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When I first came to Hollywood, the blacklist was just starting, and they were having hearings in Washington. What most people don't know is the judge of these hearings himself was later convicted of misappropriation. 'Spartacus' helped break the blacklist, because Spartacus was a real character.

I can't tell you how good it is to go from 'Homeland' to be lucky enough to find 'The Blacklist' at the right time. It literally came at the very end of pilot season when I thought there was nothing left.

I was blacklisted because of this activity, so I'm not a typical anything.

'The Blacklist' was really right place, right time. I read the script and met with Jon Bokenkamp, John Eisendrath, John Fox and John Davis, and we just hit it off. They understood that I was not so much trying to adapt to television, but adapt a cinematic style to the things that we were gonna do.

Not a single person I named hadn't already been named at least a half-dozen times and wasn't already on he blacklist.

I'm on the very blackest part of the black list.

We Negro writers, just by being black, have been on the blacklist all our lives. Censorship for us begins at the color line.