if I’d be a very
convincing hulk.
– Lucy Liu

Being Asian in this business is something you have to consider, because sometimes people
aren’t as open. They’ll say, I can’t see you with a Caucasian person.
– Lucy Liu

I’m so proud of my heritage, but yes, I think there’s always a danger when people put you on
a pedestal. Especially when you’re just trying to live your life and pursue your dreams. The
intention is not to represent Asian Americans, but to be an Asian American who is working as
an actress. People often confuse the two. When you are representing, you have the burden
of some people projecting their hopes onto you. This can eventually lead to a certain amount
of disappointment. I strive to not deny myself experiences that open up to me. I hope to live
without looking back in regret. If people want to join me on the ride, then I’m happy to have
them along.
– Lucy Liu

Nobody really tells me what’s going on, and I find out via the trades myself.
– Lucy Liu

Everything I buy is vintage and smells funny. Maybe that’s why I don’t have a boyfriend.
– Lucy Liu

As your leader, I encourage you from time to time, and always in a respectful manner, to
question my logic. If you’re unconvinced that a particular plan of action I’ve decided is the
wisest, tell me so. But allow me to convince you and I promise you right here and now, no
subject will ever be taboo. Except, of course, the subject that was just under discussion.
The price you pay for bringing up either my Chinese or American heritage as a negative is… I
collect your fucking head. Just like this fucker here! Now, if any of you sons of bitches got
anything else to say, now’s the fucking time! … I didn’t think so!
– Lucy Liu, Kill Bill: Vol. 1

I grew up in Jackson Heights, Queens, with no money. I was taught not to take anything for
granted. If you are too busy being a diva or a freak, then you are not enjoying it.
– Lucy Liu

My freckles are always there. I think the lighting blows it out. If we had to cover up the
freckles, I’d be forever with a thick thing of makeup.
– Lucy Liu

I’m short for my height.
– Lucy Liu, Lucky Number Slevin

A lot of times people are afraid to get older or tell people how old they are. That’s a shame.
In other cultures it’s wonderful because you can actually see the legacy that you’re leaving
for yourself. For me, I’m not leaving a sex video for a legacy. I’ll make many mistakes along
the way but I’ll have to understand that wherever you go is a footprint and that’s a good
thing to learn. When you’re younger, you don’t really think so much about that and you
shouldn’t. You’re living your life and enjoying. That’s great but as you get older you want to
make an impact, be an example to live by.
– Lucy Liu

Silly Caucasian girl likes to play with samurai swords.
– Lucy Liu, Kill Bill: Vol. 1

I did one movie in Mandarin… I also speak a little Spanish, I’m taking Italian, and I took a
little Japanese and a little French… It opens up your world completely.
– Lucy Liu

You have to look out for becoming trapped in a place where people want to see you all the
time doing one thing.
– Lucy Liu

I do art, and a lot of it has to do with found objects. Sometimes I find glass or wood pieces,
and I make them into collages and things like that.
– Lucy Liu

But now it’s time to take the bulletproof vest off. I always thought: “If people think I’m a bitch,
that’s fine for Ally McBeal or for chopping people’s heads off or whatever.” It’s easy to let
people believe you are what you represent. But it’s harder to show people who you really are.
At first I was afraid of allowing people in who are not close friends and family. But then I
realised that people are always making judgements about what I’m wearing or who I’m with, so
why not allow them to see something that’s a real part of me?
– Lucy Liu

I have been known to dumpster-dive; if I see something really fascinating and warped or
distorted, like a piece of metal, I’ll jump over and grab it and create something from it.
– Lucy Liu

I think my parents are happy about my career now, but originally I was like, “Why don’t you
support whatever I want to do? If I wanted to sell beef on the street why wouldn’t you want
to support me?” But it’s not about that. Parents never stop being parents, and yet you want
them to be your friends at a certain age and that’s just not going to happen.
– Lucy Liu

Don’t waste your time doing things you don’t want to be doing. That’s the one thing I’ve
learned is to say: “That’s not something I would like to do so I think I’m going to have to
pass on that.”
– Lucy Liu

We didn’t have many traditions in our family. My parents were immigrants coming from China,
and they spoke English haltingly. They both held down full-time jobs, and we were latchkey
children; you’re given a key and you take yourself to school. There wasn’t time for niceties. It
was about survival. It wasn’t about continuing traditions.
– Lucy Liu

You can’t afford to get on camera and have no energy because there’s an entire crew of
people waiting for you and just because you decided to have a doughnut, you’re not focusing
anymore.
– Lucy Liu

It’s like kill or be killed, that’s my thing basically.
– Lucy Liu

Get a push, support from someone who believes in you. Sometimes you need a little bit of a
push, I certainly do.
– Lucy Liu

It’s a special thing to take time in your life to do something that people wouldn’t think that
you would do. I was very tentative to do that.
– Lucy Liu

People malign the Catholic church for sexual abuse and the discrepancies of wealth, but they
just don’t know. Or there’s the same idea about people being Muslim. If you don’t know enough
about it, if it’s scary and it’s the unknown, it creates that enigmatic quality of distance, of
disconnect, and I think that prevents you seeing someone else. You’ve already seen them
before you’ve actually even met them.
– Lucy Liu

A woman hasn’t got true control of a man until her hand is on the dumb stick.
– Lucy Liu, Ally McBeal

You can’t look back; you have to keep looking forward.
– Lucy Liu

I was just thinking that if you’re still alive when I get back from work tonight… maybe, I don’t
know, we could go out to dinner or something?
– Lucy Liu, Lucky Number Slevin

Martial arts are art forms and require a great deal of discipline and dedication. I so admire
people who focus their lives on it, because it’s not an easy thing to do.
– Lucy Liu

