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Downloaded from
YTS.MX

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Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX

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♪ ♪

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BYRON PITTS:
What filmmaker has had five movies

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open number one at the box office
in the last four years?

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Spielberg? Tarantino?

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Scorsese?

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No.

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This record belongs to Tyler Perry.

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MICHAEL PASEORNEK:
When people would come to me and say,

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"I have the next Tyler Perry," I'd say,

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"Does he tour 280 to 300 days a year,
getting to know his audience?"

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If he doesn't, then you don't have
the next Tyler Perry.

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OPRAH WINFREY:
Do not play him small.

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Because he is not just
some lucky, rich Negro...

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...turned Black man.

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LUCKY JOHONSON:
We grew up Uptown New Orleans, 3rd Ward.

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Round the Magnolia Project.

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People reverted to crime.

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You know, burglary, robbery, drugs--
using 'em, selling 'em.

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OPRAH:
Can you believe you were homeless

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seven years ago?

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-Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
-(audience laughs)

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(crowd applauds)

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JAMES CORDEN: He is an actor,
writer, director, producer.

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I'm gonna say it, entertainment mogul.

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JIMMY FALLON:
Tyler Perry Studios.

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You have the largest studios
in the United States.

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-TYLER: That's what they told me, yeah.
-FALLON: The country. Yeah.

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Give him a planet, come on.

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KASIM REED:
You have no idea

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what it is like to acquire an asset
from the United States Army.

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HARVEY SCHWARTZ:
20 feature films, more than 20 plays,

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nine TV shows, New York Times Best Seller.

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-Unbelievable.
-(crowd cheering)

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(cheering fades)

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REPORTER: Known for producing movies
primarily for Black audiences,

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but a growing number of critics
in the Black community

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take issue with Perry's work.

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WOMAN: You can't expect
that everyone is just going to

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give him the thumbs-up because he's Black

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and he, you know, scraped his way up
to Hollywood.

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MAN 1:
The underlying stories and plots

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that he uses and stereotypes,
I have a lot of problems with.

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EBRO DARDEN:
Here's the biggest thing.

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Tyler Perry didn't give a eff about

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what nobody had to say
about what he was doing.

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-He served his audience.
-(cheering)

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MAN 2: I think just
when you're a pioneer in anything,

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it's not gonna be easy.

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It's a formula, again and again and again,
and he hits you over the head with it.

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I don't know what he's trying
to work out on film.

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Probably needs to work it out in therapy.

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It's just a really horrible message.

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It's like cinematic malt liquor
for the masses.

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KILLER MIKE:
You know when you represent the culture...

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...there's a responsibility
and sometimes almost a burden

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that comes with that.

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AMAN PERRY:
Why do you work so hard?

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Why do I work so hard?

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MAN 3: Few have done more to widen
the scope of television than Tyler Perry.

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MAN 1: And in this latest film,
I think he's crossed the line.

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REPORTER: Most successful
African American filmmaker in history.

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MAN 4: But at the point
that it reaches Hollywood,

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that's when it becomes a problem.

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ARI EMANUEL:
He was definitely an outsider.

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GAYLE KING:
There is no denying the talent...

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MAN 5:
Tyler Perry has become a billionaire...

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-...and the power...
-...and still likes to put on a dress.

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...of Tyler Perry.

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-You've accomplished a lot.
-(applause)

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What have you not done
that you want to do?

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♪ ♪

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♪ ♪

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-(wind blowing softly)
-(leaves rustling)

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LUCKY JOHNSON:
Hey, look, shouts out to you.

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You're a billionaire's sister.
How about that?

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(laughs)

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God is good, baby. Look out.

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All right, baby.

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All right, sweetie, talk to you soon.

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Bye-bye.

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My cousin Melva, Tyler's sister.

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You know, we used to call him "Junior"
growing up.

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"What's up, Junior?" "Junior. Junior."

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But now it's Tyler, you know.

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It's not Emmitt, and, um...

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But that was his birth name:
Emmitt Perry Jr.

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You know, he changed his name
to Tyler Perry, rightfully so,

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because he had an estranged relationship
with his dad.

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You know, for freaking many years.

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So he didn't want to be known
as Emmitt Jr.

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Let me tell you this.

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And this is just me. This how I feel.

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The trauma too deep.

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The wound is cut too deep.

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You cut a person, and it start healing,

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and then you--
then you rupture the-the wound.

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So, every time he was wounded,
he kept rupturing the wound.

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Now the wound never heals.

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(echoing):
And it never will.

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REPORTER:
It was a star-studded night Saturday

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as celebrities flooded Atlanta
to celebrate

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the grand opening of Tyler Perry Studios.

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(birds chirping)

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The studio-- 330 acres--
sits on the grounds

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of the former Fort McPherson army base
in southwest Atlanta.

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Tyler also dedicated 12 soundstages,

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each named after
a groundbreaking Black artist,

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including Oprah Winfrey,
Will Smith and Halle Berry,

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just to name a few.

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(humming a tune)

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PRODUCER:
How do you feel right now, sir?

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TYLER:
I feel...

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excited.

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And calm.

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And, um, ready and grateful
and thankful and hopeful and...

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Yeah.

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Ready to go.

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I'm really trying to calm my nerves,
'cause you know how I am about time.

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-It's like... (stammers, sighs)
-(snapping fingers)

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I'm just trying to be like,
"Just go with the flow, TP.

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Just go with the flow. Be in the moment."

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PRODUCER:
That kid underneath your porch,

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did he ever think
you'll have all of this right now?

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TYLER: Are you really trying that
with me right now?

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-Yeah.
-You really trying that with me right now?

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-It ain't gonna happen, bud.
-I didn't-- I just mean...

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It ain't gonna happen. You better...

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You better call Gayle King
or Oprah Winfrey or somebody.

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You ain't... (stammers)
Ain't gonna happen.

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I'm not going there.

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-All right.
-Mm-mm.

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-I'm-a try it all weekend.
-I've got to just get through this moment.

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I have to try not to float above.
You see, that's-that's my thing, though.

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My problem with a lot of things in life is
I float above it.

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And, uh...

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That's just from childhood.
That's from abuse, where it's pain.

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You just try to get through it.

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But I found out that
I have that with everything.

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When it's even joy and happiness,
I just...

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(stammers) Gets my s...
Senses get too heightened.

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I just want to be above it.

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So, tonight, and every day
and every moment, just like,

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"Calm down, calm down, calm down.

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"You're okay. Calm down. You're safe.

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"It's just emotion. It's just feeling.

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"It's just... It's good. You're all right.

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It's love. It's joy, so..."

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(banging on door)

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(audience cheering and applauding
in distance)

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MELLODY HOBSON:
You know, they say,

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"The best wine is grown
in the toughest soil."

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And when you think of
just the finest wines,

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the grapes have to push through
rocks and branches,

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in all sorts of detours,
in order to come through the soil.

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In many ways, I think that
that really does characterize

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Tyler's growing up.

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He had some horrific experiences
as a child,

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and that has fed into who he is.

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That ultimately led
to the characters he created

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and the imagination that he had.

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Because you go inside your mind.

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And so, it all makes sense to me

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that he would turn into
this person that he is,

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that he would have
the level of perseverance

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and relentlessness that he has.

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Because he had to come through a lot.

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He had to be that wine
to break through that soil.

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(shoes tapping rhythmically)

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LUCKY:
It's hard living in New Orleans.

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Hard to survive,
and it's a dangerous town.

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The gunfire.

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The robberies.

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The-the gang violence.

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But it was, it was very dangerous.

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It was very dangerous.

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The crime rate was real high.

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We was once the murder capital
of the world.

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ANCHORWOMAN: Gun violence is surging
once again in New Orleans...

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ANCHORMAN:
Rise in crime is...

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ANCHORWOMAN 2:
Murders are up in New Orleans, and...

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JAMES BALDWIN: I don't know what
most white people in this country feel.

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I can only conclude what they feel
from the state of their institutions.

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MAN:
"He told me, 'Dying is very easy.

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Living is a difficult thing.'"

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(sirens wailing in distance)

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And, um, the police went up
in Bruce Grocery.

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Opened fire on 'em.

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YOUNG MAN: They told me,
"Stand up," and I said, "No.

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What, so you can shoot me?"

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LUCKY: Statistically, here in New Orleans,
you might not make it to live to see 21.

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If you make it to your 21st birthday,

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you beat the odds.

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You-you beat the devil.
You beat the statistic.

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And it's survival of the fittest
growing up in this area.

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You know? So, soon as
you come out your house,

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hell, you might not come back.

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I'm-a pan around,
and you'll see this building right here.

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This was a scatter-site,
so we lived in here as well.

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Two houses down-- Aunt Maxine,
my Tyler Perry, Yulanda, Emmbre,

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Melva, they lived two houses down,

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which we're gonna go to right now.

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This is the actual house
that Tyler grew up in.

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In the back of this house, he built a, uh,

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clubhouse, where we would go back there,
under the house,

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and get away from Uncle Emmitt.

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PITTS (over TV): We crossed the street
to where he used to live,

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and the pain of his past came back.

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TYLER:
This is where I grew up.

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I have not been in this house in years.

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PITTS:
He brought us out back,

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showed us the cubbyhole where he would
escape from his father's abuse.

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-(dog barking in distance)
-This was my hideout,

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my safe place, you know?

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When it got too much, you'd go in here?

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TYLER: Yeah. Yeah.
I've spent, like, all day in there.

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LUCKY:
I be a little sad for Tyler sometimes

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because he had it real rough.

220
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You know, he had a real-- he had--
he had it way rougher than us.

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It didn't have to be like that.

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Yeah, I don't know
what God message was for him,

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and maybe the message has come to pass,
because he's very successful now.

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Whereas he has a lot going on,

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and he's taking care of a lot of people
and blessing them,

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but how is he sleeping at night?

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You know, thinking about his childhood.

228
00:11:01,411 --> 00:11:04,247
Tyler's dad,
he was a rough man growing up.

229
00:11:04,331 --> 00:11:06,625
He was a... a no-nonsense type guy.

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00:11:06,708 --> 00:11:09,378
You know, didn't laugh a lot,
didn't think too much was funny.

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00:11:09,461 --> 00:11:12,297
Uh, you know, he was a strong,
hardworking man,

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but he was just a real irate,
sultry type man.

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00:11:16,093 --> 00:11:18,053
Just hard, you know?

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00:11:18,136 --> 00:11:19,596
Third-grade education,
come out the country,

235
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and he just guided by working hard.

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He would get off work maybe 3:00,
get home at 3:30.

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There's a corner store right here
at the corner, not even half a block,

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00:11:28,939 --> 00:11:30,649
and they would have cases of beer.

239
00:11:30,732 --> 00:11:32,734
But he would drink every single day.

240
00:11:32,818 --> 00:11:35,612
Soon as the truck pull up,
we knew it was about to go down.

241
00:11:35,695 --> 00:11:39,282
He gon' jump out with the,
with the, with the 24 case of beer.

242
00:11:39,366 --> 00:11:41,576
He gon' drink all of 'em
until somebody get here,

243
00:11:41,660 --> 00:11:43,078
and he gon' cut up.

244
00:11:43,161 --> 00:11:46,373
And for Junior-- for, uh, for Tyler,
I'm sorry-- for Tyler,

245
00:11:46,456 --> 00:11:49,251
(stammers) his beatings was just
a little more excessive.

246
00:11:50,544 --> 00:11:53,380
One time, we were real young,
and he whipped Tyler real, real bad.

247
00:11:53,463 --> 00:11:54,840
He had blood all on his back.

248
00:11:54,923 --> 00:11:56,591
He ran out the house, man.

249
00:11:56,675 --> 00:11:58,218
He-- you know, he was young.
He ran out the house.

250
00:11:58,301 --> 00:12:00,137
He come around the corner by us.

251
00:12:00,220 --> 00:12:02,514
And our mom was like,
"What? Who did this?"

252
00:12:02,597 --> 00:12:06,309
AUNT JERRY: There are these huge welts
across his back.

253
00:12:06,393 --> 00:12:09,771
I mean, about this long and about
that thick 'cause they're swollen.

254
00:12:09,855 --> 00:12:11,690
I mean, that's-that's my nephew.
He's a baby.

255
00:12:11,773 --> 00:12:14,234
He was a little boy then, little boy.

256
00:12:14,317 --> 00:12:16,069
Maybe seven or eight years old.
He was little.

257
00:12:16,361 --> 00:12:17,654
LUCKY:
She didn't play 'bout us.

258
00:12:17,737 --> 00:12:19,406
You know, her nieces, nephews, her kids.

259
00:12:19,489 --> 00:12:22,075
The mother lion, if you will.

260
00:12:22,159 --> 00:12:23,785
She protected us by all costs.

261
00:12:23,869 --> 00:12:27,289
If the big bad bear was coming,
she gon' fight the bear.

262
00:12:27,372 --> 00:12:29,875
So, I just... just clicked.

263
00:12:29,958 --> 00:12:32,043
I went and got the gun.

264
00:12:32,127 --> 00:12:33,503
We come around the corner,
Mama dragging us all.

265
00:12:33,587 --> 00:12:35,046
We had on our little Hanes brief.

266
00:12:35,130 --> 00:12:37,841
You know, our little tighty-whities,
and we crying.

267
00:12:37,924 --> 00:12:40,385
Saw him getting on the porch
as usual, drinking.

268
00:12:40,469 --> 00:12:42,971
AUNT JERRY: And I asked him
why did he hit him in his back like that.

269
00:12:43,054 --> 00:12:44,806
And he told me to mind my business.

270
00:12:44,890 --> 00:12:47,058
He shouldn't have said that.

271
00:12:47,142 --> 00:12:49,019
She raised the gun up to shoot him,
and my dad moved it.

272
00:12:49,102 --> 00:12:50,770
(gunshot)

273
00:12:50,854 --> 00:12:52,230
That was so scary,

274
00:12:52,314 --> 00:12:55,066
'cause it went--
I looked at my mom like, "Jesus."

275
00:12:55,150 --> 00:12:56,401
(chuckles):
You know, she...

276
00:12:56,485 --> 00:12:58,987
Mom was just about to shoot Uncle Emmitt,
you know?

277
00:12:59,070 --> 00:13:01,656
And then he didn't play with her,
and he would listen to her.

278
00:13:01,740 --> 00:13:04,075
Even in the drunken stupor,
he would listen to her,

279
00:13:04,159 --> 00:13:05,869
'cause he remembered that goddamn gun.

280
00:13:05,952 --> 00:13:08,038
AUNT JERRY:
That's not one of my proud moments,

281
00:13:08,121 --> 00:13:10,415
but it was just so hurtful.

282
00:13:10,499 --> 00:13:12,292
I just can't tolerate it,

283
00:13:12,375 --> 00:13:14,252
because I chastised my children, too,

284
00:13:14,336 --> 00:13:18,590
but none of my boys could ever tell you
that they got beat like that.

285
00:13:18,673 --> 00:13:21,468
I mean, no, no, no, no. How can you
when you love your children?

286
00:13:21,551 --> 00:13:24,554
How can you do that?
How can your heart allow you to do it?

287
00:13:24,638 --> 00:13:28,517
So I don't understand that,
but it's not for me to understand.

288
00:13:31,728 --> 00:13:33,939
OPRAH: It wasn't until last night,
when I was talking with the producers

289
00:13:34,022 --> 00:13:35,941
about this story, that I first heard,

290
00:13:36,024 --> 00:13:39,110
uh, that you had been beaten so badly

291
00:13:39,194 --> 00:13:41,279
that one time you blacked out.

292
00:13:41,363 --> 00:13:45,242
Like, I-I remember holding on
to a chain-link fence,

293
00:13:45,325 --> 00:13:47,494
and I'm holding so tight
my hands are bloody

294
00:13:47,577 --> 00:13:49,454
as he's hitting me, and I'm-I'm holding...

295
00:13:49,538 --> 00:13:52,499
-Wow.
-Just trying to hold on for my life.

296
00:13:52,582 --> 00:13:55,377
(voice breaking):
I was so enraged about it in my mind.

297
00:13:55,460 --> 00:13:58,380
I see myself running from me.

298
00:13:59,381 --> 00:14:01,967
-Wow.
-And I couldn't get the little boy...

299
00:14:02,050 --> 00:14:04,052
(breathes shakily)

300
00:14:06,805 --> 00:14:09,140
I couldn't get that little boy
to come back to me.

301
00:14:09,224 --> 00:14:12,018
I couldn't get myself to come back to me.

302
00:14:12,102 --> 00:14:15,939
OPRAH:
So it got so bad that, as a little boy,

303
00:14:16,022 --> 00:14:18,900
-you slit your wrists.
-TYLER: Yeah.

304
00:14:18,984 --> 00:14:20,610
Yeah, I was, I was suicidal,

305
00:14:20,694 --> 00:14:24,531
because I thought I just--
what is the point in living?

306
00:14:24,614 --> 00:14:26,616
♪ ♪

307
00:14:35,083 --> 00:14:39,170
Having this tremendous trauma as a kid,
for me...

308
00:14:40,630 --> 00:14:46,511
...I could create spaces in my mind
that were real.

309
00:14:46,595 --> 00:14:48,388
While things are happening to me,

310
00:14:48,471 --> 00:14:50,974
no matter what it was--
if it's my father yelling,

311
00:14:51,057 --> 00:14:54,644
or if I'm being violated
or touched inappropriately--

312
00:14:54,728 --> 00:14:58,148
I would go in my mind
to a different place.

313
00:14:59,357 --> 00:15:02,152
One of my places of escape was this yard,

314
00:15:02,235 --> 00:15:05,947
and I could see birds and trees and fields

315
00:15:06,031 --> 00:15:08,283
and hear people having conversations

316
00:15:08,366 --> 00:15:10,910
and see their houses and their cars

317
00:15:10,994 --> 00:15:14,289
and the tiniest detail
of the outlet on the wall,

318
00:15:14,372 --> 00:15:17,000
what was plugged into it and what--
the steam from the coffee.

319
00:15:17,083 --> 00:15:19,419
I could see all these things in my head.

320
00:15:19,502 --> 00:15:24,090
The world was so vivid
and so beautiful and so clear,

321
00:15:24,174 --> 00:15:28,470
that place that I thought was
safe and peaceful

322
00:15:28,553 --> 00:15:31,348
really existed, and I got there.

323
00:15:32,307 --> 00:15:33,725
And I didn't want to leave.

324
00:15:33,808 --> 00:15:38,021
I didn't want to come back down
into myself after the trauma was over.

325
00:15:38,104 --> 00:15:42,192
And the heightened senses
would send me to these moments.

326
00:15:42,275 --> 00:15:46,821
OPRAH: The way he was
literally tortured as a little boy--

327
00:15:46,905 --> 00:15:49,658
that was torture-- and to know
that he was able to separate

328
00:15:49,741 --> 00:15:53,453
in his imagination
without losing his mind.

329
00:15:53,536 --> 00:15:58,625
Because for so many children
who are treated as horrifically as he was,

330
00:15:58,708 --> 00:16:01,127
particularly by the father figure,

331
00:16:01,211 --> 00:16:03,421
they have personality disorders.

332
00:16:03,505 --> 00:16:05,965
And they completely separate,

333
00:16:06,049 --> 00:16:08,009
not just in terms of their imagination

334
00:16:08,093 --> 00:16:12,222
but separate in terms of
personalities in order to, uh,

335
00:16:12,305 --> 00:16:15,600
bear the torture, bear the pain.

336
00:16:15,684 --> 00:16:19,354
Bear the consistent
never knowing when it's gonna come

337
00:16:19,437 --> 00:16:21,106
or how hard it's gonna be,

338
00:16:21,189 --> 00:16:23,191
but you know it's gonna be hard.

339
00:16:24,651 --> 00:16:26,653
His ability to relate to people is

340
00:16:26,736 --> 00:16:29,948
because he comes from
the space of living it

341
00:16:30,031 --> 00:16:31,616
and not just talking it.

342
00:16:31,700 --> 00:16:35,662
And that's why he can speak to
anybody else who's ever been abused

343
00:16:35,745 --> 00:16:39,833
or burdened or involved
in any kind of struggle and crisis,

344
00:16:39,915 --> 00:16:42,460
as children, as adults.

345
00:16:42,544 --> 00:16:47,006
He's one of those people who is able
to turn his pain into some real power.

346
00:16:47,090 --> 00:16:50,593
And he wouldn't be who he is,
he wouldn't have the wealth,

347
00:16:50,677 --> 00:16:53,596
the notoriety,
the ability to tell the stories

348
00:16:53,680 --> 00:16:58,810
in the way that he specifically
is able to hit the nerve

349
00:16:58,893 --> 00:17:03,106
of the African American community,
had he not lived that pain.

350
00:17:04,357 --> 00:17:06,901
TYLER:
People ask, "How can you write, you know,

351
00:17:06,984 --> 00:17:10,363
20 scripts in two weeks?"

352
00:17:10,446 --> 00:17:13,575
It's just I can access that place

353
00:17:13,657 --> 00:17:15,743
and see that world and hear those voices,

354
00:17:15,827 --> 00:17:17,787
and it just floods out of me.

