Latest / The Breakfast Club / INTERVIEW: Chris Rock Talks 'Misty Green,' Acting & Comedy Career, Media Backlash; 'Ghetto Famous,' Family, Friendships & Industry Relationships + More

Transcript

INTERVIEW: Chris Rock Talks 'Misty Green,' Acting & Comedy Career, Media Backlash; 'Ghetto Famous,' Family, Friendships & Industry Relationships + More · The Breakfast Club

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hold up. Every day I wake up.
• 0:03
  Speaker 2: Wake your ass up. The Breakfast Club. Y'all finished or
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: y'all done?
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Morning, everybody.
• 0:08
  Speaker 3: It's DJ Envy, Just Hilarious, Charlamagne Tha God. We are
• 0:11
  Speaker 3: The Breakfast Club. Lawn LaRose is here as well. We
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: got a special guest in the building.
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: Yes, indeed.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, Chris Rock. I'm here. The legend. The icon.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: Welcome to The Breakfast Club. Yes.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: It's hot.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: All y'all got these big ass deals I read about.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: All of you. This guy, he's getting Frankie Crocker's money.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Overcharging him for what they did to Frankie Crocker. Overcharging him.
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: What they did to Frankie Crane.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: Tom Joyner got a tear in his eye. Yo! All
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: the great black broadcasters. Charlamagne Tha God. Come from the
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: windy school. Took the windy formula but put some cut
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: on it. Put some cut on it and now you
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: can sell this This windy coke all over the place.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: That windy shit is strong.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: It's too strong for the bathroom.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: It's killing motherfuckers.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: How you feeling?
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: How are you, man? I'm all right, man. How are y'all? Good, good.
• 1:21
  Speaker 4: How are y'all?
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Happy to see you.
• 1:23
  Speaker 5: I saw something recently where you said you've been doing
• 1:25
  Speaker 5: a lot of therapy since COVID. And the work was
• 1:28
  Speaker 5: around convincing yourself that you're enough.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: That's what therapy, a lot of it is. A lot
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: of it, you know, all of us in the entertainment business,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: a lot of us are, I always say, egomaniacs. with
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: inferiority complexes. You know what I mean? You know what
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: I mean? I mean, you see it, especially in rappers
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: and whatever, and comedians, it's like, your ego's like, I'm
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: the best, I'm the best, I'm the best.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: What they saying?
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? It's like, if you're so confident,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: why do you care what everybody thinks? So sometimes you gotta...
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: Did you feel that way, though?
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: As much as you've done?
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you've reached the mountain. There's not much higher that
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: you can go.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: Oh, there's always higher... And a lot of it is
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: an overreaction to maybe being ignored or overlooked in other
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: parts of your life. You know what I mean? A
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: lot of it is, a lot of being an artist
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: is escaping the physical world. So a lot of artists,
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: they're almost always shorter than... You know what I mean?
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: They're always shorter. They're always smaller. You know what I mean?
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: I had a conversation with Teddy Riley about that one time.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you go to like Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: everybody's like five foot six.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Teddy had a whole theory that you could not be
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: a tall superstar. And I was like, well, what about Jay-Z?
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: What about Snoop?
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Those are exceptions. Those are totally exceptions. Most superstars or
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: short guys that want to be, are so successful, you
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: forgot a motherfucking short. That is what it is, okay?
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: Because I'm not like a manosphere guy, but women, you motherfuckers,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: you got two real rules. You don't like short, and
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: you don't like cheap. Damn! Cheap is not broke. You
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: can be broke, you just got to be generous with
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: your broke ass. Yeah. Generous with your Burger King check. Yeah, yeah. Right?
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: He's not lying. You better be considerate. Yeah. Cash out, considerate.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: Where's my card?
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Where's my card? Hey, your broke ass can afford a card.
• 3:52
  Speaker 5: So when therapy started peeling all that back, what did
• 3:54
  Speaker 5: you discover about yourself that you didn't like?
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: I mean, well, with me... Okay, A, I had to,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: I swear, I got diagnosed with this kind of a
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: learning disorder, kind of like, not quite Asperger's, this thing, NVLD.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: And so I have a hard time picking up on, yeah,
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: NVLD is nonverbal learning disorder. So I have a hard
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: time picking up on nonverbal cues. So, like, I am not...
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: the brother to give a hint to. Like you need
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: to tell me explicitly what the fuck you want.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: So if you meet a chick and she's like this, you.
• 4:40
  Speaker 6: Doing that back?
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: Many a times it'd be like three weeks later, I
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: could have felt better.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: It'd be like three weeks later.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: I think Sade liked me. It wasn't Sade. But you
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? So I need things spelled out
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: for me. You know what I mean? I suffer. I
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: do black and white thinking. I have a hard time
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: with nuance. Really?
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: I think you're one of the most nuanced people when
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: I hear you.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I work really hard. I work hard to
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: overcompensate my disadvantage. I catastrophize things. I immediately go to
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: the worst possible scenario on everything. And by the way,
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: all of those traits or that handicap works perfect for
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: being a stand-up comedian. You know what I mean? You
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? Like black and white thinking.
• 5:39
  Speaker 4: Catastrophizing.
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: That's all a joke is. You take something and take
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: it to the worst or the best possible space. But
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: it's horrible in your relationships with family and love relationships
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: and stuff like that. When people got to deal with
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: you all the time. Especially when your relationships with people,
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: a lot of it is just shorthand anyway. You know
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: what I mean? So I had to learn... I had
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: to humble myself because... When you mix celebrity in with
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: this stuff, you just blame everything on being famous. Because
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: in most situations, I'm just like the famous person in
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: the room. So when there was a misunderstanding, it was
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: so easy for me to blame and to go, oh,
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: they're jealous or whatever the hell. Or they just can't
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: adjust to my fame. It's like, no, no, no, no.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: So I've had to learn that, hey, it might be me.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: It probably is me. Let's slow down. What is this
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: person trying to say? Listen again. You know what I mean?
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: Like I just had to learn to slow down and
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: life isn't a standup set. You know what I mean?
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: That's the other thing too, with all of us, especially
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: in this business or I consider us, we're all in
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: the same business, especially with dudes. It's like, I'm going
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: to take the things that have worked for me so
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: well in show business and and try to use that
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: model in my personal life. And the credits don't transfer.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? That's what you have to learn.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: You're like, it works here. It does not work over here.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: It does not work with your children. It doesn't work
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: with your woman. It doesn't work with your family. You
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: know what I mean?
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: What was the hardest lesson?
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: You know, the hardest lesson is just like, dude, just listen.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: Just like slow down and listen. Also, you... you get
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: over this fear of losing it. You know what I mean?
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: Because we always have, like, all of us have this
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: scenario where we're back where we started. You know what
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: I mean? Like, every day, every day we think about it. Like,
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: this scenario where I'm at Red Lobster, you know what
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: I mean? Like, bussing tables, you know what I mean?
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: Or driving, you know, riding, emptying furniture trucks and shit.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? So, I also had to, like,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: get over it. It's like, dude, you're a comedian. You've
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: been a comedian longer than anything. You know what I mean?
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: You're not a rapper, in a sense. A guy like
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: Jay-Z still... It's like, dude, how long did you sell crack?
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: It's like a short period. It's like, no, you are
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: a comedian. Longer than everything. You're okay. They're not kicking
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: you out of the club. You'll be invited to All-Star Weekend.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: Do you feel like you're enough now?
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: I feel like I'm trying to be enough. Yeah, I
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: guess I'm enough. Well, I'm not basing my life on
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: accomplishments now. I don't think my accomplishments have anything to
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: do with my quality of relationships. So I'm enough for
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: this room. I'm enough for... You know, just the people
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: I love and the people that love me.
