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Steve Harvey Explains How He Stopped Giving Away His Money in Hollywood · Earn Your Leisure

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  Speaker 1: So let's talk about this. Steve Harvey Global. So all
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: your companies are underneath that, right? So I want to
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: talk about the family feud, Africa. But first, I'll pick
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: up on a conversation that we just had as far
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  Speaker 1: as you realizing that you wanted to change things up
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  Speaker 1: how usually Hollywood is done, where you wanted to eliminate
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  Speaker 1: the traditional agent route, hiring a full-time attorney.
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  Speaker 2: Shout out to Brandon. Uh-huh.
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  Speaker 1: And and actually, you know, doing the deals yourself, negotiating
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  Speaker 1: the deals with yourself, you and your attorney and not
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  Speaker 1: having to pay the percentage and not having to go
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  Speaker 1: through all of the hassle of dealing with the traditional.
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  Speaker 1: So can you talk about that a little bit?
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  Speaker 3: Yes. It took me years to come to this because
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  Speaker 3: Hollywood is a system. They have an ingrained system out there, man.
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  Speaker 3: You come out here, you get an agent. Then a
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  Speaker 3: lot of them got a manager, too. And then when
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  Speaker 3: you sign a contract with a Hollywood attorney, they 5%
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  Speaker 3: of your contract for the duration. So if you sign
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  Speaker 3: a five-year deal, they get 5% of your money for
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  Speaker 3: five years. And everybody falls into that deal, man, because
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  Speaker 3: they lock you in. And then what's crazy, what I
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  Speaker 3: found out was, is not a lot of agents that's
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  Speaker 3: beating the bushes to procure you employment. They simply list
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  Speaker 3: you on their roster, And when somebody wants you, they
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  Speaker 3: go online, and your name is under this agency's roster,
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  Speaker 3: and they call these people. Now because they picked up
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  Speaker 3: the phone, now their ass is in for 10%. Now
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  Speaker 3: when they come in for 10%, then you want to
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  Speaker 3: go do the deal They pick up their phone and
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  Speaker 3: call their favorite lawyer, who is their boy, who they.
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  Speaker 2: Work in conjunction.
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  Speaker 3: Steve, we got the guy that's gonna cut your deal.
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  Speaker 3: You so busy being happy to be on TV, you say, okay, cool,
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  Speaker 3: because you don't have that lawyer normally. And now, right there,
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  Speaker 3: you 15% of your money gone.
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  Speaker 2: Now, if you real stupid, You got a manager. Who
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  Speaker 2: is this dude?
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  Speaker 3: That's some dude that's usually your homie that you started
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  Speaker 3: out with and you make him your manager. Now he
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  Speaker 3: can be anywhere from five to 20%, depending on how
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  Speaker 3: you cut your deal with him.
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  Speaker 2: Now, you're looking up at your money, man, and you could.
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  Speaker 3: Be out of anywhere from 15 to 25 to 30%
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  Speaker 3: of your money off the dribble.
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  Speaker 2: Before taxes, anything. You ain't got nothing.
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  Speaker 3: So if you make $ 1 million, $ 300, 000 of that is gone.
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  Speaker 2: Yo, man. And you're doing it in California.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and then you got to pay taxes.
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  Speaker 3: Bro, and now you got that franchise tax. So now
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  Speaker 3: you're sitting up here going, then the government, they want $ 40, 000.
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  Speaker 3: Now you sitting up here, man, 70% of your money gone.
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  Speaker 3: And that's real, man. That's real talk. That's why, man,
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  Speaker 3: Hollywood is the land of illusion. Most of us, man,
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  Speaker 3: are not making what y'all think we making. We just not, man,
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  Speaker 3: because we in that system. And it's not that's cause
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  Speaker 3: you stupid or nothing. It's just you get caught up
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  Speaker 3: in the system. So as the years went by, And
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  Speaker 3: I'm just not.
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  Speaker 2: Getting free of this. You know what I mean? It
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  Speaker 2: took me a long time to figure it out. So
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  Speaker 2: I said, wait a minute, man.
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  Speaker 3: So I had this lawyer that was doing some deals
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  Speaker 3: for me with a business I had. This guy named
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  Speaker 3: Brandon Williams.
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  Speaker 2: And he was black.
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  Speaker 3: And he was with this huge law firm, acquisition merger firm, right?