355
00:17:17,871 --> 00:17:21,875
So for-for what some think
is-is weird or strange,

356
00:17:21,958 --> 00:17:26,713
for me, it's just being able to access
a place that I created as a kid

357
00:17:26,796 --> 00:17:29,090
to help me cope,

358
00:17:29,174 --> 00:17:31,760
that now is the very thing
that is sustaining

359
00:17:31,843 --> 00:17:34,095
a lot of what I'm doing in the business.

360
00:17:34,179 --> 00:17:38,933
So, again, everything finding its way
to work together for the good.

361
00:17:45,190 --> 00:17:48,151
ELVIN ROSS: Writing in his journal
was cathartic for him.

362
00:17:48,234 --> 00:17:50,195
He got that from Oprah.

363
00:17:50,278 --> 00:17:52,947
He used to always speak about her
in the early days,

364
00:17:53,031 --> 00:17:57,035
you know, and how that
someday he would meet her.

365
00:17:57,118 --> 00:17:58,745
You know, "Someday I'll meet Oprah.

366
00:17:58,828 --> 00:18:01,122
"Someday we'll be friends, you know?

367
00:18:01,206 --> 00:18:03,458
Someday I'll have my own TV show."

368
00:18:03,541 --> 00:18:05,502
KELEIGH THOMAS MORGAN:
He was so inspired by that episode

369
00:18:05,585 --> 00:18:08,755
where she talked about journaling
and writing things down,

370
00:18:08,838 --> 00:18:12,217
and I think he found healing through that
and catharsis.

371
00:18:12,300 --> 00:18:15,303
And-and that's where the first stories
were born, the first play.

372
00:18:15,595 --> 00:18:19,182
So I love that somebody who inspired him
and who he looked up to,

373
00:18:19,265 --> 00:18:22,435
and who probably seemed...

374
00:18:22,519 --> 00:18:25,230
a lifetime away

375
00:18:25,313 --> 00:18:29,108
ended up becoming one of
his closest confidants.

376
00:18:29,192 --> 00:18:31,277
ALL:
Yay!

377
00:18:31,361 --> 00:18:34,989
But he also used to always talk about
the way she did business.

378
00:18:35,073 --> 00:18:38,159
I watched him walk away
from major networks

379
00:18:38,243 --> 00:18:39,536
because they wouldn't do it his way.

380
00:18:39,619 --> 00:18:41,871
There was a certain formula that he had.

381
00:18:41,955 --> 00:18:44,874
But it goes back to his faith
and what God has told him.

382
00:18:44,958 --> 00:18:48,127
"This is what I've given for you to do.

383
00:18:48,211 --> 00:18:50,964
Stay steadfast and stay focused."

384
00:18:51,047 --> 00:18:53,633
-And that's exactly what he's done.
-(applause)

385
00:18:53,716 --> 00:18:56,511
TARAJI P. HENSON:
Tyler, you are a brilliant visionary

386
00:18:56,594 --> 00:19:00,431
that embodies
what the African American dream truly is.

387
00:19:00,515 --> 00:19:02,684
I am deeply, deeply honored

388
00:19:02,767 --> 00:19:08,106
to present
the 2019 BET Ultimate Icon Award

389
00:19:08,189 --> 00:19:12,193
to my dear, dear friend, Mr. Tyler Perry.

390
00:19:12,277 --> 00:19:14,904
(crowd cheering)

391
00:19:15,989 --> 00:19:17,657
TYLER: I couldn't help
but think about my mother.

392
00:19:17,740 --> 00:19:19,701
I remember being a kid
at about five years old.

393
00:19:19,784 --> 00:19:22,495
She would take me into the projects
with her when she played cards

394
00:19:22,579 --> 00:19:24,914
some Friday nights with a bunch of women.

395
00:19:24,998 --> 00:19:28,001
Now, these women didn't have
more than a 12th grade education,

396
00:19:28,084 --> 00:19:29,794
but they were smart Black women,
they were powerful Black women.

397
00:19:29,878 --> 00:19:32,255
They had great stories to tell.

398
00:19:32,338 --> 00:19:35,216
And I was a five-year-old kid
sitting there on the floor,

399
00:19:35,300 --> 00:19:37,427
playing with my Matchbox cars,
listening to them talk about

400
00:19:37,510 --> 00:19:40,388
their men, their relationships
and their pains.

401
00:19:40,471 --> 00:19:41,848
And when one of them would get really sad,

402
00:19:41,931 --> 00:19:44,517
another woman would come in and
make a joke and they'd all start laughing.

403
00:19:44,601 --> 00:19:46,978
I didn't know
I was in a master class for my life.

404
00:19:47,061 --> 00:19:49,814
I would get home,
and my father would be beating my mother

405
00:19:49,898 --> 00:19:52,108
and doing all kinds of things
and saying all kinds of stuff to her,

406
00:19:52,191 --> 00:19:53,818
and he would leave the room,
and I'd walk in,

407
00:19:53,902 --> 00:19:57,447
and I'd imitate one of those women,
and she would start laughing.

408
00:19:57,530 --> 00:19:59,908
There was a power in that
that I didn't really get.

409
00:19:59,991 --> 00:20:03,119
My first ten movies were
all about her subconsciously,

410
00:20:03,202 --> 00:20:06,706
wanting her to know that she was worthy,
wanting Black women to know you're worthy.

411
00:20:06,789 --> 00:20:09,375
You're special.
You're powerful. You're amazing.

412
00:20:09,459 --> 00:20:11,252
(cheering)

413
00:20:11,336 --> 00:20:13,922
♪ ♪

414
00:20:19,093 --> 00:20:21,846
MAXINE PERRY: When I had Tyler,
or Junior, as I called him,

415
00:20:21,930 --> 00:20:25,975
Emmitt Perry Jr.,
he was my only son for ten years,

416
00:20:26,059 --> 00:20:28,019
so of course I spoiled him rotten.

417
00:20:28,102 --> 00:20:32,440
I would give him a bath
three and four times a day.

418
00:20:32,523 --> 00:20:38,363
I would dress him in this little jumpsuit,
one-piece outfit.

419
00:20:38,446 --> 00:20:40,823
Thought he was so cute in it.

420
00:20:40,907 --> 00:20:45,495
And he grew up to be a very loving child,

421
00:20:45,578 --> 00:20:47,538
very sweet.

422
00:20:47,622 --> 00:20:49,749
He was very sweet.

423
00:20:50,041 --> 00:20:54,671
You know, and with Junior,
I mean, it was just a difference.

424
00:20:57,632 --> 00:21:00,718
LUCKY:
Tyler, he got both of 'em.

425
00:21:00,802 --> 00:21:05,515
He got his... he got his mom humility,

426
00:21:05,598 --> 00:21:08,518
love, grace, peace.

427
00:21:08,601 --> 00:21:11,854
But he got his dad hustle,
his-his work ethic.

428
00:21:11,938 --> 00:21:14,565
You know, he's just not
an asshole like his dad.

429
00:21:14,649 --> 00:21:16,609
No disrespect to my Uncle Emmitt.
I love him.

430
00:21:16,693 --> 00:21:19,278
Yeah, but he was an asshole.
You know, he was truly an asshole.

431
00:21:19,362 --> 00:21:21,614
And he'll see the documentary.
You know, I'll-I'll face him.

432
00:21:21,698 --> 00:21:23,616
(chuckles) I'm an adult now, you know?

433
00:21:23,700 --> 00:21:24,993
But he was, he was a motherfucker, man.

434
00:21:25,076 --> 00:21:26,119
But, um...

435
00:21:26,202 --> 00:21:29,205
but when you're younger, you know,
this the big, bad wolf.

436
00:21:29,288 --> 00:21:32,458
But when you get older,
you confront the big, bad wolf.

437
00:21:32,542 --> 00:21:33,835
And that's what happened with Tyler,
you know?

438
00:21:33,918 --> 00:21:35,586
As he got older, he was like,

439
00:21:35,670 --> 00:21:38,548
"You're not gonna run over me anymore.
You're not gonna step on me anymore."

440
00:21:39,799 --> 00:21:41,342
TYLER:
You know, I think about my mother,

441
00:21:41,426 --> 00:21:45,596
and I think about this 20, 20th,
21st century judgment of her

442
00:21:45,680 --> 00:21:47,682
and how she stayed with this man.

443
00:21:47,765 --> 00:21:50,143
But her mother died when she was 13.

444
00:21:50,226 --> 00:21:52,478
This man married her when she was 17.

445
00:21:52,562 --> 00:21:55,273
She knew nothing about the world.
She knew nothing about life.

446
00:21:55,356 --> 00:21:58,109
And her-- all of her sole support

447
00:21:58,192 --> 00:22:00,486
and everything she knew
and everything she had been taught is

448
00:22:00,570 --> 00:22:03,906
if he paid the bills, you had a good man.

449
00:22:03,990 --> 00:22:06,576
So she stayed in what she knew.

450
00:22:06,659 --> 00:22:09,620
MAXINE:
We got married in 1963.

451
00:22:09,704 --> 00:22:12,331
-We moved to New Orleans.
-WOMAN: Okay.

452
00:22:12,415 --> 00:22:17,837
And I had Yulanda, then Melva right after.

453
00:22:17,920 --> 00:22:20,882
Didn't have too much sense,
just got pregnant.

454
00:22:20,965 --> 00:22:23,760
Young and dumb. And...

455
00:22:23,843 --> 00:22:26,345
TYLER: Having my sister at 18,
my other sister at 19,

456
00:22:26,429 --> 00:22:28,431
me at 24, and here we are.

457
00:22:28,514 --> 00:22:31,517
She's a Black woman in Louisiana
with three kids.

458
00:22:31,601 --> 00:22:32,852
What does she do?

459
00:22:32,935 --> 00:22:35,063
What does she do for work to pay?

460
00:22:35,146 --> 00:22:37,732
To support us? What does she do?

461
00:22:37,815 --> 00:22:40,109
She stayed.

462
00:22:40,193 --> 00:22:43,321
And I have absolutely no judgment for her

463
00:22:43,404 --> 00:22:47,366
because of the pain and the hell
she went through herself

464
00:22:47,450 --> 00:22:50,745
just-just to survive
and to keep the peace.

465
00:22:50,828 --> 00:22:54,582
And on top of all of that, she loved him.

466
00:22:54,665 --> 00:22:58,461
Don't know how, I don't know why,
but I knew she did.

467
00:22:58,544 --> 00:23:01,672
She loved him until the day she died.

468
00:23:04,175 --> 00:23:07,637
I think that her holding on to everything,
holding on to every emotion,

469
00:23:07,720 --> 00:23:10,139
never showing people sadness,

470
00:23:10,223 --> 00:23:13,518
always just smiling and happy
and always wanting peace,

471
00:23:13,601 --> 00:23:15,686
always wanting my father to be smiling.

472
00:23:15,770 --> 00:23:18,147
Like, she would send me in the room
to say hi to him when I didn't want to,

473
00:23:18,231 --> 00:23:19,690
'cause he could walk in a room, I'd leave.

474
00:23:19,774 --> 00:23:21,901
I remember asking my mother,
I was like, "Is he my father?"

475
00:23:21,984 --> 00:23:23,653
'Cause I just could not understand

476
00:23:23,736 --> 00:23:25,696
how this man could look at me

477
00:23:25,780 --> 00:23:29,700
and hate me so diligently, which--

478
00:23:29,784 --> 00:23:31,953
with such passion, he had such hate.

479
00:23:32,036 --> 00:23:34,330
Just the intimidation factor of it,

480
00:23:34,413 --> 00:23:37,792
the... again, the wicked hatred of it.

481
00:23:38,960 --> 00:23:42,338
-♪ Come on, thy weary ♪
-(crowd cheers)

482
00:23:42,421 --> 00:23:46,551
♪ I believe I've got some witnesses
here tonight... ♪

483
00:23:46,634 --> 00:23:48,636
TYLER:
How did I deal?

484
00:23:48,719 --> 00:23:52,682
(stammers)
Listen, if God gave me nothing else,

485
00:23:52,765 --> 00:23:55,685
he gave me a mother who took me to church,

486
00:23:55,768 --> 00:23:57,645
who prayed and believed.

487
00:23:57,728 --> 00:23:59,730
♪ I know he is... ♪

488
00:23:59,814 --> 00:24:04,235
I became Tyler's pastor as a teenager.

489
00:24:04,318 --> 00:24:08,948
And so, it was like God connected me
to him because of his hurt.

490
00:24:10,158 --> 00:24:13,244
TYLER:
The sense of community and faith

491
00:24:13,327 --> 00:24:16,914
and believing carried me through
some of the darkest times

492
00:24:16,998 --> 00:24:22,628
growing up into young adulthood,
of trying to understand

493
00:24:22,712 --> 00:24:26,382
who I was, what I wanted to be in life.

494
00:24:26,465 --> 00:24:29,177
It was all intertwined in the church.

495
00:24:29,260 --> 00:24:31,012
-(lively music playing)
-(rhythmic clapping)

496
00:24:31,095 --> 00:24:33,848
KILLER MIKE: You grow up in a Christian
household, especially in the Black South,

497
00:24:33,931 --> 00:24:36,559
much of your life is
revolved around the church.

498
00:24:36,851 --> 00:24:40,188
In matters of finding the arts,
as Reagan cut the arts out in the '80s,

499
00:24:40,271 --> 00:24:42,773
it really was church plays.

500
00:24:42,857 --> 00:24:44,609
It really was community theater

501
00:24:44,692 --> 00:24:47,361
that kept the arts alive for kids
that may not have had access

502
00:24:47,445 --> 00:24:48,654
through public schools anymore.

503
00:24:48,946 --> 00:24:51,115
ELVIN:
So, growing up in New Orleans,

504
00:24:51,199 --> 00:24:53,284
Tyler and I attended the same church,

505
00:24:53,367 --> 00:24:56,621
which was Greater St. Stephen Baptist
Church-- Full Gospel Baptist Church--

506
00:24:56,704 --> 00:24:58,497
in-in New Orleans, Louisiana.

507
00:24:58,581 --> 00:25:01,626
Greater St. Stephen was like
the event place of the city at the time.

508
00:25:01,709 --> 00:25:03,711
So it was almost like
an outlet for Christians.

509
00:25:03,794 --> 00:25:06,756
People from all walks of life
would attend church there.

510
00:25:06,839 --> 00:25:09,842
It pretty much served as, like,
the church of the city.

511
00:25:10,843 --> 00:25:14,096
(laughs): I was a musician,
one of the fifth string keyboard players,

512
00:25:14,180 --> 00:25:16,557
I used to like to say,
and Tyler was in the choir.

513
00:25:16,641 --> 00:25:21,270
It was a pretty big thing
to attend Greater St. Stephen.

514
00:25:21,354 --> 00:25:23,272
It was an even bigger thing
to be in the choir.

515
00:25:23,356 --> 00:25:26,234
TYLER:
On my mother's side,

516
00:25:26,317 --> 00:25:28,736
my grandfather was a minister,
my great-grandfather was a minister,

517
00:25:28,819 --> 00:25:30,029
his father was a minister,

518
00:25:30,112 --> 00:25:33,032
and we can find ministers going
all the way back to slavery on her side.

519
00:25:33,115 --> 00:25:37,411
So the very church, faith,
God is in my blood.

520
00:25:37,495 --> 00:25:39,038
It's in my DNA.

521
00:25:39,121 --> 00:25:43,793
He's always been...
he's always been a leader.

522
00:25:43,876 --> 00:25:50,132
I know many people may not know the story,
but Tyler, as a teenager,

523
00:25:50,216 --> 00:25:53,344
uh, was-was-was going to be a preacher.

524
00:25:54,595 --> 00:25:56,931
TYLER:
Went to seminary school, studied,

525
00:25:57,014 --> 00:25:58,599
learned more about the Bible.

526
00:25:58,683 --> 00:25:59,934
(chuckles)

527
00:26:00,017 --> 00:26:01,644
It was time for me to do my first sermon.

528
00:26:01,727 --> 00:26:07,566
BISHOP PAUL: In our ministry, you have to
preach what we call a trial sermon.

529
00:26:07,650 --> 00:26:10,528
You really have to be humble. (chuckles)

530
00:26:10,611 --> 00:26:14,865
You have to-- Uh, I mean,
it's-it's just a solemn situation

531
00:26:14,949 --> 00:26:16,784
where you just stand there.

532
00:26:16,867 --> 00:26:18,869
Okay, I shared with you

533
00:26:18,953 --> 00:26:21,080
the kind of word
that you're supposed to give.

534
00:26:21,163 --> 00:26:22,623
I want you to give it.

535
00:26:22,707 --> 00:26:26,085
My Aunt Thelma was there.
My mother was there.

536
00:26:26,168 --> 00:26:29,380
Everybody was so proud, 'cause I--
there I am, doing my first sermon.

537
00:26:29,463 --> 00:26:32,508
And Noah did according unto all...

538
00:26:32,591 --> 00:26:35,261
BISHOP PAUL:
I'm sitting there for the test for him.

539
00:26:35,344 --> 00:26:38,514
He gets up,
honored me, honored the church.

540
00:26:38,597 --> 00:26:41,934
And then, "Listen, y'all, y'all just all…"

541
00:26:42,018 --> 00:26:44,186
(laughs): I mean,
and people are falling out laughing.

542
00:26:44,270 --> 00:26:45,980
(laughter)

543
00:26:46,063 --> 00:26:47,815
(lively chatter)

544
00:26:47,898 --> 00:26:50,151
I said,
"Hey, you're not supposed to do that.

545
00:26:50,234 --> 00:26:53,487
This is a serious time.
You're trying to pass the test."

546
00:26:53,571 --> 00:26:58,326
Uh, and said, "Lord, I thought
you said it was gon' rain."

547
00:26:58,409 --> 00:26:59,410
ALL:
Yeah.

548
00:26:59,493 --> 00:27:03,706
After it was over, he got up behind me,
and he said, in front of everybody,

549
00:27:03,789 --> 00:27:07,793
"You know, if God calls you,
he'll qualify you.

550
00:27:07,877 --> 00:27:11,589
Um, but sometimes you ain't qualified."

551
00:27:11,672 --> 00:27:14,633
I-I stopped him in the beginning.
I said, "No, no, no, no, no.

552
00:27:14,717 --> 00:27:16,135
You're called to do something else."

553
00:27:16,218 --> 00:27:18,554
In front of everybody, in front of
my aunt, in front of everybody.

554
00:27:18,637 --> 00:27:20,097
I was crushed.

555
00:27:20,181 --> 00:27:24,018
So, in my trying to figure out

556
00:27:24,101 --> 00:27:27,897
what I'm gonna do with this thing,

557
00:27:27,980 --> 00:27:31,859
this calling thing,
I hear that voice saying,

558
00:27:31,942 --> 00:27:34,987
"I'm gonna take you to another place
to speak to more people."

559
00:27:35,071 --> 00:27:38,324
I didn't know what that was at the time,
didn't know how I would get there.

560
00:27:38,407 --> 00:27:42,119
And that has been the most frustrating
part of my early life and early career.

561
00:27:42,203 --> 00:27:45,831
Listen, I got a father who says
I'm a stupid mother(bleep),

562
00:27:45,915 --> 00:27:48,250
I'm never gonna be anything.
I'm-I'm a piece of (bleep),

563
00:27:48,334 --> 00:27:49,877
I'm a jackass, every day of my life.

564
00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:53,631
I never thought that people would
actually want to see me do anything,

565
00:27:53,714 --> 00:27:55,966
see-- uh, respect me as an actor.

566
00:27:56,050 --> 00:28:00,388
You add that to white people
controlling every part of it.

567
00:28:00,471 --> 00:28:03,557
I'm like, that-that wasn't even
a possibility or an option.

568
00:28:03,641 --> 00:28:07,853
-♪ Open the floodgates of heaven... ♪
-TYLER: I do remember

569
00:28:07,937 --> 00:28:10,606
being in the choir
and doing this thing about

570
00:28:10,689 --> 00:28:13,609
all of the animals in the ark and Noah.

571
00:28:13,692 --> 00:28:15,903
I do remember that.
I remember standing there.

572
00:28:15,986 --> 00:28:20,741
This is my big time to shine 'cause
I had two lines in front of the church.

573
00:28:20,825 --> 00:28:23,119
-...a problem, 'cause I see no rain.
-Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, sister.

574
00:28:23,202 --> 00:28:25,788
I want to know what you building
that big old thing for.

575
00:28:25,871 --> 00:28:28,207
What you gonna-- God gonna put his shoes
in there or something?

576
00:28:28,290 --> 00:28:29,583
-(laughter)
-What is that?

577
00:28:29,667 --> 00:28:32,420
Well, since you're bringing
two of everything,

578
00:28:32,503 --> 00:28:34,505
I got two air fresheners
'cause I know you need it.

579
00:28:34,588 --> 00:28:36,090
(laughter)

580
00:28:36,173 --> 00:28:39,009
He was able to relate to people.

581
00:28:39,093 --> 00:28:42,263
-We want rain.
-(overlapping chatter)

582
00:28:42,346 --> 00:28:44,098
We want rain.

583
00:28:44,181 --> 00:28:47,393
-Make it rain. Make it rain.
-(crowd chanting)

584
00:28:47,476 --> 00:28:49,562
I think that that's what drove him.