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: You know, we spoke about something this morning. You went
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: viral this week, and I'm sure you know.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: I did?
• 9:07
  Speaker 4: When you talked about.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: I really don't pay attention like I used to. Like,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: I don't. Yeah.
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: Well, you went viral this week because you talked about
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: that you had some regrets that your best friend's brother,
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: you had regretted that you didn't help him.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, it would have been an appeal also.
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: An appeal, correct.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? So people are like, hey,
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: how come you didn't help him? I was like, dude,
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: he was already locked up. Mm-hmm. And someone had testified
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: against him. And I answered the question because the journalist
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: asked me about accusations. And I'm like, dude, I'm black.
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: Not that black people can't suffer trauma and any black
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: woman or man that accuses somebody of it. These accusations
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: need to be taken seriously. But at the same time,
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: as a black man, Every day I watch, every day
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: I can pick up the new york times or daily
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: and watch a black man get out of jail after
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: 20 years you know what i mean like so what
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: what happened what so that accusation was fine that accusation
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: it's like believe all accusations except that one So, yeah,
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: I had a friend. My friend, he's dead now. Dirt
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: bike Mike. God bless the dead. And his brother was
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: in jail for a murder. And he asked me to
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: help him with an appeal. And I didn't help him.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: And it wasn't even like, fuck him or anything like that.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: I just... You know, lawyers are an open-ended... It never stops.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Like, hey, your car... Hey,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: my family, everybody in my family has my number. Hey,
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: your car doesn't start, here's some money. You got a
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: hole in your roof, here's some money. You know what
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: I mean? Like, kids want to go to school, here's
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: some money. Camp, here's some money. Lawyers, especially when you're,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: you know, when they already said you're guilty, it's like,
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: That could be $ 10, 000. That could end up being $ 400, 000.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: I just didn't, you know, have it. I had it,
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: but I didn't, you know what I mean? You didn't
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: know where it was going to end. I didn't know
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: where it was going to end. But it was really about,
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: in my life, I've seen accusations not pan out. And
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: that doesn't mean ignore anybody. Hear everything, but let the
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: system play out. And even when it plays out, it
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: still might be wrong. You know, when I was... 100
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: years ago, when I was on SNL, Sinead O'Connor rips
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: up a picture of the Pope. I'm like right there.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: I'm like literally right there, right? And the whole backstage
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: 8-H went crazy. And all the teams, everybody's mad at
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: Sinead O'Connor, right? And I remember that night, because we
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: had to do good nights. And one of the most
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: angry people was this guy, Phil Hartman.
• 11:59
  Speaker 4: He used to be on the show.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember him. And he didn't
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: want to even go on the stage. Okay, cut two
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: years later. Okay, Phil Hartman's wife shoots him in the head.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: And the Catholic Church, we all see what happened to
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: the Catholic Church. What I'm trying to say is the
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: whole world thought Sinead O'Connor was wrong. The whole world
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: destroyed this woman's career, destroyed, you know, contributed to her
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: mental decline, and the whole world was wrong.
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: She had valid reasons.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? So let's be careful with,
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: you know, let's hear all allegations, but let's be calm, man. And,
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: you know, one of the Ten Commandments is thou shall not,
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: spread false witness. So can we stop giving opinions on
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: shit we don't know about?
• 12:54
  Speaker 5: Listen, I think you're complicating this a little bit because
• 12:56
  Speaker 5: I said this this morning.
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: Sometimes you'd be like, I don't know if you did
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: it or not.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: We always don't know if it's new or not.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? And I'm not saying it's
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: not news. But thou shall not spread false witness is real, man.
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: And we all kind of like... It's like a commandment.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: We go, I don't know about that one.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: You said the Roger Logan thing still messes with you, though.
• 13:24
  Speaker 5: Is it because today you realize that sometimes having the
• 13:26
  Speaker 5: means means to help somebody?
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: It's because maybe I could have helped. Hey, by the way,
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: I could have spent a bunch of money and it
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: still wouldn't have worked. Maybe he needed the white man
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: to free him. Maybe my black ass wasn't going to
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: be able to do anything. I just had to put this...
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: I'm not that I'm the person to put somebody in
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: their place, but don't come to a black person talking
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: about allegations. You know what I mean? Check yourself.
• 13:59
  Speaker 7: Since he's been home, have you spoken to him?
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: I've seen him a couple of times. When I go
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: through the neighborhood. Who knows? Who knows? I'm glad he's out.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: I'm glad he got paid. It's still nothing. No amount
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: of money is worth You know, during that kind of time.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: 19 years, yeah.
• 14:16
  Speaker 6: You know what's crazy? When I watched the interview and
• 14:18
  Speaker 6: he asked you about the whole accusations thing and, like,
• 14:21
  Speaker 6: forgiveness when it comes to people, I didn't even catch
• 14:23
  Speaker 6: your responses. Like, you telling him, like, I'm a black man.
• 14:25
  Speaker 6: Don't ask me that.
• 14:26
  Speaker 4: They edit that part out.
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: Oh, okay.
• 14:28
  Speaker 6: Because I'm like, I was sitting there like, I'm like, yo,
• 14:31
  Speaker 6: I get what you was saying, but I'm like, he
• 14:33
  Speaker 6: handled it. I kept saying, he had so much empathy.
• 14:35
  Speaker 6: He handled things so well. Because it was like a,
• 14:37
  Speaker 6: there was a disconnect. You were trying to get him
• 14:39
  Speaker 6: to understand that. black men walking down the street every
• 14:42
  Speaker 6: single day regardless of who you are you're still a
• 14:44
  Speaker 6: black man and I don't know if even the world
• 14:46
  Speaker 6: took those clips and understood that I watched it and
• 14:49
  Speaker 6: was like for Chris Rock to be Chris Rock he
• 14:51
  Speaker 6: still understands like I'm still here as a black man
• 14:54
  Speaker 6: a lot of people don't keep that but the way
• 14:56
  Speaker 6: they clipped it up made him look but I watched
• 14:58
  Speaker 6: the full interview and I was still surprised to know
• 15:01
  Speaker 6: that I came in and asked I'm like has he
• 15:02
  Speaker 6: always been like that and I was just too young
• 15:04
  Speaker 6: to understand that or and he said you were always
• 15:06
  Speaker 6: empathetic like that I mean.
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: I walk like you know I got couple of people,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: but I don't walk around with an entourage. I don't
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: really have security unless I'm on tour. You can ring
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: my bell. I live in the city. It doesn't say
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Chris Rock on the door, but you know what I mean?
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: I try to.
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: Chris Rock was doing his basketball games every game.
• 15:27
  Speaker 7: There's videos of you walking around New York City.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: And I don't deserve credit for that. I'm just saying,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: it's just how I like to live.
• 15:34
  Speaker 6: I mean more like, you know the Jay-Z line, like,
• 15:36
  Speaker 6: I'm not black, I'm O.J.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay.
• 15:38
  Speaker 6: Like, I think To me, certain people get very, very big, very,
• 15:42
  Speaker 6: very famous, and you surround yourself with these people where
• 15:47
  Speaker 6: a lot of the certain things that will happen to
• 15:49
  Speaker 6: everyday black men in America might not hit you as hard.
• 15:51
  Speaker 6: And it feels like it's still hitting you as hard,
• 15:54
  Speaker 6: or there's an empathy there for it.