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  Speaker 3: And he used to come up to Chicago and do
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  Speaker 3: deals for me. And I just liked him, man. So
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  Speaker 3: one day I was sitting up there and I was
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  Speaker 3: watching Godfather. And I was watching my favorite movie, man.
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  Speaker 3: And Tom is the conciliar or whatever that name is
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  Speaker 3: for the family. Right. But he's not Italian and he's
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  Speaker 3: not he's not a made man or nothing. But he
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  Speaker 3: cut the deals for the Godfather. And I was sitting
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  Speaker 3: up really watching that movie, one of my favorite movies.
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  Speaker 3: I said, man, that's what I need. I need a Tom.
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  Speaker 3: Somebody just cut my deals. So Brandon Williams, some years ago,
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  Speaker 3: we hooked up, and I just approached him one day.
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  Speaker 3: I said, man, you ever thought about doing something else?
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  Speaker 3: And he said, no, I'm really good where I am.
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  Speaker 3: But that's because, you know, you in the system too, bro.
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  Speaker 3: So just let me talk to you for a little bit.
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  Speaker 3: And we talked about it. I said, man, I'm going
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  Speaker 3: to travel. I'm going to travel the world, man. I'm
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  Speaker 3: going to be global. I'm going to take my brand
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  Speaker 3: and spread it across the world. I ain't going to
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  Speaker 3: just sit here. on United States TV. I want to
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  Speaker 3: go be global. I said, man, we can travel, we
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  Speaker 3: can do this. And he said, and then he went
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  Speaker 3: home and talked to his wife. And like, we often
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  Speaker 3: joke about how much smarter our wives are than us.
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  Speaker 3: And y'all don't get to see them in the background,
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  Speaker 3: but them women, man, because they know who they really are.
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  Speaker 3: She said, it's a no brainer. And he had a
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  Speaker 3: conversation with a mom who's a lawyer. And next thing
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  Speaker 3: you know, he came back and we formed a relationship.
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  Speaker 3: And it took me some while to get out of
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  Speaker 3: some of the contracts I was in. But after a while,
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  Speaker 3: as contracts was ending, I got.
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  Speaker 2: Rid of the lawyer.
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  Speaker 3: I said, hey, man, you read that paperwork and tell
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  Speaker 3: me what it said. Because the only section I can
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  Speaker 3: really understand is compensation. Once you type in the word wince,
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  Speaker 3: I get lost because I don't know how to make.
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  Speaker 3: Now I'm reading the Bible.
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  Speaker 2: Wince furthermore.
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  Speaker 3: That's why my Bible is the New Living Translation. Because
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  Speaker 3: I need just regular English words, man. Because once you
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  Speaker 3: say furthermore. Quince, hence after.
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  Speaker 2: I'm out. So I got him and then slowly but
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  Speaker 2: surely over the years.
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  Speaker 3: As contracts would expire, I would take the lawyer out
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  Speaker 3: of this, take the lawyer out of that. And then
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  Speaker 3: I got smarter and I said, I don't really need
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  Speaker 3: an agent.
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  Speaker 2: You know, I got some agents that do.
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  Speaker 3: IMG does some stuff like we're in partnership with Miss
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  Speaker 3: Universe and stuff. And that's a whole nother story. But
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  Speaker 3: we in business with some stuff and I'll allow you
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  Speaker 3: to package the deal for me. But that's between you
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  Speaker 3: and the network. But as far as now, in my
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  Speaker 3: life now, nobody. Ain't nobody getting 10. Ain't nobody getting five.
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  Speaker 3: I found a way to just keep them out.
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  Speaker 2: And that ain't bad business, man. I'm just, why would I?
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  Speaker 2: You're not doing nothing.
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  Speaker 3: I'm the one that got to put these suits on
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  Speaker 3: and turn these corners and create these jokes and solve
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  Speaker 3: these problems and be entertained.
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  Speaker 2: And not you, man.
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  Speaker 3: So, It was a really blessing from God, man, that
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  Speaker 3: taught me that side of the business. And it's brought
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  Speaker 3: a lot more of the money to my side of
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  Speaker 3: the table.
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  Speaker 4: And so when you do things like that, it obviously
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  Speaker 4: allows you to pay more to the people that you have.
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  Speaker 4: Why do you think that more people in Hollywood, the
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  Speaker 4: beast of Hollywood, are not taking that approach?