585
00:28:49,645 --> 00:28:53,566
♪ Let it rain, rain ♪

586
00:28:53,649 --> 00:28:55,734
♪ Let it rain ♪

587
00:28:55,818 --> 00:28:56,861
♪ Rain ♪

588
00:28:56,944 --> 00:29:01,907
♪ Let it rain down on me ♪

589
00:29:01,991 --> 00:29:04,869
♪ Rain, rain, rain ♪

590
00:29:04,952 --> 00:29:08,247
♪ Rain down on me ♪

591
00:29:08,330 --> 00:29:12,543
♪ Rain, rain, rain ♪

592
00:29:12,626 --> 00:29:15,004
♪ Rain, rain ♪

593
00:29:15,087 --> 00:29:18,466
♪ Let it rain ♪

594
00:29:19,592 --> 00:29:25,848
♪ Open the floodgates of heaven. ♪

595
00:29:25,931 --> 00:29:28,517
(song ends)

596
00:29:28,601 --> 00:29:30,519
LUCKY:
I tell you this, man.

597
00:29:30,603 --> 00:29:33,564
New Orleans wasn't
extremely supportive of Tyler.

598
00:29:33,647 --> 00:29:35,316
He had to go away.

599
00:29:35,399 --> 00:29:36,734
He love his town, don't get me wrong.

600
00:29:36,817 --> 00:29:39,069
He love his town. He do.

601
00:29:39,153 --> 00:29:43,115
But the town didn't produce Tyler Perry.

602
00:29:44,575 --> 00:29:46,619
You know, Atlanta produced Tyler Perry.

603
00:29:46,702 --> 00:29:48,204
♪ It's Outkast for the boots,
I thought you knew ♪

604
00:29:48,287 --> 00:29:49,705
♪ So now you know, let's go ♪

605
00:29:49,788 --> 00:29:53,501
♪ All the players came
from far and wide... ♪

606
00:29:53,584 --> 00:29:56,378
TYLER: In the '90s,
there was this great migration.

607
00:29:56,462 --> 00:29:58,339
Every Black person was moving to Atlanta.

608
00:29:58,422 --> 00:30:01,008
20-something years old,
put everything I had,

609
00:30:01,091 --> 00:30:03,886
which was nothing, in my Hyundai

610
00:30:03,969 --> 00:30:06,138
and drove to Atlanta.

611
00:30:06,222 --> 00:30:10,351
Moving to Atlanta was a big example
for me to understand what I could be.

612
00:30:10,434 --> 00:30:12,311
♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪

613
00:30:12,394 --> 00:30:15,189
♪ You know, I do some things
more different than I used to... ♪

614
00:30:15,272 --> 00:30:17,775
I see Black people doing well,

615
00:30:17,858 --> 00:30:20,736
and that's not something we had
as Black people in New Orleans.

616
00:30:20,819 --> 00:30:23,572
It was drugs, gangs, rape, murder.

617
00:30:23,656 --> 00:30:26,033
You know, horrible atrocities going on.

618
00:30:26,116 --> 00:30:29,036
And to come out of that
and come into Atlanta,

619
00:30:29,119 --> 00:30:33,207
where the drug dealers in my mind
were replaced by doctors

620
00:30:33,290 --> 00:30:37,044
and lawyers who were Black,
where the people in the neighborhood

621
00:30:37,127 --> 00:30:41,590
had more than what they needed
and felt that they deserved it,

622
00:30:41,674 --> 00:30:43,926
it was like,
"Whoa, this is the promised land."

623
00:30:44,009 --> 00:30:49,139
There's a heart that beats
in this city for Black people to thrive.

624
00:30:49,223 --> 00:30:52,560
That for me is a revelation,

625
00:30:52,643 --> 00:30:56,814
that I deserve it, too,

626
00:30:56,897 --> 00:30:59,066
because I am just as good as anybody else.

627
00:30:59,149 --> 00:31:01,193
(busy chatter)

628
00:31:01,277 --> 00:31:05,239
So, I came here for what-what
the Black kids call Freaknik at the time,

629
00:31:05,322 --> 00:31:07,950
-which-which is spring break.
-(scattered laughter)

630
00:31:08,033 --> 00:31:11,954
But when I saw people doing well,
I knew Atlanta was gonna be my home.

631
00:31:12,037 --> 00:31:15,291
Seeing hope all around me,
that's what this city

632
00:31:15,374 --> 00:31:16,834
and this state has represented for me.

633
00:31:16,917 --> 00:31:18,836
I was working everywhere I could.

634
00:31:18,919 --> 00:31:23,007
Saved enough money to rent the 14th Street
Playhouse and did my first play.

635
00:31:24,383 --> 00:31:26,427
ELVIN:
I moved to Atlanta several years later,

636
00:31:26,510 --> 00:31:29,930
and he came up to me
one Sunday after church and said,

637
00:31:30,014 --> 00:31:32,433
"Hey, you remember me from New Orleans?"
I was like, "Yeah, I actually do."

638
00:31:32,516 --> 00:31:34,893
He was like, "I'm doing this play called
I Know I've Been Changed."

639
00:31:34,977 --> 00:31:38,480
I was like, "Isn't that the same play
that was failing in New Orleans?"

640
00:31:38,564 --> 00:31:40,899
He was like, "Yeah, it's-it's-- you know,
we're-we're-- we picked back up,

641
00:31:40,983 --> 00:31:43,569
and I lost my music director."

642
00:31:43,652 --> 00:31:46,196
TYLER: I rented this place called
the 14th Street Playhouse to do this play,

643
00:31:46,280 --> 00:31:48,157
because I thought
people are gonna show up.

644
00:31:48,240 --> 00:31:50,743
We're rehearsing in the shows.

645
00:31:50,826 --> 00:31:52,286
It's this 200-seat theater.

646
00:31:52,369 --> 00:31:54,830
I keep checking the ticket sales
every day.

647
00:31:54,913 --> 00:31:57,207
They said, "Oh, you sold one today."
All right, we're two weeks out.

648
00:31:57,291 --> 00:31:59,084
"Oh, you've sold four seats."

649
00:31:59,168 --> 00:32:01,045
Uh, okay.

650
00:32:01,128 --> 00:32:04,173
I don't know what the hell I was thinking,
that people were gonna come out

651
00:32:04,256 --> 00:32:07,009
and see a play
on the Fourth of July weekend.

652
00:32:07,092 --> 00:32:09,845
-(indistinct chatter)
-(applause)

653
00:32:10,929 --> 00:32:14,850
PRESENTER: Tonight,
this young man that wrote this play,

654
00:32:14,933 --> 00:32:16,352
and these great cast members,

655
00:32:16,435 --> 00:32:19,313
they have come here
to give us some insight

656
00:32:19,396 --> 00:32:22,816
on the trials and tribulations that
we've been going through in our lives.

657
00:32:22,900 --> 00:32:25,110
Some of us have been
through the storms a lot.

658
00:32:25,194 --> 00:32:26,195
And they're giving us...

659
00:32:26,278 --> 00:32:27,738
KEITH CORSON:
I Know I've Been Changed is about

660
00:32:27,821 --> 00:32:30,115
adult survivors of child sexual abuse

661
00:32:30,199 --> 00:32:33,952
and the lingering ramifications of that
in their lives.

662
00:32:34,036 --> 00:32:35,788
It's telling a very personal story

663
00:32:35,871 --> 00:32:37,706
that is actually really relatable
to a lot of people.

664
00:32:37,790 --> 00:32:40,084
I mean, if you just look at statistics
about how many people have been

665
00:32:40,167 --> 00:32:43,253
victims of sexual assault
and child sexual abuse,

666
00:32:43,337 --> 00:32:45,964
um, it's something
that's not spoken of very much.

667
00:32:46,256 --> 00:32:48,801
But it's something
that a lot of people deal with.

668
00:32:50,177 --> 00:32:54,014
Wrapping that with
an uplifting message at the end,

669
00:32:54,098 --> 00:32:56,517
you can take this trauma
and turn it into something positive.

670
00:32:56,600 --> 00:33:00,813
So Perry has a very motivational premise
with this play.

671
00:33:00,896 --> 00:33:03,232
I remember this.

672
00:33:03,315 --> 00:33:06,068
-(laughs) -CORSON: And I think
that's continued through his work.

673
00:33:06,151 --> 00:33:08,654
TYLER: There were about 30 people
in the audience,

674
00:33:08,737 --> 00:33:11,240
and I thought I'd see 1,200
over the course of the weekend.

675
00:33:11,323 --> 00:33:13,575
That was a hard moment
and hard lesson learned.

676
00:33:13,659 --> 00:33:16,370
Out of the 30 people that were there,
there was someone who said,

677
00:33:16,453 --> 00:33:19,373
"I think this is good. I'll invest."
I was like, "Really?"

678
00:33:19,456 --> 00:33:21,750
I can do the lights.
I will save that money.

679
00:33:21,834 --> 00:33:24,837
All right.
I can sell the candy at intermission,

680
00:33:24,920 --> 00:33:26,547
because I can do that, too.

681
00:33:26,630 --> 00:33:28,507
And then I can be back on stage,
so I've got enough time

682
00:33:28,590 --> 00:33:30,342
to get in costume, sell the candy,
put the lights up.

683
00:33:30,426 --> 00:33:33,220
Oh, and I can drive the truck.
All these things to save money.

684
00:33:33,303 --> 00:33:37,433
We were so broke that
we used to share burgers together.

685
00:33:37,516 --> 00:33:39,685
He would take half.
I'll take the other half.

686
00:33:39,768 --> 00:33:41,645
We would take a handful of fries

687
00:33:41,729 --> 00:33:44,940
and just talk about
these great dreams that he had.

688
00:33:45,023 --> 00:33:48,026
We're splitting a burger, and he's
telling me he's gonna be rich one day.

689
00:33:48,110 --> 00:33:50,446
Uh, he would say, "Man...

690
00:33:50,529 --> 00:33:52,448
you know, they-- it's all
learning experiences," you know?

691
00:33:52,531 --> 00:33:54,533
Uh, uh, it's not failures.

692
00:33:54,616 --> 00:33:56,994
You know, but he believed in hisself,
he believed in his project,

693
00:33:57,077 --> 00:34:00,706
and he wanted to get his message out,
so he stayed the course.

694
00:34:00,789 --> 00:34:03,000
I'd get jobs in between these gigs, right?

695
00:34:03,083 --> 00:34:04,918
So I go to my boss,

696
00:34:05,002 --> 00:34:09,380
and I tell him I need some time off
to go and do this play.

697
00:34:09,465 --> 00:34:13,677
My mother had rented a van
for me to drive the cast.

698
00:34:13,761 --> 00:34:17,723
That was the worst show of my career.
I still have nightmares about it.

699
00:34:17,806 --> 00:34:22,311
I loaded up everything in the truck
and drove down to Spartanburg.

700
00:34:22,393 --> 00:34:26,190
That weekend, a hurricane,
of all weekends, is coming that weekend.

701
00:34:26,273 --> 00:34:28,567
I still did the show. Nobody showed up.

702
00:34:28,650 --> 00:34:30,944
I was coming back,
it's raining so hard I'm flying.

703
00:34:31,027 --> 00:34:32,654
-(thunder crashes)
-This big truck,

704
00:34:32,737 --> 00:34:34,739
with all the stuff in the back of it,

705
00:34:34,822 --> 00:34:37,868
and I got the pedal to the metal
because I was so angry with God.

706
00:34:37,951 --> 00:34:40,996
I'm like, "You told me to do this.
I know I heard the voice.

707
00:34:41,079 --> 00:34:42,371
"What is going on?

708
00:34:42,456 --> 00:34:45,083
Every time I step out here
to do these plays, you leave me."

709
00:34:45,167 --> 00:34:47,628
Over and over and over again it happened.

710
00:34:47,710 --> 00:34:49,379
And I'm just like, "What am I doing?"

711
00:34:49,463 --> 00:34:51,840
And I'm just flying.
Didn't care if I lived or died.

712
00:34:51,924 --> 00:34:53,842
(thunder rumbles)

713
00:34:53,926 --> 00:34:57,429
BISHOP T.D. JAKES: Any time
you're about to have a fresh start,

714
00:34:57,513 --> 00:34:59,848
there's always a storm.

715
00:34:59,932 --> 00:35:03,936
A storm always announces
that you have outgrown where you are...

716
00:35:04,019 --> 00:35:06,271
-(echoes): have outgrown where you are...
-TYLER: But hearing my mother say

717
00:35:06,355 --> 00:35:10,359
that the play will never work,
that was-- that crushed me,

718
00:35:10,442 --> 00:35:13,070
because she was my sole support.

719
00:35:13,153 --> 00:35:18,158
I got home and told her that I didn't make
that $300 to pay for that van.

720
00:35:18,242 --> 00:35:19,785
Oh, that was it.

721
00:35:19,868 --> 00:35:22,496
"(bleep) you mean
you didn't make this mother(bleep)?"

722
00:35:22,579 --> 00:35:25,624
Oh, she-she lost it.

723
00:35:25,707 --> 00:35:27,626
"Give that (bleep) up.
You ain't never gonna make it."

724
00:35:27,709 --> 00:35:30,128
I'll never forget it.
I sat there in tears.

725
00:35:30,212 --> 00:35:32,422
She was in front of me on the sofa,
'cause she was smoking.

726
00:35:32,506 --> 00:35:34,132
She was just like... (imitates puffing)

727
00:35:34,216 --> 00:35:37,177
"You spent-- How-how the hell I'm-a pay
this $300 on the (bleep) credit card

728
00:35:37,261 --> 00:35:39,972
'cause you run--
running out doing this mother(bleep)..."

729
00:35:40,055 --> 00:35:42,140
And she's just smoking, right?

730
00:35:42,224 --> 00:35:46,061
And I'm sitting back on the sofa
as she's there doing it,

731
00:35:46,144 --> 00:35:49,189
and tears are just running down my face.

732
00:35:49,273 --> 00:35:52,526
And she's smoking and she realizes that,
at some point in all her cussing,

733
00:35:52,609 --> 00:35:54,486
she's realizing I'm quiet.

734
00:35:54,570 --> 00:35:56,738
She turned around
and she sees the tears on my face.

735
00:35:56,822 --> 00:35:59,241
She said--
and then she got water in her eyes.

736
00:35:59,324 --> 00:36:00,868
She's like, "Baby, I'm so sorry.

737
00:36:00,951 --> 00:36:03,745
I just want you to just get you a job."

738
00:36:03,829 --> 00:36:06,498
I got home to an eviction notice,
of course,

739
00:36:06,582 --> 00:36:09,251
and ended up out on the streets.

740
00:36:09,334 --> 00:36:13,755
♪ I... ♪

741
00:36:13,839 --> 00:36:15,799
♪ Know I've been changed… ♪

742
00:36:15,883 --> 00:36:20,053
After about seven years of doing the show
over and over again and it not working,

743
00:36:20,137 --> 00:36:22,556
I had got another job, so defeated.

744
00:36:22,639 --> 00:36:24,558
I said, "Okay, that's it.
I'm not doing this anymore."

745
00:36:24,641 --> 00:36:27,811
And I got a call from these promoters
saying they had an opportunity

746
00:36:27,895 --> 00:36:32,190
to do the show at the House of Blues,
and they wanted me to do it one more time.

747
00:36:32,274 --> 00:36:35,903
And I was like,
"Eh, no, I'm over it. I'm done."

748
00:36:35,986 --> 00:36:39,990
I started thinking and hearing that voice
and praying that I should do it.

749
00:36:40,073 --> 00:36:42,367
This time, I had been homeless,
out on the street.

750
00:36:42,451 --> 00:36:44,161
I know what that feels like.
I don't want to do that again.

751
00:36:44,244 --> 00:36:46,455
I know that I can depend
on this money coming in.

752
00:36:46,538 --> 00:36:48,165
But that voice was so clear.

753
00:36:48,248 --> 00:36:51,126
So I went and told the man that I quit.

754
00:36:51,209 --> 00:36:52,711
We're gonna do the show.

755
00:36:52,794 --> 00:36:57,215
So I'm thinking this is gonna be
the same story all over again.

756
00:36:57,299 --> 00:36:58,634
I just wanted to get through the show.

757
00:36:58,717 --> 00:37:00,677
I sat in the dressing room
the night of the show,

758
00:37:00,761 --> 00:37:03,180
and I said, "God, you know what?
I've had enough."

759
00:37:03,263 --> 00:37:04,932
It's-- I was 28 at the time, and I said,

760
00:37:05,015 --> 00:37:08,518
"I-I can't go on living like this.
You-- I know you told me to do this,

761
00:37:08,602 --> 00:37:11,605
"I know you keep bringing me out here,
but I don't hear from you

762
00:37:11,688 --> 00:37:14,107
"when I get in these situations,
when I can't pay the rent,

763
00:37:14,191 --> 00:37:16,526
"when I can't pay the bills,
when I got friends and family,

764
00:37:16,610 --> 00:37:18,820
I'm calling them for 20,
30 dollars so that I can eat."

765
00:37:19,112 --> 00:37:21,323
-But when God is telling you something...
-WOMAN: Mm.

766
00:37:21,406 --> 00:37:24,326
-...and you know it in your spirit...
-Yes.

767
00:37:24,409 --> 00:37:26,578
...you walk into what God is telling you.

768
00:37:26,662 --> 00:37:29,623
So what I did was I said,
"Okay, I'm not doing it no more, God."

769
00:37:29,706 --> 00:37:31,750
And I heard a still,
small voice say to me,

770
00:37:31,833 --> 00:37:33,752
-"I am God.
-(scattered cheering)

771
00:37:33,835 --> 00:37:36,588
I tell you when it's over.
You don't tell me when it's over."

772
00:37:36,672 --> 00:37:37,881
(cheering, applause)

773
00:37:40,384 --> 00:37:43,804
I got up and I looked out the window,
and there was a line around the corner,

774
00:37:43,887 --> 00:37:47,557
in the cold, trying to get into
the Tabernacle, with House of Blues.

775
00:37:47,641 --> 00:37:49,559
The show starts. I walk out onstage.

776
00:37:49,643 --> 00:37:51,770
It's packed to the rafters.

777
00:37:51,853 --> 00:37:54,940
Every joke is hitting,
every line is hitting.

778
00:37:55,023 --> 00:37:59,444
They are loving it. They are rolling
back and forth in the chairs.

779
00:37:59,528 --> 00:38:02,280
End of the show, I come out
to take a bow, standing ovation.

780
00:38:02,364 --> 00:38:05,200
Dust literally shaking,
coming down from the rafters

781
00:38:05,283 --> 00:38:08,286
-from all the noise in the room.
-(cheering)

782
00:38:08,370 --> 00:38:11,456
My life shifted in that moment.
It changed in that moment.

783
00:38:11,540 --> 00:38:13,458
I got a call from a national promoter
who said,

784
00:38:13,542 --> 00:38:15,919
"We want to take you to the Fox Theater
next week."

785
00:38:16,003 --> 00:38:17,796
4,500-seat theater.

786
00:38:17,879 --> 00:38:20,173
I think we did three or four shows,
sold them all out.

787
00:38:20,257 --> 00:38:23,885
It was the beginning of something
that I wasn't prepared for,

788
00:38:23,969 --> 00:38:27,139
because I had had
all of this negativity in my life.

789
00:38:27,222 --> 00:38:30,434
I had all these people tell me
what I would never be.

790
00:38:30,517 --> 00:38:33,145
Nobody said what I could be.

791
00:38:33,228 --> 00:38:36,773
And now, all of a sudden,
I had success for the first time.

792
00:38:36,857 --> 00:38:38,859
-(singer vocalizing)
-(cheering)

793
00:38:41,611 --> 00:38:43,238
♪ Yes, he did. ♪

794
00:38:43,321 --> 00:38:45,824
TYLER: And the show was bigger
and better than ever.

795
00:38:45,907 --> 00:38:47,325
New set, new lights, new sound.

796
00:38:47,409 --> 00:38:48,785
It-It's over the top.

797
00:38:48,869 --> 00:38:50,454
I'm actually leaving the show
to go do the new show,

798
00:38:50,537 --> 00:38:52,664
which is called
I Can Do Bad All By Myself.

799
00:38:52,748 --> 00:38:54,458
INTERVIEWER:
Okay, and are you in this particular one?

800
00:38:54,541 --> 00:38:57,502
Yes, I am. I play a 68-year-old woman
named Madea,

801
00:38:57,586 --> 00:38:59,963
-who... Yeah.
-(laughs) A 68-year-old woman? Oh.

802
00:39:02,049 --> 00:39:05,135
TYLER: I was gonna do
the Madea character small,

803
00:39:05,218 --> 00:39:07,804
really quick, onstage five minutes,

804
00:39:07,888 --> 00:39:09,681
make the people laugh
and get off the stage.

805
00:39:09,765 --> 00:39:13,685
I don't owe you nothing!

806
00:39:13,769 --> 00:39:17,189
ELVIN: He had started out with Daddy Joe
in I Know I've Been Changed.

807
00:39:18,523 --> 00:39:20,567
And then he moved to the character Madea.

808
00:39:22,027 --> 00:39:25,197
The first stop we did was in Chicago.

809
00:39:25,280 --> 00:39:30,202
It was Madea and another artist
that was supposed to be in the play.

810
00:39:30,285 --> 00:39:31,828
TYLER:
Sold all these tickets out in Chicago

811
00:39:31,912 --> 00:39:33,413
for her to be there,
and she never showed up.