One of my closest friends was playing Frisbee one day, and a car drove by too fast, and my
friend said, “You stupid Chink!” Then she saw me sitting on the stoop and said, “Oh, I’m sorry,
I didn’t really mean that. It’s not about you.” That was incredibly painful for me. I didn’t know
how to talk about it. I couldn’t say that was racist, because people don’t really understand
racism unless it’s clear, like I’m black, you’re white. It’s kind of the same thing as when they
were rounding up the Japanese and putting them in camps. If you were Chinese or Korean,
nobody’s gonna be able to see the difference. Everyone goes down with the ship.
– Lucy Liu

There’s nothing I enjoy more then seeing a happy couple and coming between them.
– Lucy Liu, Ally McBeal

If you see the Sopranos, you’re not going to be speaking in the Shakespearean English.
– Lucy Liu

At the time I went to school, I don’t think religion and culture were as highlighted and
billboarded as they are now. There was no PC. If you’re a Chink, you’re a Chink, you know? Or
you’re black, not African American. Things were not as parenthesized. It was a harder way to
grow up, because there was already a decision made about you on sight. Nowadays, you give
a person some hope and a little more benefit of the doubt.
– Lucy Liu

For some reason, when I’m really, really busy, I become more creatively stimulated.
– Lucy Liu

It’s so much fun playing Ling (Ling Woo, Ally McBeal), but I have this fear that people are
going to run away from me in terror on the streets. They think I’m going to bite their heads
off or something.
– Lucy Liu

You might not be able to fight like a samurai, but you can at least die like a samurai.
– Lucy Liu, Kill Bill: Vol. 1

I also feel that how you feel is also how you’re going to look. I feel really good and I don’t run
around with a mirror hanging around my neck. I feel good about that. I guess people are
surprised sometimes that you can look as young as you feel.
– Lucy Liu

Men, when they fight in movies, it’s a very different style. Harrison Ford was so cool when he
had the whip, and Bruce Lee was such an artist that you couldn’t take your eyes off of him.
– Lucy Liu

Thanks for the sugar, sugar.
– Lucy Liu, Lucky Number Slevin

By the way, I want to preface that I have never Googled myself. I have never Wikipedia’d
myself. I’m not on Facebook. I’m not on Twitter. I don’t read anything about myself. I will not
read this article either, no offense to you. I feel like my experience with you will be what it is,
because things get so misconstrued, and it just ruins the experience.
– Lucy Liu

The neck is kind of what’s sexy in Japan, so you have to have the kimono a little bit back. It
was just a whole different way of appealing to what was sexy.
– Lucy Liu

It’s a problem being beautiful. It’s only the handsome men that ask us out because they’re
the only ones who think they have a chance. And handsome men are dolts. Life is unfair to us.
At some point we have to face the certain reality: Despite all the good the world seems to
offer, true happiness can only be found in one thing – shopping.
– Lucy Liu, Ally McBeal

There’s a feudal system on the street – it’s just a given. If you’re born into that, there’s a serf
and there’s a lord, and you move your way up and down. The culture of the street is its own
entity, and you cannot control that.
– Lucy Liu

I have had many injuries from different stunts over the years, and I realised how trauma that
happens to our bodies stays with us, and it’s emotional. You hold on to these things and grow
through them. And then you go to the doctor and they say, “You’ve been injured ten years,
but your body just worked around it.”
– Lucy Liu

Meditation is such a wonderful way of connecting to a larger part of yourself that you’re not
really aware of. I thought there was a connection between what I believe in Eastern philosophy
and the Kabbalah mentality.
– Lucy Liu

Hi, I’m – Lucy Liu and I’m a native New Yorker and I support marriage equality. I was born in
Jackson Heights, Queens. New York has always been about diversity and acceptance. Please
join me in supporting marriage equality for all New Yorkers.
– Lucy Liu, for hrc.org

There’s always sacrifices. My family don’t generally say that they’re related to me – my sister
doesn’t say she’s my sister – because they don’t want to be judged or lauded based on who I
am.
– Lucy Liu

I had friends that were studying it. It reminds me of Taoism, it’s mind over matter, essentially,
and I’m fascinated by that. But I’m also fascinated by Buddhism – my mother’s a Buddhist.
There are so many different things to study, so many different fragments that come together.
– Lucy Liu, on Kabbalah

I think it’s unfortunate when people are against something that can bring so much guidance
for people. I don’t know much about Scientology – I know a little bit about it – but if it helps
someone become less addicted to something, or not addicted, or if it helps someone recover
from abuse, you can never say it’s bad.
– Lucy Liu

When you work with chains or any kind of weapons, or just when you’re using hand-to-hand
combat, you are going to get hurt.
– Lucy Liu

Rio is sensual, it’s hot, it’s sexy, it’s happiness. It really is! I have pictures here from the
carneval, and you can see the expressions on people’s faces. I mean, they’re in full costume,
everyone lines up, and it’s really spectacular.
– Lucy Liu

Alright, let’s see if I can win the teddy bear!
– Lucy Liu, Charlie’s Angels

I studied kali-eskrima-silat (Filipino sword and stick fighting) when I was young. I thought it
was really beautiful, and I wanted a hobby, so I started doing that. It came in handy for a
couple of projects, but people make it out like I’m some expert, and I’m not. I studied for
some films, but if somebody came up and tried to judo chop me, they could probably get the
best of me.
– Lucy Liu

I think if you go to Paris, you know, going to a fashion show would be one of the top things
on the list. It’s definitely an event. You know, there’s an energy there, even watching the
people who go to the shows is something else.
– Lucy Liu

People use location as a language in films, and Quentin uses action as a language in his films.
There’s really not a lot of violence. It’s more of an emotional beat than it is a physical beat.
– Lucy Liu