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  Speaker 3: Well, I just think, man, you get caught up in
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  Speaker 3: the system and it's comfortable and it's easy. And, you know, look, man,
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  Speaker 3: you got to look at some of these big boys
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  Speaker 3: out here. They're making so much money. You know, you
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  Speaker 3: look at Tyler and Denzel and Samuel and these boys
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  Speaker 3: and Will, Will Smith, these dudes is really making money, man.
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  Speaker 2: You know, I mean, they, listen to me. They making,
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  Speaker 2: they scraping it.
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  Speaker 3: So, and I don't really know their particular business, but
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  Speaker 3: you know, if you make an X amount of dollars
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  Speaker 3: and you know off the dribble and you comfortable and
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  Speaker 3: you got a team, sometimes comfort, because you don't want
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  Speaker 3: to have, you got to get a lawyer. You do
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  Speaker 3: have to get a lawyer. I'm just not finna pay
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  Speaker 3: you 5%. You know, why don't you tell me what
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  Speaker 3: your hourly rate is, how many hours it take you
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  Speaker 3: to cut this contract, and then let that be your money.
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  Speaker 2: But you get in the TV business, it's like that. Now,
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  Speaker 2: I would think of.
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  Speaker 3: Denzel, because he's such a brilliant dude, man. And his wife, Pauletta,
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  Speaker 3: I'm pretty sure she done sat down and figured this out.
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  Speaker 2: So, and Tyler, Tyler's a gangster too.
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  Speaker 3: Because Tyler, I think, has done more In our lifetime, man,
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  Speaker 3: in this generation, I don't think there's been anybody black
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  Speaker 3: that's been more successful than this dude in terms of ownership. Now,
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  Speaker 3: the queen was Oprah for a long time. Oprah ain't
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  Speaker 3: no joke. But she teaches it to us. She done
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  Speaker 3: told me, Steve, got to get ownership. That's Tyler's whole mantra.
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  Speaker 3: But I think what Tyler fitting to do of late
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  Speaker 3: going to change the game. He's fitting to go past everybody.
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  Speaker 2: So just really quick. So even like the shows that.
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  Speaker 4: had your name as a title, so we had the
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  Speaker 4: Steve Harvey Show, which was on WB, and obviously you
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  Speaker 4: had the Steve Harvey Show on NBC, talk show. Did
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  Speaker 4: licensing the name, or how does that work? There was
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  Speaker 4: no ownership of those?
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  Speaker 3: See, I didn't get, I wasn't a businessman when the
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  Speaker 3: Steve Harvey Show was out. I was just happy to
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  Speaker 3: be on TV. I just took my check and went
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  Speaker 3: out and said, I own 12% of the show back end.
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  Speaker 3: But I learned real quick in Hollywood, you never see
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  Speaker 3: back end. They got a different type of arithmetic. It's
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  Speaker 3: like the music industry. The only people that you make
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  Speaker 3: true back end with is book people. Book people are
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  Speaker 3: the most honest people I've ever done business with. Books,
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  Speaker 3: they're honest. Music and TV.
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  Speaker 2: You're not going to get no back end partner.
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  Speaker 3: How? Man, by the time they get through doing their arithmetic,
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  Speaker 3: I ain't made back end on none of my shows ever.
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  Speaker 1: Because they're saying they didn't hit the numbers that it
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  Speaker 1: was supposed to hit.
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  Speaker 2: Even in syndication.
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  Speaker 3: Bro, Steve Harvey's show. Never saw back in, never. It's
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  Speaker 3: just crazy, man. So I started figuring that out and
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  Speaker 3: I went, okay.
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  Speaker 2: You know, my business with Fremantle, which.
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  Speaker 3: Is one of the best companies I've ever dealt with,
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  Speaker 3: they're very honest and forthright. But when I signed a
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  Speaker 3: deal to do Family Feud, you know, look man, Family
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  Speaker 3: Feud was a 20 year franchise and they had ownership
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  Speaker 3: and they couldn't get, you know, I was going.
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  Speaker 2: Through tax problems back then.
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  Speaker 3: I just wanted a check. So I took the check.
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  Speaker 3: Over the years, I still couldn't get ownership. But since
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  Speaker 3: I can't get ownership, I'll tell you what, though. I
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  Speaker 3: tell you what, I might not have ownership, but you're
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  Speaker 3: going to feel like I'm one. And so we've negotiated
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  Speaker 3: really nicely with them.
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  Speaker 4: I mean, you're the longest running host in the history
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  Speaker 4: of the show.
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  Speaker 2: And it's the number one syndicated show on earth.