812
00:39:33,497 --> 00:39:37,084
So all these people come in
looking for her, and she wasn't there.

813
00:39:37,167 --> 00:39:38,960
It was really scary,
and I had to go onstage

814
00:39:39,044 --> 00:39:41,046
and do the Madea lines and her line.

815
00:39:41,129 --> 00:39:43,882
We're looking at an audience, and they're
looking like, "Are you kidding us?"

816
00:39:43,965 --> 00:39:46,718
TYLER:
Somebody tell me what is going on.

817
00:39:48,011 --> 00:39:50,263
ELVIN:
I looked at him, I was like,

818
00:39:50,347 --> 00:39:52,224
"It feels like
we just lost the Super Bowl."

819
00:39:52,307 --> 00:39:53,517
TYLER: I tell you
how much I appreciate your patience,

820
00:39:53,600 --> 00:39:55,727
'cause I know that
this has been a struggle.

821
00:39:55,811 --> 00:39:57,938
I know it's been difficult.
It's been difficult for us.

822
00:39:58,021 --> 00:40:02,526
ELVIN: After all of that success,
there was there another failure.

823
00:40:02,609 --> 00:40:06,279
When you walk into a season that's yours,
I don't care what is happening around you.

824
00:40:06,363 --> 00:40:09,157
No matter what it is or who it is,
nobody can stop you,

825
00:40:09,241 --> 00:40:11,451
nobody can keep you
from getting to what's your--

826
00:40:11,535 --> 00:40:12,702
You paid your dues.

827
00:40:12,994 --> 00:40:15,497
No man has done this,
so no man can take it away.

828
00:40:15,580 --> 00:40:18,083
And I wake up every morning
thanking God for it.

829
00:40:18,166 --> 00:40:19,876
(phone ringing)

830
00:40:19,960 --> 00:40:23,630
ELVIN: He called me early in the morning,
says, "Get up."

831
00:40:23,713 --> 00:40:25,924
I'm like, "Okay."

832
00:40:26,007 --> 00:40:27,342
"We're gonna fix it."

833
00:40:27,425 --> 00:40:30,637
He worked on the script.

834
00:40:30,720 --> 00:40:32,472
We met for rehearsal.

835
00:40:32,556 --> 00:40:34,766
We worked on some music.

836
00:40:34,850 --> 00:40:37,769
And that Wednesday night-- show opened
on Tuesday-- that Wednesday night,

837
00:40:37,853 --> 00:40:42,566
he came out as Madea,
and he got some laughs.

838
00:40:42,649 --> 00:40:44,192
-(humming)
-(phone rings)

839
00:40:45,360 --> 00:40:47,404
-(deep voice): Hello?
-(laughter)

840
00:40:47,487 --> 00:40:50,657
(Madea's voice): Oh, hey, girl,
how you doing? Girl, I thought...

841
00:40:50,740 --> 00:40:52,075
ELVIN:
The next night, we worked it again.

842
00:40:52,159 --> 00:40:54,578
The next day, we got bigger laughs.

843
00:40:55,829 --> 00:40:58,415
-Well, how I look today?
-Oh, you look nice, too, Miss Ma'am.

844
00:40:58,498 --> 00:41:00,125
-Thank you so much. (laughs)
-(laughter)

845
00:41:00,208 --> 00:41:03,628
ELVIN: By the time
we got to the end of the weekend,

846
00:41:03,712 --> 00:41:05,672
the theater was full,
and everybody was humming.

847
00:41:05,755 --> 00:41:07,674
He had completely worked the play.

848
00:41:07,757 --> 00:41:10,677
Madea had become the star.

849
00:41:12,470 --> 00:41:13,680
MAN:
Absolutely loved it.

850
00:41:13,763 --> 00:41:15,932
WOMAN:
He plays the characters.

851
00:41:16,016 --> 00:41:17,350
Would have to be Madea. We're...

852
00:41:17,434 --> 00:41:19,686
Hands down, Madea. (laughs) Hands down.

853
00:41:19,769 --> 00:41:22,439
I loved it. I loved it. I loved it.

854
00:41:22,522 --> 00:41:24,441
We loved it. Absolutely loved it.

855
00:41:24,524 --> 00:41:26,193
We'd come see it ten billion more times.

856
00:41:26,276 --> 00:41:30,989
Madea is this larger-than-life character
who can tell you all about yourself.

857
00:41:31,072 --> 00:41:33,074
Tell you all you-- all about yourself,

858
00:41:33,158 --> 00:41:36,286
drink you under the table
and cuss you out.

859
00:41:36,369 --> 00:41:37,495
And then tuck you in.

860
00:41:37,579 --> 00:41:39,873
TYLER: It's a Southern term.
It's short for "Mother Dear."

861
00:41:39,956 --> 00:41:42,626
KILLER MIKE: I think it's important to say
the African American community,

862
00:41:42,709 --> 00:41:45,295
especially in the South,
is a matriarchal one.

863
00:41:45,378 --> 00:41:47,297
Our families are ran by big mamas.

864
00:41:47,380 --> 00:41:50,342
You can be whatever you want
to be in this world.

865
00:41:50,634 --> 00:41:52,052
KILLER MIKE:
You don't have a Black Panther Party

866
00:41:52,135 --> 00:41:53,887
without the female contingent.

867
00:41:53,970 --> 00:41:56,932
-I like that. Okay, okay.
-If you're Black and from the South,

868
00:41:57,015 --> 00:41:59,059
you know Madea,
like, straight up. (laughs)

869
00:41:59,142 --> 00:42:01,061
You just-- it may be your aunt,

870
00:42:01,144 --> 00:42:02,687
it may be your mom,
maybe your grandmother or your sister.

871
00:42:02,771 --> 00:42:06,858
You know someone who's loosely familiar
with the principles of the Bible.

872
00:42:06,942 --> 00:42:08,193
May not have ever read it.

873
00:42:08,276 --> 00:42:11,279
But-- (laughs) But will tell you,
"Jesus said, 'Be nice to your cousin.'"

874
00:42:11,363 --> 00:42:13,198
You like, "Jesus never-- "
"What did I say?"

875
00:42:13,281 --> 00:42:14,950
-Didn't I tell you not to grab...
-(laughter)

876
00:42:15,033 --> 00:42:16,284
KILLER MIKE:
For me, it's-it's brilliant.

877
00:42:16,368 --> 00:42:19,829
You know your cousin
that struggles with addiction.

878
00:42:20,121 --> 00:42:22,165
And you know your cousins
that had to go live with an aunt.

879
00:42:22,249 --> 00:42:24,167
And you know those cousins
only made it through high school

880
00:42:24,251 --> 00:42:25,877
and became independent adults

881
00:42:25,961 --> 00:42:28,255
because that aunt embraced them
and took them in.

882
00:42:28,463 --> 00:42:30,465
Well, come by in the daylight.
Hell, don't come by at o' dark-thirty.

883
00:42:30,548 --> 00:42:32,384
Madea, please.

884
00:42:32,467 --> 00:42:33,885
-(sighs softly)
-(insects chirping)

885
00:42:35,136 --> 00:42:37,889
Come on in here.

886
00:42:37,973 --> 00:42:40,058
JOE:
Who that is at the door?

887
00:42:40,141 --> 00:42:43,103
-I'm getting tired of all these people...
-Shut up, Joe! I got this!

888
00:42:44,312 --> 00:42:47,148
-♪ I've been ♪
-TYLER: The show started to take off.

889
00:42:47,232 --> 00:42:51,027
-♪ Loving you... ♪
-And I was traveling from city to city,

890
00:42:51,111 --> 00:42:56,992
seeing 99.999% Black people,
packed to the rafters.

891
00:42:57,075 --> 00:42:59,995
-(cheering) -REPORTER: Soon
he was performing 300 shows a year

892
00:43:00,078 --> 00:43:02,372
for 30,000 people a week.

893
00:43:02,455 --> 00:43:07,877
His plays toured in sold-out arenas along
the South's so-called "Chitlin Circuit."

894
00:43:07,961 --> 00:43:10,922
(blues guitar solo)

895
00:43:11,006 --> 00:43:13,216
TREAANDREA RUSSWORM: There's
a rich tradition of gospel theater,

896
00:43:13,300 --> 00:43:15,218
and there's a rich tradition of

897
00:43:15,302 --> 00:43:18,972
the chitlin circuit, a sort of Black
theater and performance history.

898
00:43:19,055 --> 00:43:21,016
♪ ♪

899
00:43:21,099 --> 00:43:22,559
TYLER:
That circuit was so wonderful.

900
00:43:22,642 --> 00:43:24,644
I mean, you had Josephine Baker
and Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald,

901
00:43:24,728 --> 00:43:28,815
and all of these people who could not
perform in white establishments,

902
00:43:28,898 --> 00:43:30,900
so they went on the road
and to all these little juke joints

903
00:43:30,984 --> 00:43:33,111
with chicken fries and chitlins.

904
00:43:33,194 --> 00:43:35,238
And they traveled the country,
and they became so famous

905
00:43:35,322 --> 00:43:37,115
among their own people

906
00:43:37,198 --> 00:43:40,327
that they were able to support themselves
and live well.

907
00:43:40,410 --> 00:43:42,287
♪ You were tired... ♪

908
00:43:42,370 --> 00:43:44,080
KILLER MIKE:
So in matters of the Chitlin Circuit,

909
00:43:44,164 --> 00:43:46,708
for me, the spirit of it is
a very real and true spirit,

910
00:43:46,791 --> 00:43:48,126
and I think he's genius to have done it.

911
00:43:48,209 --> 00:43:50,920
WHOOPI:
He's standing on all of those shoulders.

912
00:43:51,004 --> 00:43:54,049
He's a giant upon giant shoulders.

913
00:43:54,132 --> 00:43:56,384
♪ ♪

914
00:43:57,469 --> 00:43:59,262
Can you do that one more time?
Yeah, just like that.

915
00:43:59,346 --> 00:44:00,847
Ow!

916
00:44:00,930 --> 00:44:02,724
(cheering, applause)

917
00:44:02,807 --> 00:44:03,933
Yeah, just one more time!

918
00:44:07,562 --> 00:44:10,565
♪ With you, my life... ♪

919
00:44:10,648 --> 00:44:15,236
TYLER:
I was on the road from 1998 until 2004

920
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:17,864
doing 300-and-something performances
a year,

921
00:44:17,947 --> 00:44:20,909
all over the country, end to end.

922
00:44:20,992 --> 00:44:23,703
And before social media,
I'm out at the end of the show saying,

923
00:44:23,787 --> 00:44:25,538
you know, "Sign up for my mailing list.

924
00:44:25,622 --> 00:44:26,706
Here's my website."
People were like, "Your what?

925
00:44:26,790 --> 00:44:29,125
Your www-what?"

926
00:44:29,209 --> 00:44:31,711
And I had a few million people
following me on my website,

927
00:44:31,795 --> 00:44:34,881
so I could send out an email
and sell out theaters and arenas

928
00:44:34,964 --> 00:44:37,300
all over the country
before we even advertised anything.

929
00:44:37,384 --> 00:44:40,428
CORSON: What Perry started doing
and has continued to do is that

930
00:44:40,512 --> 00:44:43,848
he's put up the financial backing
for his own projects

931
00:44:43,932 --> 00:44:47,435
and-and taken the risk if it went wrong.

932
00:44:47,519 --> 00:44:51,356
It was a beautiful thing
for me to understand that

933
00:44:51,439 --> 00:44:56,027
we had the power
to support and lift each other.

934
00:44:56,111 --> 00:44:58,238
Because when I came on to the circuit,

935
00:44:58,321 --> 00:45:01,950
no one was talking about
the things that were really plaguing us

936
00:45:02,033 --> 00:45:07,038
as a community, like molestation and rape
and drug addiction, to this degree,

937
00:45:07,122 --> 00:45:10,250
so I wanted to p-paint it
in a-- in-in a frame

938
00:45:10,333 --> 00:45:12,460
of making you laugh,

939
00:45:12,544 --> 00:45:15,380
and laugh so hard
that you get so comfortable.

940
00:45:15,463 --> 00:45:17,674
-(laughter)
-At the end of the show,

941
00:45:17,757 --> 00:45:19,676
I'm gonna take about 20 minutes,

942
00:45:19,759 --> 00:45:23,138
and I'm gonna talk about what's
plaguing us and how we help each other.

943
00:45:23,346 --> 00:45:25,014
What am I supposed to do now?

944
00:45:25,098 --> 00:45:26,641
MADEA:
Get up and go on with your life.

945
00:45:28,017 --> 00:45:30,186
It's all right to sit around,
be depressed for a minute,

946
00:45:30,270 --> 00:45:33,731
cry about it, do whatever you have to,
but don't stay there too long.

947
00:45:33,815 --> 00:45:36,317
Get up and go on with your life.

948
00:45:36,401 --> 00:45:37,986
-(applause)
-MARK E. SWINTON: The biggest difference

949
00:45:38,069 --> 00:45:42,323
between a Tyler Perry play
and a traditional theater or Broadway play

950
00:45:42,407 --> 00:45:44,492
is that they cater to different audiences.

951
00:45:44,576 --> 00:45:47,495
And I remember taking my mom
to Broadway plays

952
00:45:47,579 --> 00:45:49,456
and was always excited to do that.

953
00:45:49,539 --> 00:45:54,461
And I remember one day she said to me,
"I like going to the Broadway plays,

954
00:45:54,544 --> 00:45:58,339
but I really like
going to see Tyler Perry plays."

955
00:45:58,631 --> 00:45:59,883
(laughter)

956
00:45:59,966 --> 00:46:04,262
And I remember I asked her why,
and she said, "Well, I feel safe there."

957
00:46:05,472 --> 00:46:08,516
Well, Tyler Perry, we love you,
we love you, we love you.

958
00:46:08,600 --> 00:46:11,686
-WOMAN: They love it and will.
-We love Madea.

959
00:46:11,769 --> 00:46:15,315
CORSON: Some people kind of
look at-at Madea as...

960
00:46:15,398 --> 00:46:19,277
a continuation of the-the fat suit,
uh, and the drag performance

961
00:46:19,360 --> 00:46:22,530
that kind of emasculates
Black male performers.

962
00:46:22,614 --> 00:46:23,781
Oh, that's wonderful.

963
00:46:23,865 --> 00:46:26,659
I can't wait for Sherman
to bring me home some grandbabies.

964
00:46:26,743 --> 00:46:28,786
You see this with Eddie Murphy.
You see this with Martin Lawrence.

965
00:46:28,870 --> 00:46:32,790
Um, but it's doing something
much more nuanced and complicated.

966
00:46:32,874 --> 00:46:34,083
It's not making fun of.

967
00:46:34,167 --> 00:46:38,963
It is, um, kind of embodying with respect.

968
00:46:39,047 --> 00:46:40,757
Madea?

969
00:46:43,218 --> 00:46:46,387
If Tyler Perry is the Tyler Perry
the producer, the director,

970
00:46:46,471 --> 00:46:51,017
Tyler Perry not in drag
is a centerpiece of his brand,

971
00:46:51,100 --> 00:46:53,603
then Madea is right there next to him,
right?

972
00:46:53,686 --> 00:46:56,689
So this character looms large in his work

973
00:46:56,773 --> 00:46:59,651
and in the public interaction
with his work,

974
00:46:59,734 --> 00:47:02,320
uh, both at the fan base level,

975
00:47:02,403 --> 00:47:07,242
um, being that Madea is probably
the signature portion

976
00:47:07,325 --> 00:47:10,620
of-of what people gravitate toward
or have gravitated toward

977
00:47:10,703 --> 00:47:13,456
in appreciating Tyler Perry
and in the critiques.

978
00:47:13,665 --> 00:47:15,792
Madea has got to be
the centerpiece of that as well.

979
00:47:15,875 --> 00:47:18,211
So Madea is important.

980
00:47:18,294 --> 00:47:20,213
Madea is a big part of
Tyler Perry's brand.

981
00:47:20,296 --> 00:47:24,050
ANNOUNCER:
And now, New Orleans, Mr. Tyler Perry.

982
00:47:24,133 --> 00:47:26,761
DR. SAMANTHA N. SHEPPARD: And
Tyler Perry is the center of his world.

983
00:47:26,844 --> 00:47:28,263
He's the sun, he's the moon,

984
00:47:28,346 --> 00:47:31,266
he's the entire universe,
and he's God himself.

985
00:47:31,349 --> 00:47:33,226
He's the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit.

986
00:47:33,309 --> 00:47:35,812
Like, that's who he is for his work.

987
00:47:35,895 --> 00:47:40,191
And, in doing so, it really is about him.

988
00:47:40,275 --> 00:47:42,193
And when I say it's about him,

989
00:47:42,277 --> 00:47:44,737
I want to actually make a shift
in how we understand this.

990
00:47:44,821 --> 00:47:48,741
Yes, the representational politics
are problematic around women.

991
00:47:49,033 --> 00:47:51,828
But if we peel back the disguise
even just a little bit,

992
00:47:51,911 --> 00:47:55,582
if it's about Tyler Perry,
then it really is about patriarchy.

993
00:47:55,665 --> 00:47:57,500
It's about Black patriarchy.

994
00:47:57,584 --> 00:48:00,545
It's about toxic Black patriarchy.
It's about masculinity.

995
00:48:00,628 --> 00:48:02,797
It's about the way that Black men

996
00:48:02,880 --> 00:48:07,176
have not and continue to not understand
Black women's experiences,

997
00:48:07,260 --> 00:48:09,554
even as they view up close.

998
00:48:09,637 --> 00:48:11,431
In fact, we should be even weary.

999
00:48:11,514 --> 00:48:13,933
You are so close
to Black women's experiences,

1000
00:48:14,017 --> 00:48:15,435
so close to the traumas,

1001
00:48:15,518 --> 00:48:17,604
and yet it's still illegible for you.

1002
00:48:17,687 --> 00:48:19,814
You still don't understand.

1003
00:48:21,691 --> 00:48:24,569
HOBSON:
It is a man playing the character,

1004
00:48:24,652 --> 00:48:29,407
but this man is so good at understanding
this woman and women like her.

1005
00:48:29,490 --> 00:48:32,827
And as a man,
he validates a lot of women's feelings.

1006
00:48:32,910 --> 00:48:37,332
The Black woman component is an important
cultural voice out of our community,

1007
00:48:37,415 --> 00:48:41,377
because it is the truest representation
of leadership in our community.

1008
00:48:41,461 --> 00:48:43,004
CARL HANCOCK RUX:
Let's put the Black male

1009
00:48:43,087 --> 00:48:47,383
in a Black female dress and empower him

1010
00:48:47,467 --> 00:48:51,763
with the ability
to become the ultimate savior,

1011
00:48:51,846 --> 00:48:56,142
in order to empower
the victimized Black female body.

1012
00:48:56,225 --> 00:48:58,102
All of these things are abstractions.

1013
00:48:58,186 --> 00:49:01,731
None of these things are
actually about humanity.

1014
00:49:01,814 --> 00:49:04,108
None of these things are actually
about looking at each other.

1015
00:49:04,400 --> 00:49:07,195
So it's really not
the Diary of a Mad Black Woman

1016
00:49:07,278 --> 00:49:09,530
or-or an Angry Black Woman.

1017
00:49:09,614 --> 00:49:11,616
It's-it's the Diary of a Puppet.

1018
00:49:13,409 --> 00:49:16,204
BALDWIN:
I can only speak as... as what I am.

1019
00:49:16,412 --> 00:49:17,955
I'm a kind of poet.

1020
00:49:18,039 --> 00:49:20,208
And if I'm a kind of poet,
then I'm responsible

1021
00:49:20,291 --> 00:49:24,212
for my own point of view
to the people who produce me...

1022
00:49:25,546 --> 00:49:26,881
...and the people who will come after me.

1023
00:49:26,964 --> 00:49:30,968
CRITIC 1: ...understand why my grandmother
and my mother and my aunts

1024
00:49:31,052 --> 00:49:34,472
love this stuff, and my family down South,
why they love this stuff.

1025
00:49:34,555 --> 00:49:37,016
I just can't watch it without cringing.

1026
00:49:37,100 --> 00:49:39,477
CRITIC 2: His latest film,
I think he's crossed the line.

1027
00:49:39,560 --> 00:49:43,272
I mean, I see some kind of
misogynistic tendencies in there

1028
00:49:43,356 --> 00:49:45,608
that I don't know
what he's trying to work out on film.

1029
00:49:45,692 --> 00:49:48,611
Probably needs to work it out
in therapy in a hotel...

1030
00:49:48,695 --> 00:49:50,822
CRITIC 3: I noticed that
a whole lot of entertainers,

1031
00:49:50,905 --> 00:49:53,825
artists, they come from backgrounds

1032
00:49:53,908 --> 00:49:57,912
of pain and just abuse

1033
00:49:57,995 --> 00:50:00,832
(echoing):
and all kind of stuff.

1034
00:50:00,915 --> 00:50:02,542
("Mr. Morale" by Kendrick Lamar
& Tanna Leone playing)

1035
00:50:02,625 --> 00:50:04,544
(heavy rhythmic breathing)

1036
00:50:04,627 --> 00:50:06,796
♪ ♪

1037
00:50:06,879 --> 00:50:08,673
♪ Enoch, your father's just detoxed,
my calling is right on time ♪

1038
00:50:08,756 --> 00:50:11,634
♪ Transformation,
I must had a thousand lives ♪

1039
00:50:11,718 --> 00:50:12,885
♪ And like 3,000 wives ♪

1040
00:50:12,969 --> 00:50:15,805
Jamie Foxx had to hang up the dress,

1041
00:50:15,888 --> 00:50:20,685
but Tyler Perry has become a billionaire
and still likes to put on a dress.