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: Oh, it hits me every day as hard. And, you know, hey, man,
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: we're in midtown Manhattan. And right now, if we go
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: outside and stand on, you know, if we go to
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: Madison Avenue, three blocks from here, you're going to see
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: a bunch of people shopping and a bunch of people
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: eating at outdoor cafes. But you're not going to see
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: a lot of black people doing that. You're going to
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: see the black people are going to have on blue.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: They work for Amazon. They're serving, you know. And that's,
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: you know, I can't. I can't just live a life where, oh,
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: I'm balling. Fuck all y'all. It affects me. You know
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: what I mean? I'm working on a book. I'm working
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: on a book, an essay, so hopefully I finish it.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: And right now the name of it is When the
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: Homeless Know Your Name. You know what I mean? Because
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: when the homeless know your name, it hits harder. You
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? And I'm not like, you know, whatever,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: people think I'm over, I dropped out of high school,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: I don't have, you know what I mean? So without
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: the breaks I had in show business early on, who
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: knows what I'd be doing. I don't think I'd be
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: in jail or anything like that, but I would probably
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: be serving white people.
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: Do you ignore the shit out of people on purpose?
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: Like when you walk in? We've seen a lot of
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: videos of you just like ignoring people when.
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: They try to take a picture. I mean, I try
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: to nod or whatever, but if I stopped at every picture,
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't have got here.
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: Like, where's Chris? He never makes the interview.
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: I was watching your interview on Hollywood Reporter, right? And
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: she asked your first job. And you said, my first
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: job was Crush Groove, right? You said you were extra,
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: they paid.
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: You $ 30.
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: Did you always know you wanted to be a comedian
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: or did you want to be a rapper back then?
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: Because Crush Groove was such a... Okay, I actually wanted
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: to be a rapper.
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: Here's the thing.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: I figured that because you were in cross-group.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: I DJed. I DJed with these guys called the Rock
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Freak Crew in Brooklyn and, you know, playing block parties
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: and there's pictures online of me, like, actually spinning records.
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: So I DJed. I was a rapper for a minute.
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: I even had a deal.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Like, A record deal? I even had a deal for
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: a single, for like a 12-inch. I had like a
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: 12-inch deal.
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: Did you do it?
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: Somewhere. I've been trying to find it forever.
• 18:22
  Speaker 4: That's crazy.
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: What was your rapper name?
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Just Chris Rock. For real? Yeah, yeah. And then I
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: got into comedy.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: How did you end up in comedy?
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: How did you go from rapper to... There was a guy...
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: Here's a funny thing. There was a guy that lived on...
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: A guy named Kevin.
• 18:41
  Speaker 4: Harwood.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: That used to work for Hush Productions remember Hush Productions
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: that had Freddie Melba Moore and Freddie Freddie Jackson he
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: used to rent I don't know he was like an
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: A & R guy or something and he used to
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: rent on my old block on Decatur Street and so
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: he was like he works with Freddie Jackson he's in
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: show business you know what I mean like when you're
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: young like anybody that works with anybody's in show business
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: And I used to be like, give me a job,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: give me a job. I just want to be in
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: show business. And he told me, you need to go
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: to the comic strip and audition. He just saw me
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: as a funny guy. And I guess I was one
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: of the funny guys on the block. And I ended
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: up going to audition night. You liked it from there.
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: And I didn't know it was audition night. And the
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: owner of the club, this guy Mike Egan, said, you
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: have passed audition. You should come back. You can work
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: here anytime you want. And I was doing it ever since. Wow.
• 19:39
  Speaker 5: I want to go back to the Roger Logan thing
• 19:41
  Speaker 5: because it kind of connects with Misty Green. Because with
• 19:43
  Speaker 5: Misty Green, you've been talking about love and friendship and forgiveness.
• 19:45
  Speaker 5: And I've heard you talk about forgiveness a lot lately, right?
• 19:48
  Speaker 5: Do you have to forgive yourself for that? times you
• 19:50
  Speaker 5: feel like you failed somebody?
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you do have to say to yourself, I did
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: the most with what I knew at the time. You
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? You can't punish yourself later because
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: you're a smarter guy later. You know what I mean? Like, okay,
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: who was I when I made that decision? You know?
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: That's what I would say. A lot of times we're like,
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: I should have known better. You didn't know better. You
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: should have known what you knew at that time. That's
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: all you got. That's all any of us have.
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: So do you feel like you failed your brother, Tony?
• 20:27
  Speaker 5: When you hear Tony.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God, Tony.
• 20:28
  Speaker 5: When you hear Tony, you know, say the things that
• 20:30
  Speaker 5: he says, he loves you, he supports you, he's not
• 20:32
  Speaker 5: jealous of you, but he wishes that you and him
• 20:34
  Speaker 5: could do things together.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, maybe we'll do something together. I mean... Tony's
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: been on Everybody Hates Chris. Tony's been in the Everybody
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: Hates Chris animated show. So he's been in stuff.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: And he says he wants to go on tour.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: We just haven't done a movie or a tour, but,
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: you know.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: You know, some of that's just being around. You know,
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Tony lives in L.A. I live in New York. Tony
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: lives great, man. Tony makes hundreds of thousands of dollars
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: a year. Tony's on tour. And Tony's got... And he's
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: on tour all the time. Yes, hilarious. And he tours
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: and he's got... properties, and Tony lives better than I
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: did on Saturday Night Live. So it's not like, I mean,
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not, dude, you ain't never gonna get me to
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: say anything disparaging about my brother.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: No, you shouldn't.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: But he's doing fine. It's not like a situation where
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: I'm like, well, I got this guy. No, he's doing great.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: And everybody, you know, Damon's not in scary movies.
• 21:34
  Speaker 8: It's not an issue.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's an issue. Tom Hanks has a...
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: kids that are actors.
• 21:48
  Speaker 6: And Denzel, too. And from the outside looking into it.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: And everybody does it like... Damn it ain't into it. Yeah,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: it's not like a thing. I don't think it's a.
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: It's not like Tony doing bad.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Tony's doing.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: But he said it from a place of admiration, not resentment.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tony's doing great. I'm proud of him.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: Tony's a killer comedian. He's like literally one of the
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: best out there. And you got another brother. I got Jordan.
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: And I got a daughter in the movie. You know
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: what I mean?
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: Like, I got.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: Now she has to be in the movie.
• 22:20
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Like, I got, you know,
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: we got family.
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: What's your first reaction when you hear those comments, though?
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: You call Tony? Tony, just call me.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: I mean, sometimes. I mean, we've talked occasionally. I don't,
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: you know, because I'm not tripping on any of it.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: I'm not tripping on it. But he's doing great. If
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: he wasn't, then I might be like, oh, my God.
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: But he's doing great. And, you know, you just got
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: to be around, you know? When I'm in Beverly Hills Cop, whatever,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: you think Eddie Murphy's sitting around going, how could I
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: help Chris Rock? No, he's just like, Chris Rock happens
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: to be right there. I'm like, I'm around the whale
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: and seeing what falls off. You know what I mean? Like,
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: that's what it is. You got to be, a lot
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: of this stuff, it's no different than rappers. It's like,
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: who was in the studio that night? Mm-hmm.
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: Because that's a lot of how things happen.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: That's a lot of features of just like, yo, my
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: man was downstairs and we told him to come upstairs.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: And a lot of the.
• 23:21
  Speaker 4: Movies are that way.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Where it's just like, who's around?
• 23:24
  Speaker 6: That's why you talk about being a good friend has
• 23:26
  Speaker 6: helped you too.
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: Being a good friend is, dude, I mean, everybody in
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: this room, at least 25% of your work is from friendships.
