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Have you ever heard of 'Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?' I would like to play Sidney Poitier's role - I love that role.

The biggest compliment that I receive is when other black folks come up to me and say, 'You changed the way that I thought about Chris Darden.'

Nobody told David Clarke what to think, what to feel, what to say, what to believe in, who to marry, what kind of food to eat - you know that thing that the race hustlers like to say defines your blackness? But yet every time I look in the mirror in the morning, I see a black guy looking back at me.

I grew up watching those blaxploitation movies. Ron O'Neal, Richard Roundtree, Jim Brown, Pam Grier. For the first time, I saw 'The Negro' get one over on 'The Man.'

The man who raised me is black. Culturally, he made me who I am. He was a theatre director, so he also guided me artistically.

When I became a director, I wanted to convince a very reluctant Sidney into allowing me to go on the journey of his life. Sidney had gone ahead of every other African American actor.

Sidney Poitier was directing a film called 'Hanky Panky.' And he said, 'Do you want to come with me to New York to see Gilda Radner in 'Lunch Hour' on Broadway? I said, 'I don't need to see her, I love her. I've wanted to write something for her for a long time. So it's OK by me.'

Sidney Poitier became a star in part by helping black and white Americans negotiate their new relationship in the post-Civil Rights era.

I was playing this horrible part. I didn't didn't want to play it because the character was an awful racist. But I'm glad I did it because I met Sidney Poitier.