1042
00:50:20,768 --> 00:50:22,520
♪ ... on my mind and it's heavy ♪

1043
00:50:22,603 --> 00:50:24,313
♪ Tell you in pieces
'cause it's way too heavy... ♪

1044
00:50:24,397 --> 00:50:29,402
How come Black Lives Matter
isn't out here protesting

1045
00:50:29,485 --> 00:50:31,571
the fact that another Black man

1046
00:50:31,654 --> 00:50:34,782
is dressing up as a woman
in order to make a buck?

1047
00:50:34,866 --> 00:50:37,243
-♪ When there's no one to call ♪
-♪ Don't need no conversation... ♪

1048
00:50:37,326 --> 00:50:38,953
-(bleep) you!
-Go out to the world

1049
00:50:39,036 --> 00:50:41,372
-and appeal to the masses.
-(overlapping angry shouting)

1050
00:50:41,456 --> 00:50:44,959
He said to preach the gospel.

1051
00:50:45,042 --> 00:50:51,215
Preach the gospel of your sin and repent.

1052
00:50:51,299 --> 00:50:52,633
Jesus Christ...

1053
00:50:52,717 --> 00:50:53,801
(bleep) all y'all!

1054
00:50:53,885 --> 00:50:57,346
KENYA BARRIS: I feel like you have
figured out the beat of your own drum,

1055
00:50:57,430 --> 00:51:00,141
and that's what you dance to,
and it works for you.

1056
00:51:00,224 --> 00:51:01,809
You don't seem like you care.

1057
00:51:01,893 --> 00:51:03,311
I don't.

1058
00:51:03,394 --> 00:51:04,645
I don't know how you do it, man.

1059
00:51:04,937 --> 00:51:06,314
TYLER: Nina Simone said this,
and I never forgot it.

1060
00:51:06,397 --> 00:51:08,107
She said, "You will use up
everything you've got

1061
00:51:08,191 --> 00:51:10,318
trying to give everybody what they want."

1062
00:51:10,401 --> 00:51:14,405
My mother, she told me the value
of being who I am, of my Blackness.

1063
00:51:14,489 --> 00:51:17,158
She said, "Don't you ever
let anybody tell you who you are.

1064
00:51:17,241 --> 00:51:19,410
You know who you are.
You know where you come from."

1065
00:51:19,494 --> 00:51:21,496
I watched her stories,
I watched her struggles,

1066
00:51:21,579 --> 00:51:22,997
and I'm telling the stories
that I come from.

1067
00:51:23,080 --> 00:51:24,957
And that's why they're winning,

1068
00:51:25,041 --> 00:51:27,418
because people are recognizing themselves
in these stories.

1069
00:51:27,502 --> 00:51:29,212
No matter what the critics are saying,
"Oh, I don't get this (bleep).

1070
00:51:29,295 --> 00:51:31,088
I don't understand what it is."

1071
00:51:31,172 --> 00:51:32,965
I don't give a (bleep)
'cause I'm talking to us.

1072
00:51:33,049 --> 00:51:36,385
That's why millions of people are
watching my shows every week.

1073
00:51:36,469 --> 00:51:39,472
That's why people keep showing up
and sending the movies to number one.

1074
00:51:39,555 --> 00:51:41,891
I'm talking to us, connecting with us.

1075
00:51:41,974 --> 00:51:43,267
You know what I'm saying?

1076
00:51:43,351 --> 00:51:45,436
♪ What you know about Black trauma? ♪

1077
00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:47,230
♪ F&N's kicking back is another genre ♪

1078
00:51:47,313 --> 00:51:49,148
♪ Tyler Perry,
the face of a thousand rappers ♪

1079
00:51:49,232 --> 00:51:51,317
♪ Tyler Perry, the face of
a thousand rappers ♪

1080
00:51:51,400 --> 00:51:53,361
♪ Tyler Perry,
the face of a thousand rappers. ♪

1081
00:51:53,444 --> 00:51:55,112
(song ends)

1082
00:51:55,196 --> 00:51:57,281
BARRIS:
Thanks, Tyler Perry.

1083
00:51:57,365 --> 00:51:58,950
You're welcome, Kenya Barris.
We doing government names?

1084
00:51:59,033 --> 00:52:01,661
-I just thought it was
a special moment, man. -Yeah.

1085
00:52:01,744 --> 00:52:03,579
PASEORNEK:
So, in 2003,

1086
00:52:03,663 --> 00:52:07,792
uh, to my office there was a pile
of tapes and a note that says,

1087
00:52:07,875 --> 00:52:10,503
"I'd like to introduce you
to the work of Tyler Perry.

1088
00:52:10,586 --> 00:52:13,506
He's interested in making a movie."

1089
00:52:13,589 --> 00:52:15,341
So I thought, "Huh."

1090
00:52:16,884 --> 00:52:20,263
I called our home entertainment
department, and I said,

1091
00:52:20,346 --> 00:52:24,559
"Have you ever heard of Tyler Perry?
It seems he's done huge numbers on video."

1092
00:52:24,642 --> 00:52:26,519
And they're like, "Never heard of him."

1093
00:52:26,602 --> 00:52:28,187
And I said, "Could you call around and see

1094
00:52:28,271 --> 00:52:30,690
if anybody in the industry
knows who he is?"

1095
00:52:30,773 --> 00:52:32,608
Because how does someone do
that much revenue

1096
00:52:32,692 --> 00:52:34,318
and we've never heard of him?

1097
00:52:34,402 --> 00:52:36,654
Get a call back,
no one's ever heard of him.

1098
00:52:36,737 --> 00:52:39,866
Meantime, I had a diversity committee,

1099
00:52:39,949 --> 00:52:42,368
uh, that I would meet with
every now and then

1100
00:52:42,451 --> 00:52:45,872
and talk about what type of movies
were interesting to them

1101
00:52:45,955 --> 00:52:47,832
and who was interesting.

1102
00:52:47,915 --> 00:52:51,377
I start off the meeting saying,
"Who here has heard of Tyler Perry?"

1103
00:52:51,460 --> 00:52:54,130
Every Black person in the room,
their hand goes up.

1104
00:52:54,213 --> 00:52:55,756
No white people.

1105
00:52:55,840 --> 00:52:57,508
Like, there's something going on here.

1106
00:52:58,593 --> 00:53:01,053
INTERVIEWER: So you mentioned Lionsgate.
Was there a person there

1107
00:53:01,137 --> 00:53:03,472
that really was open-minded,
that was open to you?

1108
00:53:03,556 --> 00:53:07,018
Yeah, yeah, Mike Paseornek, hands...
hands down, was the guy who said,

1109
00:53:07,101 --> 00:53:08,603
"We need to do this with you."

1110
00:53:08,686 --> 00:53:11,772
PASEORNEK: So I called Charles and said,
"We'd love to meet with Tyler."

1111
00:53:12,064 --> 00:53:14,317
I was in, uh, L.A.
I just-just taped my very first movie.

1112
00:53:14,400 --> 00:53:16,444
I just filmed it,
and I'm so excited about it.

1113
00:53:16,527 --> 00:53:18,279
-I can't wait for you guys to see it.
-(applause)

1114
00:53:18,362 --> 00:53:20,323
It's Diary of a Mad Black Woman,
the movie.

1115
00:53:20,406 --> 00:53:22,950
-It's gonna be a wonderful,
wonderful, wonderful. -(cheering)

1116
00:53:24,160 --> 00:53:26,746
CORSON: When Diary of a Mad Black Woman
came out in 2005,

1117
00:53:26,829 --> 00:53:29,832
critical communities
had no idea who he was.

1118
00:53:29,916 --> 00:53:32,543
-Who are you?
-Who are you?

1119
00:53:32,627 --> 00:53:35,379
CORSON: This was a random movie
that was showing in the theaters,

1120
00:53:35,463 --> 00:53:39,091
that hadn't really been
advertised on television.

1121
00:53:39,175 --> 00:53:42,261
Hadn't come across their desk
in terms of, uh, screeners,

1122
00:53:42,345 --> 00:53:44,055
so they didn't know what this movie was.

1123
00:53:44,138 --> 00:53:47,266
So they just thought this-- okay,
this is maybe some fly-by-night thing.

1124
00:53:47,350 --> 00:53:52,438
It was gonna make a couple hundred dollars
on each screen and go away.

1125
00:53:52,521 --> 00:53:55,775
-But when they saw the returns...
-(gunshot)

1126
00:53:55,858 --> 00:54:00,154
...they realized this film is much bigger,
and it had to have had a big audience.

1127
00:54:00,237 --> 00:54:03,449
TIM PALEN:
The time that Tyler came to Lionsgate,

1128
00:54:03,532 --> 00:54:07,912
nobody knew the rocket ship
that landed on the front lawn.

1129
00:54:07,995 --> 00:54:10,665
But they certainly knew when it left.

1130
00:54:10,748 --> 00:54:12,625
It left a big impression.

1131
00:54:12,708 --> 00:54:14,460
It's crazy to think that

1132
00:54:14,543 --> 00:54:16,629
Diary of a Mad Black Woman
was number one movie in America

1133
00:54:16,712 --> 00:54:21,133
in 2005 on March 25th.

1134
00:54:21,217 --> 00:54:24,345
And on March 25th of 2022,

1135
00:54:24,428 --> 00:54:28,349
A Madea Homecoming was the number one
streaming movie in America.

1136
00:54:28,432 --> 00:54:31,018
This mother(bleep) is actually on fire.

1137
00:54:31,310 --> 00:54:34,355
So, 17 years later,
still the number one movie,

1138
00:54:34,438 --> 00:54:36,732
still people rushing out to see it
opening weekend.

1139
00:54:36,816 --> 00:54:38,734
And, Brown, you trying to close the trunk

1140
00:54:38,818 --> 00:54:40,653
while they, while they,
while they do it, okay?

1141
00:54:40,736 --> 00:54:42,697
-Okay.
-PALEN: It really stems back

1142
00:54:42,780 --> 00:54:45,491
to his relationship with his audience.

1143
00:54:47,326 --> 00:54:49,495
Run, Madea! Run, run!

1144
00:54:49,578 --> 00:54:53,249
PASEORNEK: Roger Ebert, you know, he wrote
this scathing review of his first movie,

1145
00:54:53,332 --> 00:54:57,795
and after the movie came out,
he had never gotten more emails

1146
00:54:57,878 --> 00:55:02,633
or-or messages saying
how wrong he was about this.

1147
00:55:02,717 --> 00:55:04,176
The people spoke.

1148
00:55:04,260 --> 00:55:06,512
So he said, "You know,
I'm gonna write another review."

1149
00:55:06,595 --> 00:55:07,847
But the thing that we talked about

1150
00:55:07,930 --> 00:55:10,599
that's amazing about Tyler
is he broke every rule.

1151
00:55:10,683 --> 00:55:14,270
PALEN: First conversation at the studio,
where a studio executive said to him,

1152
00:55:14,353 --> 00:55:16,022
"Black people don't go to the movies."

1153
00:55:16,105 --> 00:55:20,276
Like, they were just wrong on every count
when it came to Tyler.

1154
00:55:20,359 --> 00:55:24,613
And I think that a monster like Hollywood
has to sort of protect itself,

1155
00:55:24,697 --> 00:55:28,784
and one way it does that
is by being critical.

1156
00:55:28,868 --> 00:55:31,078
Problem is, Tyler just kept succeeding.

1157
00:55:31,162 --> 00:55:34,081
NEWSMAN: Its debut as a box office smash
was a shock to critics,

1158
00:55:34,165 --> 00:55:37,501
but not to the filmmaker and star
who claims Hollywood

1159
00:55:37,585 --> 00:55:40,379
has ignored the very audience
that is flocking to his movie.

1160
00:55:40,463 --> 00:55:41,839
TYLER:
Been a long journey, so...

1161
00:55:41,922 --> 00:55:43,507
-INTERVIEWER: It can be fast, huh?
-Yeah. Oh, yeah.

1162
00:55:43,591 --> 00:55:44,759
Oh, yeah. That's my world.

1163
00:55:44,842 --> 00:55:47,303
REPORTER:
Perry made the film for about $5 million.

1164
00:55:47,386 --> 00:55:51,348
It pulled in ten times that
at the box office.

1165
00:55:51,432 --> 00:55:55,895
Perry got here refusing to play
by Hollywood's rules.

1166
00:55:55,978 --> 00:55:58,814
He demanded creative control
of his projects.

1167
00:55:58,898 --> 00:56:02,818
That first Friday, opening Friday,
and we were number one in the theaters,

1168
00:56:02,902 --> 00:56:04,278
I had to pull the car over.

1169
00:56:04,361 --> 00:56:08,866
In March 2004,
Tyler gave me his script for Diary.

1170
00:56:08,949 --> 00:56:10,910
By the summer, we were filming.

1171
00:56:10,993 --> 00:56:13,704
By the next February, it was
in the theaters opening at number one.

1172
00:56:13,788 --> 00:56:17,208
MORGAN: The whole town was talking
about it when his film opened number one

1173
00:56:17,291 --> 00:56:18,918
at the box office.

1174
00:56:19,001 --> 00:56:20,586
It was not expected.

1175
00:56:20,669 --> 00:56:23,714
They tried to do-- there's something
called tracking in the film industry,

1176
00:56:23,798 --> 00:56:27,927
where they use a lot of data
and, um, research

1177
00:56:28,010 --> 00:56:31,097
to anticipate what the grosses are
gonna be that weekend.

1178
00:56:31,388 --> 00:56:32,973
And they had, like, grossly mismanaged it.

1179
00:56:33,057 --> 00:56:34,350
They had no idea what it was.

1180
00:56:34,433 --> 00:56:37,228
It surprised everybody,
and I thought it was awesome.

1181
00:56:37,311 --> 00:56:38,312
It was great.

1182
00:56:38,395 --> 00:56:40,231
Now big studios are listening

1183
00:56:40,314 --> 00:56:44,026
and taking note of this writer/producer's
diary of success.

1184
00:56:44,110 --> 00:56:48,781
What I think happened after Diary of
a Mad Black Woman hit at the box office

1185
00:56:48,864 --> 00:56:53,452
was this backtracking to figure out
who is Tyler Perry

1186
00:56:53,536 --> 00:56:57,706
and how did he get an audience
to show up for this film

1187
00:56:57,790 --> 00:57:00,251
that we've never heard of
and seemed like it was unimportant.

1188
00:57:00,334 --> 00:57:02,586
'Cause it was important,
and people did know him.

1189
00:57:02,670 --> 00:57:07,258
He just wasn't someone who was visible
within the normal venues.

1190
00:57:07,341 --> 00:57:11,846
EMANUEL: Well, the perception of Tyler
Perry was he was definitely an outsider.

1191
00:57:11,929 --> 00:57:15,099
I don't think people completely,

1192
00:57:15,182 --> 00:57:18,936
like, embraced or understood
his economic value.

1193
00:57:19,019 --> 00:57:20,146
Certain people did.

1194
00:57:20,437 --> 00:57:23,149
I recognized that it was hitting a nerve

1195
00:57:23,232 --> 00:57:28,112
and feeding a level and depth of, um...

1196
00:57:28,195 --> 00:57:30,573
understanding that,

1197
00:57:30,656 --> 00:57:35,411
um, regular media could-- would-would
not even be able to comprehend.

1198
00:57:35,494 --> 00:57:37,997
You know, you're speaking to an audience

1199
00:57:38,080 --> 00:57:41,709
that has been underserved,
and in many cases

1200
00:57:41,792 --> 00:57:44,920
not served at all,
particularly when it comes to theater.

1201
00:57:45,004 --> 00:57:46,839
And so, uh,

1202
00:57:46,922 --> 00:57:50,342
it would be very hard for, you know,
regular mainstream media

1203
00:57:50,426 --> 00:57:51,760
to understand what was happening
in those theaters.

1204
00:57:51,844 --> 00:57:55,097
Particularly if you didn't grow up
in-in... in the Black church,

1205
00:57:55,181 --> 00:57:57,683
you didn't grow up in neighborhoods
where people are underserved,

1206
00:57:57,766 --> 00:57:58,934
you wouldn't know what was going on there.

1207
00:57:59,018 --> 00:58:03,105
His ability to speak to the audience

1208
00:58:03,189 --> 00:58:07,776
that now are his ride or dies,
speak to an audience that says,

1209
00:58:07,860 --> 00:58:11,238
you know, I hear you, I see you,
I feel you, I know who you are,

1210
00:58:11,322 --> 00:58:13,991
and let me, uh, help elevate your stories,

1211
00:58:14,074 --> 00:58:18,370
you know, he's done that
as well as anybody ever has.

1212
00:58:18,579 --> 00:58:20,789
WHOOPI:
What lots of white people forget,

1213
00:58:20,873 --> 00:58:25,461
there's an entire industry,
and always has been, of us.

1214
00:58:25,544 --> 00:58:27,963
People want entertainment,
and they will come out and see it.

1215
00:58:28,047 --> 00:58:30,341
They ignored all those folks.

1216
00:58:30,424 --> 00:58:32,718
But he did not,

1217
00:58:32,801 --> 00:58:35,179
'cause, you know, a whole bunch
of ten-dollar tickets

1218
00:58:35,262 --> 00:58:37,348
makes a lot of money.

1219
00:58:37,431 --> 00:58:38,974
"Hellur."

1220
00:58:39,058 --> 00:58:40,351
(laughs)

1221
00:58:40,434 --> 00:58:43,270
Tyler Perry is living up to
some high expectations.

1222
00:58:43,354 --> 00:58:45,022
Madea's Family Reunion,

1223
00:58:45,105 --> 00:58:48,442
the sequel to Perry's surprise hit
Diary of a Mad Black Woman,

1224
00:58:48,525 --> 00:58:52,071
pulled in just over $30 million
to dominate the weekend box office.

1225
00:58:52,154 --> 00:58:55,407
NEWSWOMAN 2:
The film took in $30.25 million...

1226
00:58:55,491 --> 00:58:58,035
NEWSWOMAN 3: ...hold on to the top spot
at the box office over the weekend...

1227
00:58:58,118 --> 00:59:00,120
♪ ♪

1228
00:59:04,041 --> 00:59:05,459
SPIKE LEE:
Each artist should be allowed

1229
00:59:05,542 --> 00:59:07,711
to pursue their artistic endeavor,

1230
00:59:07,795 --> 00:59:12,883
but a lot of stuff that's out today
is coonery buffoonery.

1231
00:59:12,967 --> 00:59:15,344
We're-we're talking about
Tyler Perry at this point.

1232
00:59:15,427 --> 00:59:18,055
-(audience laughing)
-No. No, I mean, now, look.

1233
00:59:18,138 --> 00:59:22,643
Is that in fact maybe
what Black America wants to see?

1234
00:59:22,726 --> 00:59:26,563
You know, you vote with your pocketbook,
your wallet.

1235
00:59:26,647 --> 00:59:30,901
You vote with your time,
sitting in front of the idiot box.

1236
00:59:30,985 --> 00:59:33,988
The man has a huge audience, and he's--

1237
00:59:34,071 --> 00:59:35,406
Tyler's very smart.

1238
00:59:35,489 --> 00:59:39,952
Church buses will pull up, packed.

1239
00:59:40,035 --> 00:59:41,662
Bought his own jet.

1240
00:59:41,745 --> 00:59:43,956
You know, you can buy a jet,
you got money.

1241
00:59:44,039 --> 00:59:45,582
(laughter)

1242
00:59:45,666 --> 00:59:48,794
For me, just the imagery
is-is-is troubling.

1243
00:59:48,877 --> 00:59:51,755
Is there a disappointment from you

1244
00:59:51,839 --> 00:59:54,550
(fades):
as a director and an African American?

1245
00:59:54,633 --> 00:59:57,136
RUX:
I don't think that

1246
00:59:57,219 --> 01:00:02,141
Tyler Perry entered
the creative marketplace

1247
01:00:02,224 --> 01:00:05,728
to save the Black community.

1248
01:00:05,811 --> 01:00:08,188
And if he did, I think...

1249
01:00:09,398 --> 01:00:12,693
...he would have actually

1250
01:00:12,776 --> 01:00:14,320
come fully armed.

1251
01:00:15,654 --> 01:00:16,905
Which he did not.

1252
01:00:16,989 --> 01:00:19,575
And I don't-- I don't have any evidence.

1253
01:00:19,658 --> 01:00:22,161
And that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
It doesn't mean I'm correct.

1254
01:00:22,244 --> 01:00:24,580
It just means that
I don't see the evidence

1255
01:00:24,663 --> 01:00:30,044
that he entered this creative marketplace
armed and informed

1256
01:00:30,127 --> 01:00:33,339
with an intention to

1257
01:00:33,422 --> 01:00:38,177
really give something noble and valuable

1258
01:00:38,260 --> 01:00:42,014
to a Black/brown community.

1259
01:00:42,097 --> 01:00:44,016
I don't believe that.