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: At least. At least 20... Probably more than that, yeah.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: It's probably 40, 50% of what you've accomplished in your
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: career is people going, hey, hey, Envy, yeah, Charlamagne. You
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? Like, people just thinking... that you're
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: cool to hang out with, that you're reliable. Being a
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: reliable black person goes a long way. Shit.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: He's on time.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: The amount of jobs I've gotten because another.
• 24:11
  Speaker 8: Black man wasn't on time.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: Especially, you know what I mean? And it's like we
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: all have like this rap mentality and rap. Yeah. The
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: studios book from eight to eight and the rappers show up.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? And they show up at
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: the last minute and they got to pay for all
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: this time. Movies are not made like that, man. Movies
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: and TV is like is a nerd's business. Like you
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: got to be there in the morning. OK, you got
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: to be reliable. I got to be able to count
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: on you. constantly and people have so yes I'm a
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: good friend but I'm also a very reliable person.
• 24:54
  Speaker 7: Speaking of friendships I love you and Adam Sandler's relationship
• 24:57
  Speaker 7: how did that come about.
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: I've known Adam I hate to say it makes me
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: seem old like 35 almost 40 years we started at
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: the comic strip and on 82nd and 2nd it's.
• 25:12
  Speaker 4: Still there that's where.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Eddie Murphy recorded his first album The funny thing was
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: when I met Adam, like when you get in one
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: of these clubs, they don't let you do the weekends
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: for a long time. It takes you years.
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: You're a pro.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: Yes, sir. It takes you forever to get the weekends, right?
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: So I'm gone doing a gig one week. I come back.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: Adam Sandler, who I'd never met before, is on stage
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: at the comic strip on Saturday night. And I'm like,
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: who's this white boy that has jumped the line? It
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: is like on Saturday night. So it's weird because I
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: was set up to hate him. You know what I mean?
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: Like this guy, like he obviously has gotten an easier
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: path at that moment than me. But I calmed down
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: and I watched his act and he was so funny.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: He was so funny. And so I just kind of
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: fell in love with the guy. We just hung out
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: that night and we've been rolling ever since. And he's
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: always looked out. We've done five, six movies together and
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: we eat. But again, not to talk about my brother
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: or anybody, just the business because a lot of this...
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: You guys are like the black Hollywood reporter in some ways.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: It's like, all of this stuff comes organically from hanging
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: around people and developing friendships. You know what I mean?
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: It doesn't, people are not sitting there like, how could
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: I help this person? We're artists. We're not, this is
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: not a factory. I don't look at it, this is
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: a factory. It's like, you put in time and, nah,
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: we just making art and we're just making stuff and like,
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: where can it fit in? And also, you know, what's
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: your contribution going to be? Because everybody ain't supposed to
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: be in front of the camera.
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: Some people do other things. This is my man, Sean
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: Wayans is.
• 27:18
  Speaker 4: A good example.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: Great in front of the camera, but the guy is
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: like a fucking genius writer. You know what I mean? Like,
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: he's the architect of the scary movie franchise. You know
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: what I mean? Like, So like, where do you fit in?
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: You know, it's like a baseball team. Just contribute, or
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: a basketball team. Some people get to shoot whenever they want,
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: and some guys gotta just set picks. You know what
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: I mean? But there's nothing wrong with it. Josh Hart
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: makes a lot of money. You know what I mean?
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: Josh Hart.
• 27:49
  Speaker 5: Rob Markman You do have to handpick some of these
• 27:50
  Speaker 5: people though, right? Because I mean, with you, Chris Rockshaw,
• 27:53
  Speaker 5: Wanda Sykes, Louis C.K., Pootie Tang. I mean, Eddie grabbed
• 27:57
  Speaker 5: you for Beverly Hills Cop.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: Rob Markman Yeah, but I was just around. You know
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: what I mean? I was at the comic strip the
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: night Eddie Murphy was at the comic strip. Wanda Sykes,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: I met, she was at Caroline's, and opened for me
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: at Caroline's. Like one night. Went on before me, not
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: even opening for me. And I was like, wow, she's incredible.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? And sometimes you write it
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: down and you're, you know, now I do it like that.
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: But back then you'd write it down. Like if I
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: ever get a show, I got to remember to call
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: this person.
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: First time I saw Wanda Sykes, I was like, oh,
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: you know, I like the joke.
• 28:31
  Speaker 4: She's like a.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: She's like a Birkin bag at a flea market. Like,
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: do they see this shit? Do they even know that
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: a genius is here? You know what I mean? So,
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: but again, it's all about who are you around? Who
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: are you around? And by the way, sometimes you gotta like,
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: you know, my mother always says association brings assimilation. And
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: it's like, yo, you gotta hang around people that are
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: doing shit. You know what I mean?
• 29:04
  Speaker 4: Just doing shit.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: That have ambition. It's weird, there's a lot of comedy podcasts,
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: and some of them are good, some of them, it's like,
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: I'm just outside looking in, I wish they would just
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: try to be funny. It takes nothing to do a
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: funny commercial. or a funny bumper. I love what Drewski's doing.
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: Drewski is like, Drewski is like, this is how I
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: would be in a sketch show, this is how I
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: would be in a movie. That guy, he's literally, he's
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: not wasting any of his time on air dealing with anybody,
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: caring about what anybody says or what anybody's doing. Every
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: time you see Drewski, that motherfucker's being funny. You know
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: what I mean? Every time. And they're tempting it. And
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: if you like it, great. If you don't like it, great.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: Next time you see me, I'm still going to be funny. Because,
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: you know, that's what people want.
• 30:07
  Speaker 6: I was told that the BET Awards commercial you did
• 30:09
  Speaker 6: for Drewski, he put in that personal call, but you
• 30:11
  Speaker 6: were down to do it because you support him so much.
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: I do. I do support him. Dude, any time you
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: get to a certain age, you're like, are they younger? Sure.
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: I do love his work.
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: I do love his work.
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: But you're like, you know, you want to.
• 30:28
  Speaker 7: Be, you want to be, you know, it's fun.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: It's fun. And it keeps you alive. It keeps you going. Right.
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: You know, I used to be Drewski.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? I used to have a
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: sketch show and I used to do all of that stuff. And,
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: you know.
• 30:52
  Speaker 6: So your sitcom, right? Everybody Hates Chris.
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: Why did you... How you doing?
• 30:56
  Speaker 4: Yes, right. How did you.
• 30:59
  Speaker 7: Why did you not decide to be in it, like
• 31:02
  Speaker 7: live action?
• 31:03
  Speaker 6: I know you did narration, but like, you're the first.
• 31:06
  Speaker 7: I feel like you're the first comedian that had a
• 31:08
  Speaker 7: sitcom that you did not star in.
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, I was doing movies.
• 31:13
  Speaker 4: I was touring.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: So you were busy. It was not, you know, I
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: don't know. Put it this way, I thought Terry Crews
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: could play my father better than me. Okay. You know
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: what I mean? I remember when we were looking for
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: somebody for that part. It was literally, it was almost
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: Patrice O'Neal.
• 31:34
  Speaker 5: Wow.
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: Who's funny. Wow. But, you know, he's got other... You know,
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: things going on. And I remember I was filming Longest Yard.
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: I didn't even know Terry Crews. You know, I'd seen
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: him like in White Chicks or something. But he's in
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: Longest Yard. And one day, his family came to the set.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: And this is like his wife and like whatever. He's
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: got like five, six kids. And you see this burly,
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: tough man. being so tender with his family. And I
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: was like, ah, that's the guy. That's the guy. You
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? But again, just around. He was around.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Like, that's what it is.
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean?
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: That's just what it is.
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: That show aged very well.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: Oh my God.
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: My kids like everybody. My kids watch it too all
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: the time. My 11-year-old, 8-year-old, like everybody hates Chris.
