"What can I say about this one? Well, I just love it. Of course that became a mantra for the civil rights movement. ‘Respect’ is just basic to everyone: everybody wants it. Even small children want respect. They don’t know that they want it, but they want respect. They let you know when they need something, and when they do, it’s a little respect. Everybody wants and needs respect. It’s basic to mankind. Perhaps what people could not say, the record said it for them. “I remember recording it with the Memphis Horns down in Muscle Shoals. Great session, great players. I had no idea it would become the hit it became. No idea. My sister Caroline and I got together for the backup vocals. And during that time, in Detroit, there was a cliché called ‘sock it to me,’ and I decided to put that in the background: ‘sock it to me, sock it to me, sock it to me.’ There was nothing sexual about that. It’s like if you gave me a high five. “I don’t think I was a catalyst for the women’s movement. As far as I know, that was Gloria Steinem’s role. But if I were, so much the better. Women did, and still do, need equal rights. We’re doing the same job, we expect the same pay, and the same respect. “I never get tired of singing it. I really love it. And I find new ways to just keep it fresh for me, without changing exactly what it is people heard on the record."

"What can I say about this one? Well, I just love it. Of course that became a mantra for the civil rights movement. ‘Respect’ is just basic to everyone: everybody wants it. Even small children want respect. They don’t know that they want it, but they want respect. They let you know when they need something, and when they do, it’s a little respect. Everybody wants and needs respect. It’s basic to mankind. Perhaps what people could not say, the record said it for them. “I remember recording it with the Memphis Horns down in Muscle Shoals. Great session, great players. I had no idea it would become the hit it became. No idea. My sister Caroline and I got together for the backup vocals. And during that time, in Detroit, there was a cliché called ‘sock it to me,’ and I decided to put that in the background: ‘sock it to me, sock it to me, sock it to me.’ There was nothing sexual about that. It’s like if you gave me a high five. “I don’t think I was a catalyst for the women’s movement. As far as I know, that was Gloria Steinem’s role. But if I were, so much the better. Women did, and still do, need equal rights. We’re doing the same job, we expect the same pay, and the same respect. “I never get tired of singing it. I really love it. And I find new ways to just keep it fresh for me, without changing exactly what it is people heard on the record."

"I remember it was showing in New York City, and I walk over with my friend [to the theater] sort of not knowing what I’m about to see, which is always kind of my favorite thing. I try more and more to not read a review of a movie before I go see it, to not read a review of a play before I go see it, so that I’m not inundated with other people’s opinions about things and I’m able to sort of … It really speaks more to my susceptibility to other people’s opinions than it does about anything that could be playing. I want to have a clean experience that’s just mine. I didn’t know anything about Edith Piaf. I had, of course, recognized many of her songs and had loved many of her songs, but I had no connection to, nor did I know historically, what had happened to her and what her story was. But I was just bowled over by Marion Cotillard’s performance. And of course then I started Googling her and trying to understand where she came from. And she had been in that Russell Crowe movie, and she was so much younger than Piaf, playing that part, and it was just another acting feat! The combination of all the beautiful and tragic things you learn about someone who is so gifted, and then also to see it portrayed by someone equally as gifted and once again be transported into a world you knew nothing about – that’s really the power of the movie."