1260
01:00:44,099 --> 01:00:46,852
ANDY NORMAN: It's definitely more hurtful
when it comes from your own community.

1261
01:00:46,935 --> 01:00:49,313
But his own community, at the same time,

1262
01:00:49,396 --> 01:00:51,482
is the one who has got him
to where he is now.

1263
01:00:51,565 --> 01:00:53,776
So it's not the whole community.

1264
01:00:53,984 --> 01:00:55,694
It's a few, you know, it's a few people.

1265
01:00:55,778 --> 01:00:58,989
But we love those people, too. (laughs)

1266
01:00:59,281 --> 01:01:02,618
(piano instrumental from "Dreams
and Nightmares" by Meek Mill playing)

1267
01:01:03,619 --> 01:01:05,162
TYLER:
I think the most difficult part

1268
01:01:05,245 --> 01:01:08,874
in all of the success
wasn't battling Hollywood.

1269
01:01:08,957 --> 01:01:11,085
It was Black people.

1270
01:01:11,168 --> 01:01:14,046
There's a certain class of
Black people who look down

1271
01:01:14,129 --> 01:01:17,049
on all things Tyler Perry. (chuckles)

1272
01:01:18,342 --> 01:01:20,219
When I start to look at the history of

1273
01:01:20,302 --> 01:01:22,971
what we've done to each other
as Black people

1274
01:01:23,055 --> 01:01:26,141
who-- others who are successful,
it's pretty interesting to see.

1275
01:01:26,225 --> 01:01:31,146
Amos 'N Andy was
the first African Americans on television,

1276
01:01:31,230 --> 01:01:36,568
and it was the NAACP who boycotted,
the first television boycott ever.

1277
01:01:36,652 --> 01:01:40,114
So the show was yanked off the air
in 1953,

1278
01:01:40,197 --> 01:01:45,994
and there was not another Black cast
on television until the late 1960s.

1279
01:01:46,078 --> 01:01:49,581
The NAACP boycotted The Color Purple,

1280
01:01:49,665 --> 01:01:54,711
because of the depictation
of Black men in--

1281
01:01:54,795 --> 01:01:57,172
Alice Walker,
Black woman who wrote the story.

1282
01:01:57,256 --> 01:02:00,217
So they were picketing and boycotting
outside the Oscars.

1283
01:02:00,300 --> 01:02:04,221
Langston Hughes called Zora Neale Hurston
"a new version of the darkie,"

1284
01:02:04,304 --> 01:02:08,767
because she spoke from a Southern dialect
and she wrote in that dialect.

1285
01:02:08,851 --> 01:02:14,982
So I learned very early on that it's okay.

1286
01:02:15,065 --> 01:02:19,736
This is how it goes, no matter
how well or good your intention is,

1287
01:02:19,820 --> 01:02:24,116
no matter how many people it really lifts
out of despair and sadness.

1288
01:02:24,199 --> 01:02:28,328
It only matters to certain critics

1289
01:02:28,412 --> 01:02:32,458
if it is what they deem to be art.

1290
01:02:32,541 --> 01:02:35,294
What I will not do, and what I cannot do,

1291
01:02:35,377 --> 01:02:38,547
is change what I am, who I am,
what I've been called to do

1292
01:02:38,630 --> 01:02:45,095
and how I do it because someone,
some critics think that it's not art.

1293
01:02:46,180 --> 01:02:48,265
KILLER MIKE:
The audience is there.

1294
01:02:48,348 --> 01:02:51,268
He paid attention to an audience
that people ignored

1295
01:02:51,351 --> 01:02:53,353
and were saying, "Come up to us."

1296
01:02:53,437 --> 01:02:55,772
And he said, "No, I'm-I'm down here
with you," you know?

1297
01:02:55,856 --> 01:02:59,026
I'm gonna-- we're gonna laugh at
the things that we laugh about

1298
01:02:59,109 --> 01:03:00,402
amongst family gatherings.

1299
01:03:00,486 --> 01:03:03,071
We're gonna make public the things
that we think are jovial.

1300
01:03:03,155 --> 01:03:06,492
You know, when you look at white comedy...

1301
01:03:09,036 --> 01:03:11,288
...they're allowed to do
the most ridiculous things,

1302
01:03:11,371 --> 01:03:14,625
and they never have to wear the burden of,
"You're making all Irish people look bad.

1303
01:03:14,708 --> 01:03:17,961
"You're making all Scottish people look--
you're making British people-- You look--"

1304
01:03:18,045 --> 01:03:21,006
You know, Mel Brooks didn't worry about
making his culture look bad.

1305
01:03:21,089 --> 01:03:23,133
He worried about being funny.

1306
01:03:23,217 --> 01:03:26,512
And if it used anecdotal things
that he had ownership

1307
01:03:26,595 --> 01:03:28,263
or control over, it was permitted.

1308
01:03:28,347 --> 01:03:31,517
And Mr. Perry has done the same thing,
and he was genius in doing so.

1309
01:03:31,600 --> 01:03:33,060
♪ ♪

1310
01:03:34,853 --> 01:03:36,855
("Dreams and Nightmares"
continues over car radio)

1311
01:03:36,939 --> 01:03:39,816
♪ Hold up, wait a minute,
y'all thought I was finished? ♪

1312
01:03:39,900 --> 01:03:41,401
-♪ When I bought that Aston Martin ♪
-Hey! (laughs)

1313
01:03:41,485 --> 01:03:42,653
♪ Y'all thought it was rented? ♪

1314
01:03:42,736 --> 01:03:45,489
♪ Flexin' on these niggas,
I'm like Popeye on his spinach ♪

1315
01:03:45,572 --> 01:03:48,242
♪ Double M, yeah, that's my team,
Rozay the captain, I'm lieutenant ♪

1316
01:03:48,325 --> 01:03:49,826
♪ I'm the type to count a million cash ♪

1317
01:03:49,910 --> 01:03:51,203
-♪ Then grind like I'm broke ♪
-♪ Grind like I'm broke ♪

1318
01:03:51,286 --> 01:03:54,498
♪ That Lambo, my new ...,
she don't ride like my Ghost ♪

1319
01:03:54,581 --> 01:03:57,376
♪ I'm riding around my city
with my hand strapped on my toast ♪

1320
01:03:57,459 --> 01:04:00,587
♪ 'Cause these niggas want me dead,
and I gotta make it back home ♪

1321
01:04:00,671 --> 01:04:02,214
(Tyler laughs)

1322
01:04:02,297 --> 01:04:03,757
I love it.

1323
01:04:03,840 --> 01:04:05,342
-(echoes): ♪ Whoo. ♪
-(song ends)

1324
01:04:05,425 --> 01:04:06,426
Morning, everybody.

1325
01:04:06,510 --> 01:04:08,887
PASEORNEK: I don't know anybody
who's had a run like Tyler.

1326
01:04:08,971 --> 01:04:12,057
Let's look at the greatest directors
and the greatest actors.

1327
01:04:12,140 --> 01:04:15,102
They haven't had a 19, 20-film run

1328
01:04:15,185 --> 01:04:17,187
where their audience
just kept showing up every time.

1329
01:04:17,271 --> 01:04:18,981
I mean, this is historic.

1330
01:04:19,064 --> 01:04:23,819
Tyler had built a fanbase that you could
turn a switch on and they showed up.

1331
01:04:23,902 --> 01:04:27,864
Uh, gave him an advantage
over every other filmmaker out there.

1332
01:04:27,948 --> 01:04:32,160
What he's done that those others
didn't do was he segued it

1333
01:04:32,244 --> 01:04:35,163
into film and television,

1334
01:04:35,247 --> 01:04:37,666
and he controlled it.

1335
01:04:37,749 --> 01:04:40,419
The thing that's valued
in the entertainment industry

1336
01:04:40,502 --> 01:04:41,795
is owning something.

1337
01:04:41,878 --> 01:04:45,132
And what you own is pieces of paper
that give you rights to things.

1338
01:04:45,215 --> 01:04:47,509
And Tyler wanted to own all those rights,

1339
01:04:47,593 --> 01:04:50,637
even before he had any leverage.

1340
01:04:50,721 --> 01:04:52,931
(laughs) Wow.

1341
01:04:53,015 --> 01:04:55,726
MARK ITKIN:
Yeah, ownership was, from the get-go,

1342
01:04:55,809 --> 01:04:59,771
the most, I think, important thing
to Tyler, besides the creative,

1343
01:04:59,855 --> 01:05:03,483
because it gave him the full control
to do what he wanted to do.

1344
01:05:03,775 --> 01:05:06,111
Giving up ownership is not an option.

1345
01:05:06,194 --> 01:05:09,656
If I wrote it and produced it and
worked that hard on it, you can't own it.

1346
01:05:09,740 --> 01:05:12,576
Jay-Z has a lyric that says,

1347
01:05:12,659 --> 01:05:14,953
"You niggas out here taking advances,

1348
01:05:15,037 --> 01:05:17,831
but we over here taking real chances."

1349
01:05:17,914 --> 01:05:19,625
And it landed with me,

1350
01:05:19,708 --> 01:05:24,546
because I never wanted to be
a person that had to wait on someone

1351
01:05:24,630 --> 01:05:27,924
to give me a check, to say, "Okay,
go make something for your own people."

1352
01:05:28,008 --> 01:05:30,218
EMANUEL:
We won't go into the fine details,

1353
01:05:30,302 --> 01:05:32,596
but there was a lot of times people were

1354
01:05:32,679 --> 01:05:34,765
questioning the stories he was telling

1355
01:05:34,848 --> 01:05:36,642
or how he was telling 'em,
and he was saying, "Listen,

1356
01:05:36,725 --> 01:05:39,311
"just let me tap into my market.

1357
01:05:39,394 --> 01:05:41,021
I know my market.
Please don't tell me my market."

1358
01:05:41,104 --> 01:05:45,150
And they would always want to give him
some sort of note or critique,

1359
01:05:45,233 --> 01:05:49,237
and-and then they realized,
you know, he actually understands it.

1360
01:05:49,321 --> 01:05:50,781
Just get out of the way.

1361
01:05:50,864 --> 01:05:53,408
And, um, and it's true.

1362
01:05:53,492 --> 01:05:55,786
TYLER: And, listen, I'm not mad
at anybody who doesn't want to own.

1363
01:05:55,869 --> 01:05:59,331
Yeah, who doesn't want to take
the responsibility, 'cause it's hard work.

1364
01:05:59,414 --> 01:06:00,832
You work your ass off
when you're the owner.

1365
01:06:00,916 --> 01:06:04,086
And there's nobody, I mean nobody,

1366
01:06:04,169 --> 01:06:05,170
who would outwork me.

1367
01:06:05,253 --> 01:06:07,255
Nobody could outwork me.

1368
01:06:07,339 --> 01:06:09,299
James Brown would've bowed down.

1369
01:06:09,383 --> 01:06:11,802
♪ One, two, get down... ♪

1370
01:06:11,885 --> 01:06:13,804
("The Boss" by James Brown
featuring The J.B.'s playing)

1371
01:06:13,887 --> 01:06:16,723
OZZIE AREU:
I remember hearing stories very early on

1372
01:06:16,807 --> 01:06:19,976
when he was pitching his first TV show
to some Hollywood execs.

1373
01:06:20,060 --> 01:06:21,728
MORGAN:
They wanted to give him a bunch of notes,

1374
01:06:21,812 --> 01:06:23,230
and, "Oh, we'll buy, you know,
a few episodes from you."

1375
01:06:23,313 --> 01:06:26,024
And he was like, "What?"
Like, "That's not what I'm doing."

1376
01:06:26,108 --> 01:06:28,360
AREU:
The fact that that turned them off,

1377
01:06:28,443 --> 01:06:29,945
then that turned Tyler off.

1378
01:06:30,153 --> 01:06:31,738
And, in my opinion, it made him feel like,

1379
01:06:31,822 --> 01:06:35,200
"Well, how do I do this myself?"

1380
01:06:35,283 --> 01:06:37,285
And so, of course, Tyler being Tyler,
like, revolutionized

1381
01:06:37,369 --> 01:06:40,580
the entire model and created
an entire new way of selling television.

1382
01:06:40,664 --> 01:06:42,124
♪ Look at me... ♪

1383
01:06:42,207 --> 01:06:44,793
What you did in business was
you did a pilot.

1384
01:06:44,876 --> 01:06:48,296
If that pilot got picked up,
you hoped for 12 to 20 the next season.

1385
01:06:48,380 --> 01:06:49,965
If that worked, you'd get another 20.

1386
01:06:50,048 --> 01:06:53,051
So everybody wanted to get
to "a hundred" to get to syndication,

1387
01:06:53,135 --> 01:06:56,680
which meant that there was
long-range money in that and residuals.

1388
01:06:56,763 --> 01:06:58,682
♪ I've paid the cost to be the boss... ♪

1389
01:06:58,765 --> 01:07:00,142
He really pushed strong into TV.

1390
01:07:00,225 --> 01:07:04,187
He was groundbreaking
with his original series,

1391
01:07:04,271 --> 01:07:06,231
which he did as part of the 10/90 formula.

1392
01:07:06,314 --> 01:07:07,774
We do ten shows and pay for it.

1393
01:07:07,858 --> 01:07:11,695
If they hit a certain market share,
then the network agrees to buy 90 more.

1394
01:07:11,778 --> 01:07:14,030
MORGAN: Which then
immediately puts you into syndication.

1395
01:07:14,114 --> 01:07:15,824
Again, a great business deal.

1396
01:07:15,907 --> 01:07:19,161
EMANUEL:
That was unique to him,

1397
01:07:19,244 --> 01:07:20,746
and it was genius.

1398
01:07:20,829 --> 01:07:22,748
ITKIN:
I knew that the traditional studios

1399
01:07:22,831 --> 01:07:25,292
would probably never go
for something like this.

1400
01:07:25,375 --> 01:07:29,713
You needed a boutique operation
in the syndication business

1401
01:07:29,796 --> 01:07:32,424
that was willing to take chances,

1402
01:07:32,507 --> 01:07:35,135
and most importantly,
that would give Tyler

1403
01:07:35,218 --> 01:07:37,345
the creative freedom
to do what he wanted to do.

1404
01:07:37,429 --> 01:07:39,639
And the other genius is Tyler owned it.

1405
01:07:39,723 --> 01:07:41,266
It was off to the races.

1406
01:07:41,349 --> 01:07:44,644
ITKIN:
Also, which hadn't been done before--

1407
01:07:44,728 --> 01:07:47,689
but this is the beauty of
working with Tyler Perry--

1408
01:07:47,773 --> 01:07:52,611
Tyler was willing to put his own money
into producing those ten episodes...

1409
01:07:53,028 --> 01:07:54,571
I'm trying to get 10 ready to go

1410
01:07:54,654 --> 01:07:55,655
for TBS

1411
01:07:55,739 --> 01:07:56,740
at least the first 10.

1412
01:07:56,823 --> 01:08:00,452
...so that not only would he own them
and have full creative control,

1413
01:08:00,535 --> 01:08:04,414
but if it worked,
he would have financial control.

1414
01:08:04,498 --> 01:08:08,794
And so, he decided to open his wallet
and put his own money in.

1415
01:08:08,877 --> 01:08:10,462
And that's when I went to Atlanta

1416
01:08:10,545 --> 01:08:12,672
and did the ten episodes of
House of Payne.

1417
01:08:12,756 --> 01:08:14,716
ITKIN: The deal was there was gonna be,
over a period of two weeks,

1418
01:08:14,800 --> 01:08:17,676
we're gonna test the ten shows
and then evaluate

1419
01:08:17,761 --> 01:08:19,638
what the next step would be.

1420
01:08:19,720 --> 01:08:22,057
Tyler Perry is a risk taker, so why not,
you know, take a chance?

1421
01:08:22,140 --> 01:08:24,184
-And we cut.
-ITKIN: The episodes go on the air.

1422
01:08:24,267 --> 01:08:26,310
♪ ♪

1423
01:08:26,394 --> 01:08:29,231
And it's a very, very big success.

1424
01:08:29,314 --> 01:08:31,899
TYLER: The ratings were higher
than what was there before,

1425
01:08:31,983 --> 01:08:33,609
which shocked them.

1426
01:08:33,693 --> 01:08:34,986
They were like,
"Okay, what do you want to do?"

1427
01:08:35,069 --> 01:08:37,572
Somebody came and they offered 17.
They want 17 more.

1428
01:08:37,656 --> 01:08:39,073
Somebody wanted 26. I was like,

1429
01:08:39,157 --> 01:08:41,827
"I want 100 episodes
so I can be in syndication."

1430
01:08:41,910 --> 01:08:43,953
Mark went back to TBS, and they said,

1431
01:08:44,037 --> 01:08:46,413
"We'll take the 90 episodes."

1432
01:08:46,497 --> 01:08:48,792
That's where the 10/90 model came from.

1433
01:08:48,875 --> 01:08:51,086
AREU: And that was the first time
that had ever been done.

1434
01:08:51,169 --> 01:08:55,340
So a ten-episode pilot
that he personally financed himself,

1435
01:08:55,423 --> 01:08:58,343
and it was probably almost all of
the money that he had at that moment.

1436
01:08:58,635 --> 01:09:01,805
But, again, this is him
reinvesting in himself,

1437
01:09:01,888 --> 01:09:04,515
reinvesting in people,
reinvesting in the audience,

1438
01:09:04,599 --> 01:09:07,685
and understanding that,
"Hey, look, I'm going all in."

1439
01:09:07,769 --> 01:09:10,020
PASEORNEK: So, Tyler betted on himself
with television

1440
01:09:10,104 --> 01:09:12,232
and scored big with that.

1441
01:09:12,314 --> 01:09:14,568
You know, they're thinking, "Oh, well,
maybe he'll be okay for a few episodes,"

1442
01:09:14,651 --> 01:09:19,029
and it became, you know, one of the most
successful shows on cable of all time.

1443
01:09:19,113 --> 01:09:21,992
And, of course, they wanted
more than the initial hundred,

1444
01:09:22,075 --> 01:09:25,203
and that's where Tyler came up
with Meet the Browns.

1445
01:09:25,287 --> 01:09:27,956
I remember being so jealous. (laughs)

1446
01:09:28,038 --> 01:09:31,710
'Cause I was at-- by that point,
I was CEO of BET,

1447
01:09:31,792 --> 01:09:33,252
and all of a sudden,

1448
01:09:33,336 --> 01:09:38,425
Turner has these two shows by Tyler Perry
that are instant hits.

1449
01:09:38,508 --> 01:09:41,011
He saved my butt at OWN.
He really rescued me.

1450
01:09:41,094 --> 01:09:43,596
He volunteered and said,

1451
01:09:43,680 --> 01:09:47,767
"I can write you a show,
and I can make it a hit."

1452
01:09:47,975 --> 01:09:50,979
Have and Have Nots has been on so long
and doing so well in ratings.

1453
01:09:51,270 --> 01:09:54,064
I said to him the other day,
"It's like As The World Turns."

1454
01:09:54,149 --> 01:09:57,110
So there wouldn't have been Will Packer.
There wouldn't have been Ava DuVernay.

1455
01:09:57,193 --> 01:09:58,236
There wouldn't have been Greenleaf.

1456
01:09:58,320 --> 01:10:00,655
There wouldn't have been any of that
had Tyler not said,

1457
01:10:00,739 --> 01:10:01,948
"Here, let me help you."

1458
01:10:02,032 --> 01:10:06,661
We tried to do a deal with him long ago,
early on, before he went to OWN.

1459
01:10:06,745 --> 01:10:08,872
TYLER:
That Viacom deal was probably 12 years

1460
01:10:08,955 --> 01:10:11,541
from the first time we talked about it
to it actually happening.

1461
01:10:11,625 --> 01:10:16,796
DEBRA: Some of the folks at Viacom
thought his career would fizzle out.

1462
01:10:16,880 --> 01:10:18,006
Well, that proved to be wrong,

1463
01:10:18,089 --> 01:10:21,885
and he keeps coming up
with more and more ideas.

1464
01:10:21,968 --> 01:10:24,512
TYLER: When I walk into these companies,
I know what I have to bring.

1465
01:10:24,596 --> 01:10:28,725
And here I am, at the top of
all of this work that I've done,

1466
01:10:28,808 --> 01:10:31,811
and I'm able to say
I really appreciate all of

1467
01:10:31,895 --> 01:10:33,730
the good, the bad
and the ugly to get here.

1468
01:10:33,813 --> 01:10:36,608
♪ ♪

1469
01:10:36,691 --> 01:10:38,234
Bless up, how you doing?

1470
01:10:38,318 --> 01:10:40,654
-DJ Khaled!
-(applause)

1471
01:10:40,737 --> 01:10:43,114
Great. One more. Let's get wide.
How long on Myles? Back up for me.

1472
01:10:43,198 --> 01:10:44,616
Get it.

1473
01:10:44,699 --> 01:10:47,327
GAYLE: I think Black people
in general are underestimated.

1474
01:10:47,535 --> 01:10:52,624
And so, here is Tyler Perry
making hit after hit after hit,

1475
01:10:52,707 --> 01:10:55,919
but it wasn't really respected,
I think, in Hollywood.

1476
01:10:56,002 --> 01:10:58,338
If there's one thing everybody respects,

1477
01:10:58,421 --> 01:10:59,965
it's money.