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: It's a beautiful thing. And it's just a love letter
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: to my parents, my mother, and my mother and father. Yeah, and...
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: And yeah, even though we were in Bed-Stuy, even though
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: we were poor and all that stuff, there was so
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: much love there. Just within the family, and even in
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: the community. Some of those characters really were there.
• 32:48
  Speaker 4: Doc.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: And it was also great to hire people that I
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: admired growing up. So Antonio Fargus, Huggy Bear from Star
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: King and Hutch is there, Raj. You know, from what's happened.
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: You know what I mean?
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: Like all these people that we grew up with that,
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: you know, sometimes are cast aside. You know, it was
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: nice to like, you know, throw them a little something.
• 33:16
  Speaker 5: I saw you earlier this year, you described yourself as
• 33:18
  Speaker 5: being ghetto famous.
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: What did you mean by that?
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: I mean, in the 90s, I know some people take
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: offense at it, but in the 90s or early 80s,
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: I mean... Yeah, we weren't everywhere. People just take it
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: for granted that we were everywhere. We were not everywhere, dude.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: There was a time, even in the early, early 90s,
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: where you would remember a black person with two lines
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: in a movie. You know what I mean? Like Damon
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: Wayans as the banana guy in Beverly Hills Cop 1.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: Remember that? Yeah.
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: No, I don't.
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: Damon Wayans, he gets the banana in the tailpipe. He
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: gets the bananas from Damon.
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: He'd say, here, take an extra one. You know what
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: I mean? Now, if you're a kid in that year,
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: you're like, so Damon Wayans is fucking ghetto famous because
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: every black person in the world knows who that character is.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: Where a white person would even register, it's like, I guess.
• 34:26
  Speaker 5: People don't like when you use black as synonymous with ghetto.
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: Okay. I mean, here's the thing. The internet's not for liking.
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: The internet's for looking for something to dislike. And the
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: internet refuses to acknowledge intention. You know what I mean?
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: Because you know I'm not. You know what I mean?
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: Like right now, it's like, oh, okay. Yeah, but I'm
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: in New Jack City. That's the biggest movie in the
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: world to us. To us. Okay? And by the way,
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: there's no streaming services. There's barely cable. So only we
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: see it. If you're Wesley Snipes, you are really famous
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: in one part of town and everywhere. absolutely anonymous in
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: another part of town.
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: Or a suspect.
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: Or a suspect. Or Ghetto Famous. That's fucking scary, nigga.
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: So that's what Ghetto Famous is.
• 35:29
  Speaker 4: You know what I mean?
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: You're literally, no one knows you. Also, it's that thing
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: where people think you have so much money. You know
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: what I mean? When I got Beverly Hills Cop, it
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: was $ 600. But they see you on the A train.
• 35:44
  Speaker 4: They think you got six million.
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what got them famous. It's
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: not putting down anything. It's just like, it's just that
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: dichotomy of being famous one place and absolutely, you know,
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: like Kid and Play when they did House Party. Right.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: You know how famous they were to black kids? Yeah.
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? But they were movie stars. Yeah.
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: Ken plays movie stars to us. You know what I mean?
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: But they were not movie stars in other places. So
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: that's what I was trying to convey. But the internet
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: is not for nuance. I want to open that internet.
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: The nuance app. Being that you've had both, right? Which one....
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: Which validation means more to you, the black validation or
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: the mainstream America once you've crossed over validation?
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: Well, it puts white. If you watch my stand-up specials, right?
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: I've done six or seven specials, right? There's no white
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: people in the audience. You know what I mean? Like, just, like,
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: really look at it. There's no white people in Bring
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: the Pain. There's no white people in Bigger and Blacker.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: There's no white people in any of those specials, okay?
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: And I do that on purpose. Because having a black
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: audience means a lot to me. And also, you know, congregating,
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: you know, is that the word? Used to be illegal
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: for us to talk, to get in groups and speak.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: So anytime a black man is speaking to a black audience,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: it is a revolutionary act.
• 37:24
  Speaker 4: Okay?
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: So... Yeah, I don't even consider anything good unless black
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: people like it. No matter what I do. And the
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: thing is, when you go on tour, things happen. Disposable
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: incomes are real things. So you might have, like, hey,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: you do speaking engagements. Sometimes there's more white people there.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Why is there more white people there? Because it's easier
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: for a white person to spend $ 300... five months in
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: advance than a black person. A black person has to
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: wait to that week. You know what I mean? So
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: that's just what it is.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: You know how I know he's telling the truth? I
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: don't even know if you remember this.
• 38:04
  Speaker 5: This was like over a decade ago. Might have been
• 38:06
  Speaker 5: the first time you came on Breakfast Club. You said,
• 38:08
  Speaker 5: hey man, I need to come on Breakfast Club. I'm
• 38:11
  Speaker 5: noticing too many white people.
• 38:11
  Speaker 4: In my shows.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: I remember this.
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: I need to come over every time and talk to
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: the audience. There's a little bit too many white people
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: in my shows, but I like it.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: Unfortunately, first of all, we're 10, 11% of the population.
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: We think we're half the population. We're not half America.
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: We are a small percentage. We're big in the cities,
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: but we're not everywhere. And success... Good or bad means
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: more people liking you. Some of the blackest people in
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: the world had a lot of white fans. James Brown
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: had a lot of white fans. Who the fuck is
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: blacker than James Brown?
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: Kendrick Lamar. Kendrick Lamar.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: Kendrick Lamar is like, I'm black, y'all, and I'm blacker
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: than black, and I'm black, y'all.
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: The fan base is crazy.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what I mean? And that's... But, you know...
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: Is there anything wrong with that? If you open a
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: soul food restaurant in Harlem, if you own Sylvia's, do
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: you want only black people there? You're trying to expand.
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: You open a restaurant to become McDonald's.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: That's how you have a successful business. You open it
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: up to everyone.
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: You want to open it up to everybody.
• 39:27
  Speaker 6: Have you ever battled or been annoyed by the whole, like,
• 39:30
  Speaker 6: because once your audience expands, now you become this black
• 39:33
  Speaker 6: cultural authority and black people are like, you have to
• 39:35
  Speaker 6: do this.
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: You're mine. I've never, I've tried to, I try to
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: never speak for the race. I can just speak to
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: my experience. You know what I mean? And I've seen
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: some people pick up that mantle and they're better at
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: it than others. You know, I just I don't think.
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: First of all, you guys are like in the you
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: guys are like in the trenches. You know, I mean,
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: there's people for that. I don't think I'm for that.
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? You guys deal with it
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: every day. So it's a thing I've been. I prefer
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: my politics. I try to like be a Trojan horse.
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: And I try to sneak them in there in the
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: jokes and sneak them in there in the movies. Like
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: if you really watch them, you're like, ooh, what's he
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: saying there? What's he saying there? But I don't ever
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: want to. I don't think I'm qualified. I've been this
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: guy for a long time. So I'm not living the
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: same experience. You know, I got lots of brothers, you know,
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: lots of cousins. You know, I have my father has
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: or had because my father's not here anymore. Nine brothers,
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: five sisters. All the men have at least three families.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Like they've been all married
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: and had other kids. So I have like over a
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: hundred first cousins. Wow.
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: Fifteen in South Carolina.
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah. A lot. You know what I mean? So, you know,
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: but even then I'm not qualified.
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: It's an impossible task. You cannot speak for a whole community.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: I cannot speak for a whole community.
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: I don't even like being on TV and they be like,
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: so what do black people think? I don't know what
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: the whole community of black people think.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: I just know what this house thinks. You know what
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: I mean? You know what I mean? Before we get
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: to Mr.
