Michelle Obama

It was sort of important for us not to deal with a specific policy change, or a specific sort of approach, but to deal with cultural change.

How hard you work matters more than how much you make.

My view is, first you get them to laugh, then you get them to listen. So I’m always game for a good joke, and I’m not so formal in this role. There’s very little that we can’t do that people wouldn’t appreciate.

Success isn’t about how much money you make. It’s about the difference you make in people’s lives.

I could have spent eight years doing anything, and at some level, it would have been fine. I could have focused on flowers. I could have focused on decor. I could have focused on entertainment. Because any First Lady, rightfully, gets to define her role. There’s no legislative authority; you’re not elected. And that’s a wonderful gift of freedom.

When you’re not engaged in the day-to-day struggles that everybody feels, you slowly start losing touch. And I think it’s important for the people in the White House to have a finger on the pulse.

We think – or maybe we’re shown – that the only way to express ourselves is through that very sexy energy. I think there’s more than that which shows our power. For me, I sometimes feel the most sexy when I’m totally covered head to toe.

“From birth to age 18, a girl needs good parents, from 18 to 35 she needs good looks, from 35 to 55 she needs a good personality, and from 55 on she needs cash.

I have tremendous respect for women.

As I grow and I get older I’m realising more and more that there’s such a beautiful, sensual power that we have as women.

There’s a long, long history of women suffering abuse, injustice, and not having the same opportunities as men, and I think that’s been very detrimental to the human race as a whole.

I think the golden rule for men should be: If you’re a man, don’t say anything to a woman on the street that you wouldn’t want a man saying to you in prison.

I’m a liability to them – I’m a woman, I’m empowered, I’m an artist. I’ve had executives who can’t come to my shows they’re so scared of me. I’ve been a thorn in many people’s sides just by existing.

We can never be complacent and think that we’ve arrived now as women. Because I hear this from young women. Some of you young women who aren’t feeling the pains that many of our predecessors have felt – you think, well, there aren’t any problems, women’s rights, we’ve got this all figured out, I’m already equal, I’m good – I’m just like, oh, just you wait, you’ll feel it. So the work continues.

If we are going to see real development in the world then our best investment is women.

I love to challenge the status quo. That’s been my mission from day one as an actress and an early feminist wanting equality and wanting to push the limits of what’s possible.

No woman gets an orgasm from shining the kitchen floor.

Girls should never be afraid to be smart.

I’m attracted to films that have strong female characters because there are strong female characters in my life.

[on her mother] she’s a very smart, independent woman who was kind of coming into her own in the feminist movement of the 70s and 80s

I wouldn’t say I’m a feminist. I think that would be, maybe, going too far.