1478
01:11:00,048 --> 01:11:03,134
And people saw the Tyler Perry Studios,

1479
01:11:03,218 --> 01:11:06,096
and I think for the first time,
people went, "Whoa,

1480
01:11:06,179 --> 01:11:07,889
what-what does he do again?"

1481
01:11:07,973 --> 01:11:09,182
You know, they knew his name,

1482
01:11:09,265 --> 01:11:10,976
they might have been familiar
with some of his work,

1483
01:11:11,059 --> 01:11:14,854
but they looked at Tyler Perry Studios,
and there was no denying

1484
01:11:14,938 --> 01:11:18,358
the talent and the power of Tyler Perry.

1485
01:11:18,441 --> 01:11:22,028
You know, I had-- I'd had
many studios that I thought "was it."

1486
01:11:22,112 --> 01:11:24,280
The first building was on Hoke Street.

1487
01:11:24,364 --> 01:11:26,658
I don't even think it was
three or four thousand square feet,

1488
01:11:26,741 --> 01:11:28,827
and I thought, "Oh, yes, this is
gonna be my movie studio."

1489
01:11:29,119 --> 01:11:30,328
I remember the first day
we were talking about

1490
01:11:30,412 --> 01:11:31,579
doing Diary of a Mad Black Woman there.

1491
01:11:31,663 --> 01:11:34,499
The producers walked in, they go,
"This is not enough room.

1492
01:11:34,582 --> 01:11:35,917
We can't do a movie out of this building."

1493
01:11:36,001 --> 01:11:37,252
I'm like, "Wait-- (stammers)
What-what do you mean?"

1494
01:11:37,335 --> 01:11:38,461
'Cause I had never done it before.

1495
01:11:40,338 --> 01:11:42,048
I bought a bigger building on Krog Street.

1496
01:11:42,132 --> 01:11:44,217
Moving in there,
there was not enough parking,

1497
01:11:44,300 --> 01:11:47,387
the neighbors were complaining every day,
and I was just forcing it

1498
01:11:47,470 --> 01:11:50,223
and forcing it and forcing it, and
tried to-- I'm like, "This is the place.

1499
01:11:50,306 --> 01:11:52,058
This is gonna be it. Nope, this is it."

1500
01:11:52,142 --> 01:11:54,352
'Cause I had this thing
where I just only wanted to do

1501
01:11:54,436 --> 01:11:55,979
things that I could write a check for.

1502
01:11:56,062 --> 01:11:58,023
But sometimes
when you're going to higher levels,

1503
01:11:58,106 --> 01:12:00,984
you have to bill for where you're going

1504
01:12:01,067 --> 01:12:03,319
and not necessarily
where you think you are right now.

1505
01:12:03,403 --> 01:12:05,155
That message came to me as clear as day.

1506
01:12:05,238 --> 01:12:06,656
"You're too big to do it wrong."

1507
01:12:06,740 --> 01:12:09,868
So then to-- leaving there
and going over to Greenbriar,

1508
01:12:09,951 --> 01:12:11,703
I'll never forget that night,
because my lawyer,

1509
01:12:11,786 --> 01:12:13,079
Larry Dingle at this time,
he called me up and said,

1510
01:12:13,163 --> 01:12:14,831
"I know you're having trouble
on Krog Street.

1511
01:12:14,914 --> 01:12:17,042
Please go look at this location
at Greenbriar."

1512
01:12:17,125 --> 01:12:20,712
And I'm standing in front of the gates
and I'm praying about it,

1513
01:12:20,795 --> 01:12:24,716
and I looked at the gates, and it's
Bible scriptures taped all over the gates.

1514
01:12:24,799 --> 01:12:28,553
And my favorite one was Psalms 91.

1515
01:12:28,636 --> 01:12:32,140
I was like, "Okay, if this ain't a sign,
I don't know what is."

1516
01:12:32,223 --> 01:12:35,185
Brick and mortar were always
the thing that I knew all my life.

1517
01:12:35,268 --> 01:12:38,271
I grew up in sawdust,
and if I can build a building

1518
01:12:38,354 --> 01:12:41,316
and own it and house everything in it--
the lights, the sound, the cameras,

1519
01:12:41,399 --> 01:12:43,985
if I can put it all in the room,
I know that eventually

1520
01:12:44,069 --> 01:12:46,571
owning this product,
getting to the other side of it,

1521
01:12:46,654 --> 01:12:48,239
not having profit right now,

1522
01:12:48,323 --> 01:12:50,283
but when it all came together
as this catalog,

1523
01:12:50,366 --> 01:12:53,244
it will be worth a tremendous amount.

1524
01:12:53,328 --> 01:12:55,205
And that's where we are.

1525
01:12:55,288 --> 01:12:58,541
REED: He believed in Atlanta's
film and entertainment community

1526
01:12:58,625 --> 01:13:00,168
ahead of the curve.

1527
01:13:00,251 --> 01:13:02,962
When I got sworn in January 4, 2010,

1528
01:13:03,046 --> 01:13:07,133
the motion picture and entertainment
business in Atlanta and Georgia

1529
01:13:07,217 --> 01:13:10,637
was about a $350 million business

1530
01:13:10,720 --> 01:13:14,557
that employed
seven to nine thousand employees.

1531
01:13:14,641 --> 01:13:17,685
When I left on January 2nd, 2018,

1532
01:13:17,769 --> 01:13:20,688
it was a $9.5 billion business

1533
01:13:20,772 --> 01:13:24,651
that employed more than 34,000 people.

1534
01:13:24,734 --> 01:13:26,778
The center of energy for all of that

1535
01:13:26,861 --> 01:13:30,865
started with Tyler Perry
and Tyler Perry Studios.

1536
01:13:30,949 --> 01:13:35,370
And every time you see a movie
with that peach logo on it,

1537
01:13:35,453 --> 01:13:38,289
uh, we ought to tip our hats to Tyler.

1538
01:13:38,373 --> 01:13:40,875
REPORTER:
The grand opening of Tyler Perry Studios

1539
01:13:40,959 --> 01:13:46,089
included a lineup of stars
that impressed even the big man himself.

1540
01:13:46,172 --> 01:13:48,591
TYLER: I'm-I'm so excited that
Sidney Poitier is here, and Cicely Tyson,

1541
01:13:48,675 --> 01:13:49,801
and Oprah's on her way.

1542
01:13:49,884 --> 01:13:52,512
It's just, I am extremely excited
to have all of--

1543
01:13:52,595 --> 01:13:54,514
Ruby Dee, are you kidding me? Hank Aaron.

1544
01:13:54,597 --> 01:13:56,808
People who paved the way
so that this could happen.

1545
01:13:56,891 --> 01:13:59,561
He's steadfast and he's solid,
and he's no phony.

1546
01:13:59,644 --> 01:14:01,563
You can feel how real he is.

1547
01:14:01,646 --> 01:14:06,234
JOHN LEWIS: A young African American man
left New Orleans with very little

1548
01:14:06,317 --> 01:14:09,487
and pursued his dream
right here in the city.

1549
01:14:09,571 --> 01:14:10,905
Uh, you have to believe.

1550
01:14:10,989 --> 01:14:12,240
WILL SMITH:
Really starting with nothing.

1551
01:14:12,323 --> 01:14:15,451
It's a... it's a truly powerful
American story.

1552
01:14:15,743 --> 01:14:18,413
REPORTER: In a magical moment
toward the end of the evening,

1553
01:14:18,496 --> 01:14:22,584
Tyler escorted the legendary Oscar winner
down the red carpet himself.

1554
01:14:23,668 --> 01:14:25,962
TYLER: And there's a moment
where Sidney Poitier is about to

1555
01:14:26,045 --> 01:14:28,756
dedicate the soundstage in his name,

1556
01:14:28,840 --> 01:14:31,509
and he's in tears, and
fireworks are going off in the distance.

1557
01:14:31,801 --> 01:14:34,637
And he points at me and I point back,
and he says, "You." I said, "No, you."

1558
01:14:34,721 --> 01:14:37,307
ANNOUNCER (over speakers):
Ladies and gentlemen,

1559
01:14:37,390 --> 01:14:41,769
please join us in dedicating
the Sidney Poitier Soundstage.

1560
01:14:41,853 --> 01:14:44,314
(cheering, applause)

1561
01:14:46,065 --> 01:14:48,109
TYLER:
In that moment, he comes down.

1562
01:14:48,193 --> 01:14:51,696
Oprah grabs him, they hug, and she said,
"What were you thinking up there?"

1563
01:14:51,779 --> 01:14:55,950
And he said, "I remember being at MGM,
where I was the only Black man allowed,

1564
01:14:56,034 --> 01:14:58,828
and the shoe shine man."

1565
01:15:00,538 --> 01:15:02,332
So now this Black man

1566
01:15:02,415 --> 01:15:04,709
and all of these Black people
are watching this moment.

1567
01:15:06,044 --> 01:15:08,546
It's kind of hard
to not make this about race

1568
01:15:08,630 --> 01:15:11,007
when it's so much about
the disenfranchisement

1569
01:15:11,090 --> 01:15:14,219
and what we had to battle
and what we had to fight.

1570
01:15:14,302 --> 01:15:18,765
So to be able to honor him and
give him that moment was phenomenal.

1571
01:15:18,848 --> 01:15:20,850
♪ ♪

1572
01:15:23,311 --> 01:15:28,483
So, in the middle of all of this success,

1573
01:15:28,566 --> 01:15:33,321
I'm dealing with my mother slowly dying.

1574
01:15:33,404 --> 01:15:35,406
♪ ♪

1575
01:15:36,699 --> 01:15:39,285
My mother was in a wheelchair
at the time, and she was like--

1576
01:15:39,369 --> 01:15:40,954
she couldn't see.

1577
01:15:47,001 --> 01:15:49,587
And I leaned down to her...

1578
01:15:52,090 --> 01:15:54,676
(chuckles softly)

1579
01:15:56,844 --> 01:16:01,307
I leaned down to her
and I said, "Are you okay?"

1580
01:16:01,391 --> 01:16:03,977
She said, "Yes, everything is beautiful."

1581
01:16:05,353 --> 01:16:07,897
I said, "How do you know that?"

1582
01:16:07,981 --> 01:16:11,943
(takes deep breath)
She said, "I can feel it."

1583
01:16:12,026 --> 01:16:15,655
"I can feel it." She could feel it.

1584
01:16:15,738 --> 01:16:19,575
This is a fantastic, incredible,
wonderful moment,

1585
01:16:19,659 --> 01:16:21,452
and, um...

1586
01:16:24,831 --> 01:16:27,667
Um, as I look around this room...

1587
01:16:27,750 --> 01:16:31,045
-(applause)
-It, uh...

1588
01:16:32,422 --> 01:16:33,923
Looking at my mother,
looking-looking at me.

1589
01:16:34,007 --> 01:16:36,759
-You-you see what your baby boy did?
-(laughter)

1590
01:16:36,843 --> 01:16:38,845
(cheering, applause)

1591
01:16:41,597 --> 01:16:45,893
So, for her to see that moment,

1592
01:16:45,977 --> 01:16:52,525
of her baby that had come through
all that bullshit, hand in hand with her,

1593
01:16:52,608 --> 01:16:54,610
that was good.

1594
01:16:54,694 --> 01:16:57,530
That was really good. It was a good night.

1595
01:17:01,034 --> 01:17:05,204
And I remember even before that,
Boyz II Men "Mama" came on the radio,

1596
01:17:05,288 --> 01:17:07,498
and she was driving somewhere.

1597
01:17:07,582 --> 01:17:10,084
And she calls me up, and it scared me,

1598
01:17:10,168 --> 01:17:12,920
because...

1599
01:17:13,004 --> 01:17:17,091
w-when she got sick,
I-I was never able to turn my phone off.

1600
01:17:17,175 --> 01:17:21,095
It, uh, it stayed on 24/7,
the ringer on all the time.

1601
01:17:21,179 --> 01:17:25,516
And she-she was crying hysterically,
and I'm thinking,

1602
01:17:25,600 --> 01:17:27,685
"Okay, I got to get on a plane,
I got to--" (stammers)

1603
01:17:27,769 --> 01:17:29,645
I'm like, "What is it?
What is it? What is it?"

1604
01:17:29,729 --> 01:17:32,690
And she was saying to me, "Thank you.

1605
01:17:32,774 --> 01:17:35,777
"Thank you.
If-if you wouldn't have made it through,

1606
01:17:35,860 --> 01:17:38,696
"even when I was telling you to stop,

1607
01:17:38,780 --> 01:17:41,824
I wouldn't be able to afford my medicine."

1608
01:17:45,953 --> 01:17:47,580
Hmm.

1609
01:17:47,663 --> 01:17:50,375
(birds chirping)

1610
01:17:50,458 --> 01:17:52,460
When she died...

1611
01:17:54,962 --> 01:17:58,800
...I couldn't find my way out of it.

1612
01:18:00,301 --> 01:18:03,679
Everything was dull.
Everything was missing something.

1613
01:18:03,763 --> 01:18:05,765
Everything. Nothing mattered.

1614
01:18:05,848 --> 01:18:09,519
And it was that way for...

1615
01:18:13,064 --> 01:18:16,567
...a long, long time.

1616
01:18:18,111 --> 01:18:20,738
AUNT JERRY:
Tyler was there when she passed.

1617
01:18:20,822 --> 01:18:23,783
All of her children were there, and, um...

1618
01:18:23,866 --> 01:18:26,160
it was hard, it was very hard,
'cause that was my baby.

1619
01:18:26,244 --> 01:18:27,745
You know, that's my girl.

1620
01:18:30,164 --> 01:18:32,208
I just left the room.

1621
01:18:33,418 --> 01:18:36,546
(chuckles): I must have cried
for two or three days.

1622
01:18:37,547 --> 01:18:40,716
Mm. (breathes shakily)

1623
01:18:44,762 --> 01:18:48,599
TYLER:
I have one regret in my life, just one.

1624
01:18:48,683 --> 01:18:51,519
It's my mother on her deathbed.

1625
01:18:51,602 --> 01:18:54,897
I was leaving, 'cause I had to go
back to Atlanta to do something,

1626
01:18:54,981 --> 01:18:56,816
and she just looked at me.

1627
01:18:56,899 --> 01:18:59,235
And I said, "I have to go,"
and she just-- she said nothing.

1628
01:18:59,318 --> 01:19:02,155
She just would not stop staring at me.

1629
01:19:02,238 --> 01:19:05,158
And I felt like-- and then she said,

1630
01:19:05,241 --> 01:19:07,326
"You know, I'm just so tired.
I'm so tired. I'm so tired."

1631
01:19:07,410 --> 01:19:09,495
I said, "No, no, it's all right."
And I'm-- And I started doing

1632
01:19:09,579 --> 01:19:12,415
all the spiritual stuff and,
"No, God's gonna do g…"

1633
01:19:12,498 --> 01:19:16,043
(sighs) Talking her out of
what she was telling me.

1634
01:19:16,127 --> 01:19:18,296
And she said, "Okay, baby. Okay."

1635
01:19:18,379 --> 01:19:22,633
My one regret is that
I wished that I had sat there

1636
01:19:22,717 --> 01:19:25,094
and listened to what she wanted to say,

1637
01:19:25,178 --> 01:19:30,391
rather than me trying to think about
myself in the moment of losing her.

1638
01:19:31,517 --> 01:19:35,771
Let her be in the moment of telling me
all the things she wanted to say.

1639
01:19:38,274 --> 01:19:41,152
Yeah. One regret.

1640
01:19:41,235 --> 01:19:43,905
MAXINE:
Tyler, I just want to tell you how much

1641
01:19:43,988 --> 01:19:45,698
it means to me,

1642
01:19:45,781 --> 01:19:49,035
how thankful I am, how blessed you are,

1643
01:19:49,118 --> 01:19:52,121
how blessed I am, to have a son like you.

1644
01:19:52,205 --> 01:19:55,249
Because so many children
wouldn't think about their parents

1645
01:19:55,333 --> 01:19:57,043
after they've come up.

1646
01:19:57,126 --> 01:20:00,838
And it's just amazing that he's doing
all these things for me.

1647
01:20:00,922 --> 01:20:03,508
I-- You give your parents flowers
while they live.

1648
01:20:03,591 --> 01:20:04,675
I've gotten all my flowers.

1649
01:20:06,344 --> 01:20:09,847
TYLER: I was a little boy, and she tells
this story. I have this on video.

1650
01:20:11,098 --> 01:20:14,143
MAXINE:
One day, we were coming from the country.

1651
01:20:14,227 --> 01:20:15,478
TYLER:
And she was driving.

1652
01:20:16,771 --> 01:20:18,981
MAXINE:
And they had this Jaguar that pass by.

1653
01:20:19,065 --> 01:20:20,942
TYLER:
She said, "Ooh, that's a pretty car."

1654
01:20:21,025 --> 01:20:23,903
And I said, "Wow, that's a pretty car."

1655
01:20:23,986 --> 01:20:24,987
I said, "What, Mama?"

1656
01:20:25,071 --> 01:20:26,614
I remember ch-- getting up on the seat
to see what she's talking about.

1657
01:20:26,697 --> 01:20:28,324
And she said, "That car."

1658
01:20:30,034 --> 01:20:31,661
And I said, "What kind of car is that?"
She said it was a Jaguar.

1659
01:20:31,744 --> 01:20:33,829
He said, "You know what?

1660
01:20:33,913 --> 01:20:37,792
"When I get big, I'm-a buy you a Jaguar.

1661
01:20:37,875 --> 01:20:39,585
And I'll buy you a house, too."

1662
01:20:39,669 --> 01:20:43,798
I said, "Okay, baby. Okay."

1663
01:20:43,881 --> 01:20:46,676
TYLER:
And she said, "Okay, baby. Okay."

1664
01:20:46,759 --> 01:20:51,556
One day, I was doing a play,
Mother's Day in New Orleans.

1665
01:20:51,639 --> 01:20:53,683
Called her up onstage
and gave her the keys to that car

1666
01:20:53,766 --> 01:20:54,892
in front of the audience.

1667
01:20:54,976 --> 01:20:56,394
Big moment for me, big moment for her.

1668
01:20:56,477 --> 01:20:58,396
She cried. It was beautiful.

1669
01:20:58,479 --> 01:21:00,106
MAXINE:
Thank you, thank you.

1670
01:21:00,189 --> 01:21:02,525
(laughs)

1671
01:21:05,111 --> 01:21:06,696
How does that make you feel?

1672
01:21:07,029 --> 01:21:10,575
Made me feel good. It made me know
that I did the right thing.

1673
01:21:11,951 --> 01:21:13,369
TYLER:
But as a little boy,

1674
01:21:13,452 --> 01:21:17,248
watching all that she had gone through,
I wanted to do everything I could.

1675
01:21:18,749 --> 01:21:21,752
Making sure that she wasn't in pain.

1676
01:21:21,836 --> 01:21:25,214
Making sure that she had money
and could leave this man.

1677
01:21:25,298 --> 01:21:29,218
It was my whole desire.

1678
01:21:29,302 --> 01:21:31,596
And no matter how much money I had,
it wasn't enough

1679
01:21:31,679 --> 01:21:33,306
to make sure she had all she needed.

1680
01:21:33,389 --> 01:21:35,683
So, when she died, that s--
everything in me died.

1681
01:21:35,766 --> 01:21:38,227
I'm like, "What do I do with this now?
What do I..."

1682
01:21:38,311 --> 01:21:42,398
If I didn't have contracts
and things lined up,

1683
01:21:42,481 --> 01:21:45,484
that probably-- that--
2009 would've probably been the end,

1684
01:21:45,568 --> 01:21:49,697
because... there was nothing

1685
01:21:49,780 --> 01:21:53,743
to keep m-making me want to
get out of bed and move through it.

1686
01:21:53,826 --> 01:21:56,454
I started drinking stupid heavy.

1687
01:21:56,537 --> 01:22:00,249
Um, and that lasted for a few years.

1688
01:22:00,333 --> 01:22:02,668
I'm just out here enjoying
this Mardi Gras, you know.

1689
01:22:02,752 --> 01:22:04,629
Wait a minute. Hold on. Hold on.

1690
01:22:04,712 --> 01:22:07,506
TYLER: No holiday meant anything
'cause she wasn't there.

1691
01:22:09,175 --> 01:22:12,136
Nobody meant anything
'cause she wasn't there.

1692
01:22:13,929 --> 01:22:17,433
And having Aman come along

1693
01:22:17,516 --> 01:22:20,519
and redefine all of that--
all right, what does that mean?

1694
01:22:20,603 --> 01:22:22,897
What does Christmas mean for him?

1695
01:22:22,980 --> 01:22:25,524
What does, mm, being born
right after Thanksgiving

1696
01:22:25,608 --> 01:22:29,028
and then, you know, Chr--
what does Christmas mean and New Year's,

1697
01:22:29,111 --> 01:22:31,489
and seeing his excitement in all of this
gave it a whole--

1698
01:22:31,572 --> 01:22:36,994
gave it a whole new, uh,
meaning in life, purpose and circle.

1699
01:22:37,078 --> 01:22:39,038
-(Aman babbles)
-Mm-hmm.

1700
01:22:39,121 --> 01:22:40,790
Yeah.