• 41:20
  Speaker 3: Green, I wanted to ask, when people talk about your
• 41:23
  Speaker 3: old characters, right?
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: And the reason I say that is, right before you
• 41:26
  Speaker 3: walked in, somebody said, Pookie, and I was like, I
• 41:28
  Speaker 3: wonder if he gets tired of those old characters that
• 41:31
  Speaker 3: he created.
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: No, I mean, here's the thing. You go through... We
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: all go through this where I'm tired, I'm tired. I'm
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: sure there was a time you were tired of the
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: breakfast club. And then one day you just appreciate it
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: in a way you never appreciated it before.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: Last week. You know what I mean? I swear last week.
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: You was tired.
• 41:49
  Speaker 6: You've been here yelling.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: No, no.
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: The interview, no. But I just was on my knees praying.
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: I was like, damn, God, thank you. Yeah.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: It's like, and then one day you're like. Then one day,
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: longevity is the win. You know what I mean? Longevity
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: is like, wow, I'm still here. Wow, I'm still doing press. Wow,
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: I'm still waking. I still, and I'm not, I just
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: like not being an oldies act. So I'm not sitting
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: here talking about, hey, remember CB4? We're doing the CB4 reboot.
• 42:20
  Speaker 4: We got to feel good, though.
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: Reboot. Because New Jack City comes back out. And Pookie's back.
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: And he runs a drug clinic. That would be dope, though.
• 42:31
  Speaker 5: That would be dope to bring New Jack City back.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: Pookie is a sponsor.
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: Because my kids.
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: Hear your voice and know your voice from something different
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: than I know you from. And then, like you said,
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: a nine-year-old knows you from Everybody Hates Chris. So there's
• 42:45
  Speaker 3: so many different generations and eras that know you.
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: Hey, man, I appreciate all of it. I can't believe
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: the ride it's been. I can't believe. Hey, man, I'm
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: just happy my mother doesn't work at Walmart. You know
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: what I mean? You know what I mean? To be
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: able to tell your mom to calm down and for
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: her to know you got it. It's like, what else
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: is there? Especially from where you came from. You want
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: to scream Pookie? Go right ahead. Pookie, you know.
• 43:20
  Speaker 6: I sure did, but I didn't want you to be like,
• 43:21
  Speaker 6: I keep saying it.
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: I was like, Pookie! It's all good. It's all good.
• 43:25
  Speaker 4: It's like a great movie.
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: I wish more people saw it.
• 43:28
  Speaker 5: I mean, it's... I'll say before we get to Misty Green,
• 43:31
  Speaker 5: I do want to stay on some black questions.
• 43:33
  Speaker 4: Oh my God.
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you.
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: Why. I'll tell.
• 43:43
  Speaker 8: You why.
• 43:48
  Speaker 5: Because this conversation that they be having about you now
• 43:52
  Speaker 5: confuses me. There's black people who've accused you of making
• 43:55
  Speaker 5: black people the punchline for white audiences. And they call
• 43:59
  Speaker 5: it cooning. Does that criticism ever bother you?
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: Here's the thing. Cooning, to me, is a, when you
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: make stuff specifically for white people.
• 44:12
  Speaker 4: Okay?
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: That's what I, that's my thing of cooning. So I've
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: never been that guy. I can't help it if white
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: people come to the show. If that offends you, okay,
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: go see somebody else. You know what I mean? Like,
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: I can't, you know what I mean? Like, and I
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: don't want to drag anybody else's name into this, but,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: you know, like you just said about Kendrick, like, Kooning's
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: making stuff for white people. I've never made anything for
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: anybody but myself and.
• 44:40
  Speaker 4: My friends, you know?
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: So I, you know, whatever, man. Whatever. I can't fight it.
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: One of your specials was called Bigger and Blacker.
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: The reason it's called Bigger and Blacker is because a
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: lot of the initial press was from Bring the Pain,
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: and Whitney Houston went through this, where they were booing
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: her at the Soul Train Awards, because they were just mad, like,
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: she's getting too many accolades. I don't know what that
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: is with us as a people. They like her too much,
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: so she must not be good. And I called the
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: special Bigger and Blacker, And I shot it at the
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: Apollo just to prove a point. It's like, I'm going,
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: and I remember for that special, I sold, there was
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: no ticket master. It was like, okay, we're going to
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: sell the tickets at the door for like $ 5. Oh, wow. Yeah,
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: so we can get the blackest possible audience.
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: Right, right.
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: In the world.
• 45:43
  Speaker 6: Free before 11. Right.
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, hey, man. You know, whatever, man. People
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: are going to say what they say. And I very
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: seldom met a hater that was more successful than the
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: person they were hating on.
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: Do you think a black comedian.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: Have you met any? No. I've never seen it.
• 46:11
  Speaker 5: Do you think a black comedian has a different responsibility
• 46:14
  Speaker 5: telling a joke about black people in front of a
• 46:16
  Speaker 5: white audience?
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: Hey, man. I... I think... First of all, I don't... Okay,
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: slow it down. Say that again.
• 46:27
  Speaker 5: Do you think a black comedian has a different responsibility
• 46:30
  Speaker 5: telling a joke about black people in front of a
• 46:33
  Speaker 5: white audience?
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: I don't view, I think an artist, one of the
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: greatest things about being an artist is you get to
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: be irresponsible. And you get to take chances, okay? And
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: the thing about a comedian, if you really respect the
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: craft and you really, you know, Again, I see a
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: lot of comedians hating on each other. You'll never hear
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: me hating on any comedian ever. If you really respect
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: the craft, the audience decides what's happening with this joke.
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: And I have never seen anybody continually repeat a joke.
• 47:16
  Speaker 4: That doesn't work.
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: Okay? So, yeah, a lot of what you see, especially
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: at a comedy club, comedy club to me is the gym.
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: And I'm just working it out. You know, Floyd Mayweather
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: gets knocked down in training because he fights bigger people.
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? And that's where I'm trying stuff.
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: So I don't view this thing responsible or irresponsible. When
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: you watch a stand-up special, normally that person has done
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: these jokes a hundred times, man. You know what I mean?
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: And you can not like them. We all have the
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: right to not like somebody. But yeah, it's A lot
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: more work goes into it than any records you're going
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: to play. You know what I mean? Comedians have the
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: hardest job.
• 48:05
  Speaker 4: In the world.
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: Because we have to always come up with new stuff.
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: I wish I could go, you know, me and, it's weird,
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: Bring the Pain and Reasonable Doubt came out the same year.
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: I wish I could go do the, bring the pain tour.
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: Do the same show. Big up to Jay. No one's nicer.
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: Whenever I go see Beyonce, Jay always brings my kids
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: back to see Beyonce.
• 48:35
  Speaker 4: And we see her and she's like sweaty and everything.
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: So you'll never hear me say anything bad about Jay.
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: But what a comedian does, it's like, you know that
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: part of every musical show you go to where the
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: person goes, hey, now we're going to do some new stuff. Yes.
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: And people go to the bathroom. Yeah.
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: As you point out.
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: That's comedians. That's comedians for hours. I'm going to do
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: nothing but new stuff and blow your motherfucking mind. That's
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: what every comedian does. Okay. Do you still work out
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: in the clubs? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I haven't worked
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: out in a while. It's been a minute. It's been
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: a minute. And I'm trying to figure out if I'm
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: gonna do it again or not. But yeah, I'm not
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: going to the clubs, and Dave will hit me up,
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: or Kevin will hit me.
• 49:23
  Speaker 4: Up, or whatever. I'll definitely go by.
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: I wonder if you could do that, though. Yeah.
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: If he did his special, and say, I'm going on
• 49:29
  Speaker 3: a tour, and do the same jokes, because Would it
• 49:31
  Speaker 3: hit different, or could you not say it?
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: I would love to hear it in words versus black
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: people again.
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: I would love to hear that.
• 49:36
  Speaker 5: I listen to that 12 minutes at least three times
• 49:39
  Speaker 5: a year. I share it with people all the time.
• 49:41
  Speaker 5: I can't believe you don't like that joke no more.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: It's not that I don't like it. It's just I'm
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: past it. You know what I mean? Okay. Are we though?
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: As a society?
• 49:48
  Speaker 6: How do you get past that when like the world
• 49:50
  Speaker 6: is still living like that? I get it.
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: I get it. He refers to it at least once.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: All the time.
• 49:54
  Speaker 6: It's like when your dad angry at you and they
• 49:56
  Speaker 6: give you something to read. He gives us that to watch. Oh,
• 49:59
  Speaker 6: it's beautiful.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: Hey, I read The Fire next time. Baldwin like every year.
• 50:03
  Speaker 6: But how do you move past?
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: I read The Fire next time. I read Pimp every year.
• 50:07
  Speaker 4: Oh, I love Pimp. Pimp's amazing.
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: I just want them to know the difference between N-words
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: and black people.
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: That's all.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Because you define it so distinctly.
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: Are you the boss now, everybody? No. Yeah. Is he
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: the boss? Is the Breakfast.
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: Club a front?
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: Are you like Bon Jovi? They say Bon Jovi's a band,
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: but then you find out Jon Bon Jovi gets all
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: the money. Are you technically the Breakfast Club? No, we
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: are a team. Oh, I see.
• 50:42
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: Now I see how they afford to pay you.
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: Let's talk about Mr.
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: Green.
• 50:52
  Speaker 6: That's right, Mr.
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: Green. She want to get some comfortable. She want to
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: get some comfortable.
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: She got a comfortable.
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: Mr. Green, let's talk about Mr. Green.
• 50:59
  Speaker 2: Let's talk about Mr.
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: Green.
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: I heard the reason why you wanted to do this film,
• 51:02
  Speaker 3: but explain to people what, you know, your idea of
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: this film, how it came about.
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, the first kernel of it was watching an
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: actress a well-known actress to me anyway.
• 51:12
  Speaker 3: And you won't say her name, right?
• 51:13
  Speaker 4: I'm not going to say her name.
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: And she was doing this thing called the loop group
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: where you make sounds like, okay, sound like you jumped
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: in the pool. Sound like the club. And it's very like,
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: it's at the bottom of the barrel movie-wise. And I
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: don't know, it just made me start, sometimes it's just
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: a little kernel of an idea. And so I started like, okay,
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: how about a movie about an actress? How about a
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: struggling actress? How about, what if she's kind of her
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: own worst enemy, like in Uncut Gems? What if I
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: can make this character interesting? Because a lot of times
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: you see In TV, every black woman's a judge. You
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? Or they're very perfect.
• 52:00
  Speaker 6: I saw you say that and I didn't agree.
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: Well, let's go to television. They're mostly judges.
• 52:06
  Speaker 6: I just think that sometimes when we see them with
• 52:08
  Speaker 6: black women, it's like the struggle of us and the
• 52:10
  Speaker 6: have to figure it out, the single black mom, the-
• 52:13
  Speaker 6: Woe is me.
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but that's still like an upstanding whatever. They never
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: have flaws. They're never like... You know what I mean?
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: It's like a caricature of that.
• 52:22
  Speaker 4: I respect your.
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: Maybe.
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: You talking about like the Talapari joints?
• 52:27
  Speaker 6: I mean, Talapari, but even like.
• 52:30
  Speaker 6: Even across netflix like there are like very few like
• 52:32
  Speaker 6: i remember watching forever even though they're younger but mara
• 52:35
  Speaker 6: brock akil did forever.
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: Mara brock akil helped me with misty green actually.
• 52:38
  Speaker 6: Yeah and i love i love forever because i felt
• 52:41
  Speaker 6: like it was balanced where like you saw like the
• 52:43
  Speaker 6: things that we were going through as like black women
• 52:45
  Speaker 6: trying to figure it out and raise our kids but
• 52:47
  Speaker 6: also you saw like once we got it right and
• 52:49
  Speaker 6: a lot of times it's just not that balanced like
• 52:51
  Speaker 6: we we see all the dark.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: Stuff you know there's only one mara mara yeah like
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: like she's She's who she is for a reason. I actually,
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: she saw an early cut of Misty and honestly gave
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: me the best notes of anybody, I gotta say.
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: She's a genius. Mara Barker kills a genius. Yeah, I
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: love her too.
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I had never seen this type of character
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: with a black woman. And to me... Characters with flaws
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: are the best to play. You know what I mean?
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: I'd rather play Pookie than Scotty in New Jack City.
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? You know what I mean?
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: Because just as an actor, it just gives you more
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: to do. And back to your thing about black actresses,
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of times it's hard to judge because the
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: parts aren't great.
• 53:40
  Speaker 6: I agree with that.
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: So, like, I think... By the way, I think Nia Long...
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: as Catherine Jackson was one of the best. But she's
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: never had a part that good. You know what I mean?
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: Where she's like, okay, she's got this marriage and she's
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: got this kid and they're moving across the country and everything. So,
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: I don't know. With Misty Green, I wanted to just
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: make a character we hadn't seen. That's the kind of
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: movies I'm trying to make. Everybody can make what they
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: want to make. We're all just singular here. but I
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: wanted to make something that just, I like a movie
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: that makes you talk in the parking lot. I like
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: a movie that you're arguing about it at dinner. You
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? Like when I made Good Hair,
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: it was about like, the back and forth of it.
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: I don't like just a statement and like, okay, that
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: was fun.
• 54:27
  Speaker 6: What's next?
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: What's next? I like to stick to you. And I
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: actually appreciate it. Even when people don't like it, I
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: like that they don't like it passionately. So, I hate
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: this review. It's almost as good as I love this review.
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: Because it's a review, nonetheless.
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: It's the fucking, it's the middle that you gotta be
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: scared of. Yeah. You know?
• 54:50
  Speaker 5: You know, good hair is something that comes up a
• 54:52
  Speaker 5: lot now because people say a man should have never
• 54:55
  Speaker 5: been able, should have not made that movie.
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: I mean, hey, make it. I'm not, you know what
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: I mean? Like, I don't own a studio. I don't,
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean? I went out there and
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: begged for money and did the same thing everybody else does.
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: I can't help it if I had an idea earlier
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: than somebody else. I mean, by the way, I think
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: a black woman did eventually make a hair documentary called
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: a few years later that actually won the freaking Academy Award. So,
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: but yeah, man, whenever you're early to anything artistically, first
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: of all, you're lucky to even make any money at it.
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? You don't wanna be the
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: Melly Mel of something. You wanna be the Kendrick Lamar.
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: You wanna come in later.
• 55:43
  Speaker 2: When you think about Misty Green, what scares you more?
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: Losing your talent or losing your relevance?
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: I mean, relevance is a thing you can't control. You
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? And that's up to you guys.
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: That's up to the powers that be. The talent is
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: a thing.
• 56:00
  Speaker 4: You really would be scared to lose.
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: That gives you solace and, okay, I'm going to be
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: all right. I know how to do this thing. I
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: like being a comedian. I like being a writer. It's great.
• 56:17
  Speaker 4: That I have these skills. To lose that would be like, oh, God.
• 56:22
  Speaker 6: What is God giving to her? I don't know. Stuff
• 56:25
  Speaker 6: like that. Even in the movie, when she's not at
• 56:27
  Speaker 6: her best, she's still so talented.
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: She doesn't go anywhere.
• 56:31
  Speaker 6: She just doesn't understand how she's in her own way, basically.
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: Most people that are in their own way have no
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: idea they're in their own way. It's weird. I always
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: say about stand-up, or show business in general, we get
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: paid at night, right? Because we do shows at night.
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: But we make our money in the day. It's like,
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: how do you treat the day? Like, you show me
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: the comedian that commands the day that is up and
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: doing what they're supposed to do, and that person generally
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: goes further than people that hang out all the time.
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Like, in this on the scene. Like,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: how do you handle the day? Because, you know, And
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: nighttime is trouble anyway. We all know that.
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: I know you got to go.
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: I know she was saying.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: Well, it was a.
• 57:24
  Speaker 6: Couple things, but I wanted to mention the.
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: I'm here for you.
• 57:28
  Speaker 6: Just putting her in the lead as a black actress, right?
• 57:31
  Speaker 6: Like black woman actress. I saw the comment you said
• 57:33
  Speaker 6: when you were like, you've been saying how black women
• 57:35
  Speaker 6: have it rough in Hollywood because they're not being hired
• 57:38
  Speaker 6: even if they are really good. There are people that
• 57:40
  Speaker 6: are discovering her for the first time or will through
• 57:42
  Speaker 6: this movie. I watch it and I'm like, she's so
• 57:45
  Speaker 6: freaking talented. And she's talking about she wasn't working.
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, she's on a show called Slow Horses now. Season
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: six or whatever. But yeah, I mean, hey, man, we
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: don't own studios. I said this in the New York Times.
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: Black people pretty much live exactly where they lived when Dr.
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: King got shot. Think about New York. Think about where
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: Harlem is. Think about east side, west side. There's some gentrification,
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: but for the most part, we are exactly where we were. Yes, there's...
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: Beyonce has a better record deal than Aretha Franklin. Yes.
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Maybe I make more percentage
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: money than Flip Boson. You know what I mean? And
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: you're doing better than Frankie Crocker. But we.
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: Are exactly where we were. In some ways we're worse
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: off because we don't control, hey, we used to own
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: the radio. We used to own the radio, we used
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: to own record labels. You know, you couldn't, you had
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: to have a positive rap record on an album to
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: be released. That does not exist anymore. Hey, the first N.W.A.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: song you heard was Express Yourself. It was not straight
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: out of Compton, okay? And every album... had something ridiculously positive.
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: So Slick Rich Scott, Hey Young World, and Run DMC's
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: Got Proud to Be Black. I heart radio don't give
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: a fuck about black youth, okay?
• 59:34
  Speaker 4: Enlightenment.
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: Don't give a fuck about my people, okay?
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: It's not intentional.
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: Oh, it's intentional. You think so?
• 59:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah, motherfucker.
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: All this marching and all this protesting and there's no
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: protest music? Yes, that's intentional.
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: But they could play it. If that music was being made,
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: they could play it.
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: But the people that are making the music, first of all, again,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: black men, grown men and black women used to own
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: radio stations and.
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: And record labels, and they would mentor young artists. They
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: didn't tell them exactly what to do, but they would go, hey,
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: Belly Mel, why don't you, child is born in no
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: state of mind, blind to the, you know, like, like,
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: They would give him a little shove and go, hey,
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: you really want to say that?
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: You would think over the past decade, there'd be more of.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: That kind of music. Well, yeah, but nah, white men
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: don't give a fuck about our children.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 4: That's true.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 3: And Nas' first single, If I Rule The World. If
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 3: I Rule The World was the major single.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: No, it was the second album. That was the second album.
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 4: Second album, second album, yeah.
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: And Rosalind Elazar, that's her.
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: Name, right? Rosalind Elazar, the great Rosalind Elazar.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 6: She's amazing.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: She is fucking incredible. Yeah. Very good. Here's the thing.
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: She came in and read for it. Everybody thinks she
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: got to know some. I didn't know her at all.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: I'd never seen her TV show. And you can look
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: at the cast and tell I had my pick. Okay?
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: Because we got Daniel Kaluuya. We got Adam Driver. We
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: got Anna Kendrick. I know.
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 8: And Anthony Anderson by the way everybody in there is
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 8: like a great actor even I think Anthony Anderson you
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 8: know he studied acting you know people think Anthony's just
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 8: funny that motherfucker's a fucking thespian right and so everybody
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 8: in there is amazing and she.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: You know we were just reading we kind of had
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: a person or whatever but you always read people just
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: in case you don't close a deal you know And
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: we read her, and she was so good. Wow. And
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: she kept being good, and she kept being good, and
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: she really wanted the part. You know what I mean?
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: She flew herself in from England and all this shit,
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: and we're like, God damn. Amazing. Let's just, you know,
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: the movie's such, it's an indie. It's such a small
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: budget anyway. So let's just, you know, it's the piece
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: of art I wanted to make right now. And so
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: let's go for it. Do you plan to... Direct more?
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: I am planning to direct more, yes.
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 4: I got a little script.
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 2: Okay, cool.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 7: Now, I heard you say earlier, you said, you know,
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 7: people get these opportunities by being around, right?
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: So how can I be around?
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: Anyway, get my number from Charlemagne. I ain't going to
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: give it. I'll get you my number. All right.
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 2: My cousin.
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: Chris Rock is your cousin?
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 6: Y'all are not related. Stop for real.
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: I think we're related, yeah. We are.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 4: You two show it.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: Shut up.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 7: He's so rich, we forgot he's short.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: He's that rich.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 5: I know people criticize you a lot nowadays, but I
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 5: really like this version of you because the Chris Rock
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 5: that did Bring the Pain seems certain about everything, but
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 5: this Chris Rock seems more willing to say, hey, maybe
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 5: I was wrong.
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: I was definitely wrong. I was definitely wrong. Yeah.
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: Is that age? Is it therapy?
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: Some of it's age. Some of it's therapy. Some of
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: it's having your own children and going through... When you
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: have your own kids, it's like you get to go
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: through this... You're basically experiencing life again. Yeah. And a
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: lot of it's just messing up, man.
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 4: I was married. I'm divorced.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? This mess, the destruction of that.
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: It's like... okay, you can learn or you can burn.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? So I would rather learn
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: than burn. Absolutely. You still on the Ryu Ryu app?
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: Are you still on the Ryu app?
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: Ryu.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 4: Ryu.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: No, I'm not off it, but I'm not like actively looking.
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: I'm not actively looking. Put it that way. I've just
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: been busy. I've been busy, you know. I thought I saw. Okay. Okay.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: I mean, you know, they put them all up there.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 6: No, but I thought you was like locked down in
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 6: a relationship. Like not, wasn't you outside kissing?
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: I mean, you know, things happen. I'm currently not in
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: a relationship.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 6: Okay, well, nice.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 4: I would say that.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: But I'm never like, I'm never one to make anything
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: official or unofficial. I was married and I got divorced.
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: Everything else is speculative.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: Are you still as horny as you once were?
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: I saw a picture and.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 6: Then he just seen, I don't know what he looking
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 6: at that made you ask that.
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: I'm really on The Breakfast Club. Some things never change.
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: Now the Wendy's coming out. Bring up Twendy wherever you are.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: Chris Rock, ladies and gentlemen. Make sure y'all go check
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: out Misty Green, man.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: That's right. Comes out this week. Definitely check it out.
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: Comes out on the 9th, right? Friday. Friday. This Friday.
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: All right. It's The Breakfast Club. It's Chris Rock.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 5: It's The Breakfast Club.