1701
01:22:41,874 --> 01:22:44,794
My prayer for him
when Gelila was pregnant was about,

1702
01:22:44,877 --> 01:22:46,504
"God, give him the best of me,

1703
01:22:46,587 --> 01:22:50,424
and anything that is the worst of me,
let it be buried with me."

1704
01:22:50,508 --> 01:22:53,427
I only wanted him to have
the best of me in his DNA.

1705
01:22:53,511 --> 01:22:56,138
I remember I was telling him
I love him one day,

1706
01:22:56,222 --> 01:22:59,600
when he was maybe about four,
four and a half.

1707
01:22:59,684 --> 01:23:01,102
And I told him
like ten different times that.

1708
01:23:01,185 --> 01:23:02,770
He said,
"Why do you keep telling me that?"

1709
01:23:02,853 --> 01:23:05,022
Because, uh, you know,
I wanted him to know

1710
01:23:05,106 --> 01:23:07,149
what that sounds like,
what that feels like

1711
01:23:07,233 --> 01:23:09,402
to have that from your father,
somebody to say, "I love you,"

1712
01:23:09,485 --> 01:23:12,530
and to hug you and to know
that you are-are special

1713
01:23:12,613 --> 01:23:15,658
and-and strong and powerful.

1714
01:23:22,039 --> 01:23:23,499
PIERS MORGAN:
Is he still alive, your father?

1715
01:23:23,582 --> 01:23:24,709
-He is. He's still alive.
-And what kind of relationship

1716
01:23:24,792 --> 01:23:26,711
-do you have with him?
-We don't speak very much,

1717
01:23:26,794 --> 01:23:28,295
but I am taking care of him.

1718
01:23:28,379 --> 01:23:29,714
I make sure he has everything he needs.

1719
01:23:29,797 --> 01:23:31,799
Do you feel that he loved you?

1720
01:23:31,882 --> 01:23:33,968
No, never felt that. Never felt that.

1721
01:23:34,051 --> 01:23:36,929
I felt very strongly that
there was something there,

1722
01:23:37,012 --> 01:23:39,432
and I didn't know what it was,
and when I was about 30,

1723
01:23:39,515 --> 01:23:41,892
my mother told me
he never thought that I was his child.

1724
01:23:41,976 --> 01:23:43,310
-So...
-Really?

1725
01:23:43,394 --> 01:23:47,523
So that was another thing I didn't know,
which caused a lot of issues as well.

1726
01:23:49,233 --> 01:23:51,402
Y'all look mad. What the doctor say?
Some bad news, Brown?

1727
01:23:51,485 --> 01:23:53,696
-He's fine.
-Ask her, Cora.

1728
01:23:53,779 --> 01:23:55,781
Madea, who's my daddy?

1729
01:23:55,865 --> 01:23:57,908
-That is your daddy.
-I'm-a find out.

1730
01:23:57,992 --> 01:23:59,952
Dana tell you anything
you want to know. Call Dana.

1731
01:24:00,035 --> 01:24:02,621
-Who is Dana?
-Yeah, who is Dana?

1732
01:24:02,705 --> 01:24:04,623
Yeah, they both dumb as hell.
You don't know who Dana is?

1733
01:24:04,707 --> 01:24:06,917
They've been using Dana
to find people out for years

1734
01:24:07,001 --> 01:24:08,919
who the daddy or who the mama. Dana.

1735
01:24:09,003 --> 01:24:11,172
-CORA: We...
-D-N-A. DNA.

1736
01:24:11,255 --> 01:24:13,716
That's Dana. Lord, you so dumb.

1737
01:24:15,676 --> 01:24:16,886
TYLER:
We did a DNA test.

1738
01:24:17,178 --> 01:24:19,388
Well, results come back.

1739
01:24:19,472 --> 01:24:21,182
He's not my father.

1740
01:24:21,265 --> 01:24:27,062
And I felt a-a wave of, um, relief.

1741
01:24:27,146 --> 01:24:29,482
I was relieved because...

1742
01:24:31,108 --> 01:24:35,112
...my image of a father was not
somebody who could do that to their child.

1743
01:24:47,833 --> 01:24:50,628
LUCKY: Uh, we're gonna be turning
real soon, right here.

1744
01:24:50,711 --> 01:24:52,505
(intercom buzzes)

1745
01:24:52,588 --> 01:24:55,216
-Uh, say, Uncle Emmitt.
-(horn honks)

1746
01:24:55,299 --> 01:24:56,383
That was me, Uncle Emmitt.

1747
01:24:56,467 --> 01:24:58,052
EMMITT PERRY SR.:
I don't give a (bleep) who it is.

1748
01:24:58,135 --> 01:24:59,845
LUCKY:
Well, I apologize, baby.

1749
01:24:59,929 --> 01:25:02,723
EMMITT: Apologize my (bleep) ass.
Now get the (bleep) away from here.

1750
01:25:02,807 --> 01:25:04,767
-LUCKY: Uncle Emmitt.
-EMMITT: Get the (bleep) on.

1751
01:25:06,435 --> 01:25:08,437
Let's go.

1752
01:25:10,231 --> 01:25:11,899
Get the (bleep) on.

1753
01:25:12,942 --> 01:25:14,652
-I was coming to visit you, nigga.
-(bleep)

1754
01:25:14,735 --> 01:25:16,737
(Emmitt shouting angrily, indistinctly)

1755
01:25:18,197 --> 01:25:20,324
-You stay the (bleep) out of here.
-I called you, Uncle Emmitt.

1756
01:25:20,407 --> 01:25:21,867
I was checking on you. I called you.

1757
01:25:21,951 --> 01:25:23,953
Now tow your (bleep) ass away from here.

1758
01:25:25,913 --> 01:25:27,915
(engine starts)

1759
01:25:30,751 --> 01:25:32,586
LUCKY:
You knew it was me, though, huh?

1760
01:25:32,670 --> 01:25:33,838
EMMITT: Yeah, I knew
who (bleep) it was, but you...

1761
01:25:33,921 --> 01:25:34,964
LUCKY:
Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

1762
01:25:35,047 --> 01:25:36,841
Coming to try and talk to his daddy, man.

1763
01:25:36,924 --> 01:25:38,425
That's all it was.

1764
01:25:38,509 --> 01:25:40,678
I didn't mean no harm, baby.
How you gon' be like that?

1765
01:25:42,638 --> 01:25:43,764
You heard me?

1766
01:25:45,474 --> 01:25:47,351
You heard me, Uncle Emmitt?

1767
01:25:48,727 --> 01:25:50,563
Uncle Emmitt?

1768
01:25:53,190 --> 01:25:55,693
♪ ♪

1769
01:25:55,776 --> 01:25:57,111
PIERS:
Has he ever said sorry?

1770
01:25:58,195 --> 01:26:00,281
No, he hasn't.

1771
01:26:00,364 --> 01:26:01,657
-He hasn't.
-Would you like him to?

1772
01:26:02,867 --> 01:26:04,326
At this point, I don't know if it matters.

1773
01:26:04,410 --> 01:26:06,495
I really don't know if it matters.

1774
01:26:06,579 --> 01:26:10,499
I was able to forgive him in my mid-20s,
and that changed my life.

1775
01:26:10,583 --> 01:26:14,086
Because what I did was, what-what
I think a lot of people don't realize

1776
01:26:14,169 --> 01:26:16,630
or understand is that
their parents have a story, too.

1777
01:26:16,714 --> 01:26:20,801
Now-- So, whatever happened in your life
because of them has made--

1778
01:26:20,885 --> 01:26:23,679
And you really need to find out the story
so that you can understand it.

1779
01:26:23,762 --> 01:26:26,515
And what I found about--
He-he and his sister and his brother,

1780
01:26:26,599 --> 01:26:31,437
they were all found by a white man
in rural Louisiana, in a ditch.

1781
01:26:31,520 --> 01:26:33,272
He was two years old at the time.

1782
01:26:33,355 --> 01:26:36,150
He was brought to a 14-year-old woman
named Mae to raise.

1783
01:26:36,233 --> 01:26:39,904
Her father was bedridden, very old man,
who was a slave.

1784
01:26:39,987 --> 01:26:43,824
And everything that she knew to do

1785
01:26:43,908 --> 01:26:45,618
to get these children to behave
was to beat them.

1786
01:26:45,701 --> 01:26:47,870
(stammers) She would tie them
in a potato sack, hang them in the tree,

1787
01:26:47,953 --> 01:26:49,204
and she would beat them.

1788
01:26:49,288 --> 01:26:52,166
So that's what his-- that's what he knew.
That's what he came from.

1789
01:26:52,249 --> 01:26:53,918
-He'd been abused.
-Oh, I mean, he'd been abused

1790
01:26:54,001 --> 01:26:55,085
his entire life.

1791
01:26:55,169 --> 01:26:57,713
So it helped me to understand
a lot of who he is,

1792
01:26:57,796 --> 01:27:00,591
which made it easier for me
to let go and forgive him.

1793
01:27:00,674 --> 01:27:02,468
PIERS:
Hard to forgive that.

1794
01:27:02,551 --> 01:27:05,429
TYLER: It is, but it's very necessary,
because what I found that is this--

1795
01:27:05,512 --> 01:27:07,973
and this is so true--
If you do not forgive,

1796
01:27:08,057 --> 01:27:10,726
you hold on to this thing in-inside of you

1797
01:27:10,809 --> 01:27:13,187
that can change your life
and take you in the wrong direction.

1798
01:27:13,270 --> 01:27:16,231
Nine times out of ten,
the people that have done things to you

1799
01:27:16,315 --> 01:27:18,651
are asleep and at peace,
and you're holding on to it.

1800
01:27:18,734 --> 01:27:21,362
It can really, literally,
become sickness in your body

1801
01:27:21,445 --> 01:27:22,613
and make you physically ill.

1802
01:27:22,696 --> 01:27:24,698
So I think that
forgiveness is beyond important.

1803
01:27:24,782 --> 01:27:26,700
PIERS:
You support him?

1804
01:27:26,784 --> 01:27:28,369
TYLER:
Absolutely, 100%.

1805
01:27:28,452 --> 01:27:31,497
As a child, he wasn't a great father,
but he was a great provider,

1806
01:27:31,580 --> 01:27:33,415
and he had an incredible work ethic.

1807
01:27:33,499 --> 01:27:36,085
So he definitely gave me my work ethic.

1808
01:27:37,503 --> 01:27:39,880
Hold the work. Let me concentrate.

1809
01:27:39,964 --> 01:27:42,132
GAYLE:
Well, his work ethic is--

1810
01:27:42,216 --> 01:27:45,386
I-I still don't understand
how he works at the speed that he does.

1811
01:27:45,469 --> 01:27:49,139
You know, I've never worked for him,
but I hear Tyler Perry's tough.

1812
01:27:49,223 --> 01:27:51,809
-Let's roll, let's roll, let's roll.
-(overlapping chatter)

1813
01:27:51,892 --> 01:27:55,354
GAYLE:
I hear Tyler Perry ask a lot of his cast.

1814
01:27:55,437 --> 01:27:56,981
But I also know this:

1815
01:27:57,064 --> 01:28:00,359
Tyler Perry doesn't ask anything
of anybody else

1816
01:28:00,442 --> 01:28:02,111
that he's not asking of himself.

1817
01:28:02,194 --> 01:28:04,279
♪ ♪

1818
01:28:04,363 --> 01:28:05,572
Don't have your hat backwards in here,
you understand?

1819
01:28:05,656 --> 01:28:07,241
-Turn it around. I'm just kidding.
-(laughter)

1820
01:28:09,118 --> 01:28:10,494
DERRICK DOOSE:
I started off as a production assistant.

1821
01:28:10,577 --> 01:28:14,331
In my first time working with him,
he had never done a movie before.

1822
01:28:14,415 --> 01:28:15,624
He just streamlined a bunch of stuff.

1823
01:28:15,708 --> 01:28:16,875
TYLER:
I want to see all that.

1824
01:28:16,959 --> 01:28:18,419
Give me two Steadicams
and get the antennas close.

1825
01:28:18,502 --> 01:28:21,005
-I'm ready to roll.
-And a lot of people didn't get it.

1826
01:28:22,047 --> 01:28:23,549
When I say, "Bring the energy," I'm...

1827
01:28:24,550 --> 01:28:26,301
♪ ♪

1828
01:28:32,349 --> 01:28:36,186
Sorry, guys, hold up. Nobody shoot.
Oprah wants to talk to me.

1829
01:28:36,562 --> 01:28:38,939
You all are shooting that in 4 days!?

1830
01:28:39,023 --> 01:28:40,649
We're shooting an episode a day, yeah.

1831
01:28:40,733 --> 01:28:41,734
What!?

1832
01:28:43,652 --> 01:28:45,904
DOOSE: It's extremely nontraditional
for everybody.

1833
01:28:45,988 --> 01:28:47,031
And you had to be ready to go.

1834
01:28:47,114 --> 01:28:48,782
Like, there was no downtime.

1835
01:28:48,866 --> 01:28:52,119
4,000 pages of content a year sometimes.

1836
01:28:52,202 --> 01:28:54,955
60, 80, 90 episodes of TV,

1837
01:28:55,039 --> 01:28:58,417
two, three features,
and that's Tyler actually writing 'em.

1838
01:28:58,959 --> 01:29:01,170
TYLER: People ask,
"How do you shoot a movie so quickly?

1839
01:29:01,253 --> 01:29:02,963
How do you shoot television so quickly?"

1840
01:29:03,047 --> 01:29:05,591
When I walk in on the set,
when I'm watching an actor act,

1841
01:29:05,674 --> 01:29:10,345
I'm seeing all the cuts in my head.

1842
01:29:10,429 --> 01:29:12,765
So I will roll and do everything,

1843
01:29:12,848 --> 01:29:16,143
moving the camera in every position,
no matter how close, how tight I want it.

1844
01:29:16,226 --> 01:29:17,811
Once the lighting's set up,
I'm ready to go.

1845
01:29:17,895 --> 01:29:19,438
You just have to trust the process,

1846
01:29:19,521 --> 01:29:21,940
and I've got a really good team
that helps me to do that.

1847
01:29:22,024 --> 01:29:23,358
Good job, guys. We got it.

1848
01:29:23,442 --> 01:29:26,278
CREW MEMBER:
Nobody does what we do right here.

1849
01:29:26,361 --> 01:29:28,489
He does what nobody else can do.

1850
01:29:28,572 --> 01:29:32,659
TYLER: And just from the time I-I saw
the first process of a movie being made,

1851
01:29:32,743 --> 01:29:36,038
I just didn't understand
the ridiculous amount of waste.

1852
01:29:36,121 --> 01:29:39,416
PASEORNEK:
Millions of dollars of wrong, bad choices.

1853
01:29:39,500 --> 01:29:42,586
We could feed a nation on the waste I see.

1854
01:29:42,669 --> 01:29:45,297
TYLER: Standing there with
your fingers twiddling, talking about,

1855
01:29:45,380 --> 01:29:47,424
"What if we..." What the (bleep)
you talking about, "what if we"?

1856
01:29:47,508 --> 01:29:50,260
You should've figured out "what if we"
before you got your ass here.

1857
01:29:50,344 --> 01:29:51,386
The "what if wes" are gone.

1858
01:29:51,470 --> 01:29:53,430
You're on set now. The money's burning.

1859
01:29:53,514 --> 01:29:56,975
Work that out before the monies is spent,
checks written.

1860
01:29:57,059 --> 01:29:58,727
That's what I think. (scoffs)

1861
01:29:58,811 --> 01:30:00,729
(crew laughing)

1862
01:30:00,813 --> 01:30:03,565
PASEORNEK:
I always say that Tyler accomplishes more

1863
01:30:03,649 --> 01:30:05,859
in one day than most of us in a lifetime.

1864
01:30:05,943 --> 01:30:09,113
Had a conversation with Tyler
outside of the office.

1865
01:30:09,196 --> 01:30:12,241
I hear him whispering to me on the phone.
He's in a hushed voice.

1866
01:30:12,324 --> 01:30:14,493
And we're talking about what,
you know, I'm gonna shoot Tuesday,

1867
01:30:14,576 --> 01:30:16,829
and we'll do this and we'll do...
And I'm like,

1868
01:30:16,912 --> 01:30:18,497
"Tyler, where are you?"
And he says, "I got to go,"

1869
01:30:18,580 --> 01:30:22,000
and then I hear the Madea voice,
and he walks out onto stage.

1870
01:30:22,084 --> 01:30:24,586
He was having a business meeting with me
from backstage.

1871
01:30:24,670 --> 01:30:27,589
Well, who can multitask like that?

1872
01:30:27,673 --> 01:30:28,841
That's what Tyler does.

1873
01:30:28,924 --> 01:30:32,302
NORMAN: I always tell people
that this train will keep on running

1874
01:30:32,386 --> 01:30:35,013
whether you get on it or you get ran over.

1875
01:30:35,097 --> 01:30:36,181
So the question is

1876
01:30:36,265 --> 01:30:39,393
you have to jump on board
or you get ran over or pushed out the way.

1877
01:30:39,476 --> 01:30:42,771
His legacy will always be picked apart.

1878
01:30:42,855 --> 01:30:44,815
Everybody has a opinion.
Everybody has a voice.

1879
01:30:44,898 --> 01:30:47,651
Some criticism is good. Some is bad.

1880
01:30:47,734 --> 01:30:52,072
I don't think it'll ever stop,
but it's not gonna stop him either.

1881
01:30:52,281 --> 01:30:53,282
Are you a revenge guy?

1882
01:30:53,365 --> 01:30:54,575
Or are you a forgive and forget guy?

1883
01:30:54,867 --> 01:30:57,119
I'm a "forgive and forget,
but don't (bleep) with me" guy.

1884
01:30:58,287 --> 01:31:01,498
GAYLE: Some of the biggest names we know
can say that they got their start

1885
01:31:01,582 --> 01:31:03,792
because Tyler Perry gave them a break.

1886
01:31:03,876 --> 01:31:06,003
That is no small thing.

1887
01:31:06,086 --> 01:31:09,840
All the negativity hit me right and left
about how he should be this

1888
01:31:09,923 --> 01:31:12,092
and he sh-- he's that,
he's horrible, he's a...

1889
01:31:12,176 --> 01:31:13,927
Just kept my eyes on the prize.

1890
01:31:14,011 --> 01:31:16,054
NEWSMAN:
Media titan Tyler Perry is one of

1891
01:31:16,138 --> 01:31:19,141
Hollywood's most prolific power players.

1892
01:31:19,224 --> 01:31:22,060
PITTS: What filmmaker has had
five movies open number one

1893
01:31:22,144 --> 01:31:23,812
at the box office in the last four years?

1894
01:31:24,855 --> 01:31:26,773
This record belongs to Tyler Perry.

1895
01:31:26,857 --> 01:31:28,150
This is gonna be good!

1896
01:31:28,233 --> 01:31:29,985
♪ ♪

1897
01:31:30,068 --> 01:31:32,237
GAYLE:
The entertainment icon is the mastermind

1898
01:31:32,321 --> 01:31:34,198
behind dozens of movies, plays
and TV shows.

1899
01:31:34,281 --> 01:31:38,327
LARRY KING: Forbes Magazine named him
the number three top earning Black star,

1900
01:31:38,410 --> 01:31:40,829
grossing 125 million dollars a year.

1901
01:31:40,913 --> 01:31:43,457
MEREDITH VIERA: ...movies have taken in
more than $400 million at the box office

1902
01:31:43,540 --> 01:31:44,791
in the past five years.

1903
01:31:44,875 --> 01:31:47,127
REPORTER:
873 million worldwide...

1904
01:31:47,211 --> 01:31:48,587
REPORTER 2:
...la película, A Madea Christmas.

1905
01:31:48,670 --> 01:31:52,966
AREU: Tyler was making hit after hit
after hit after hit.

1906
01:31:53,050 --> 01:31:55,552
And finally people had to wake up.

1907
01:31:56,345 --> 01:31:59,181
WARREN ZAVALA:
Tyler Perry is completely unique.

1908
01:31:59,264 --> 01:32:02,851
And so, you interface with him and his
business in a completely different way.

1909
01:32:02,935 --> 01:32:04,436
You know, I still go back to

1910
01:32:04,519 --> 01:32:06,480
the conversation I had
when the pandemic started.

1911
01:32:06,563 --> 01:32:09,524
Media mogul Tyler Perry
made headlines recently

1912
01:32:09,608 --> 01:32:11,985
when he announced that his studio
would resume production.

1913
01:32:13,987 --> 01:32:16,657
I have 360 employees or so on these shows

1914
01:32:16,740 --> 01:32:20,369
who are taking care of their families
and who needed to work.

1915
01:32:20,452 --> 01:32:23,497
I couldn't wait around for a plan.
I had to do something.

1916
01:32:23,580 --> 01:32:25,999
ZAVALA:
Tyler believes.

1917
01:32:26,083 --> 01:32:28,377
Maybe it's his faith,
maybe it's his history,

1918
01:32:28,460 --> 01:32:31,421
but his strength and his belief of self…

1919
01:32:34,007 --> 01:32:35,676
...moves people.

1920
01:32:35,759 --> 01:32:37,219
Moved me.

1921
01:32:37,302 --> 01:32:41,223
NEWSMAN: Tyler Perry, the award-winning
actor, writer, producer, director,

1922
01:32:41,306 --> 01:32:46,603
and author is a bona fide studio mogul,
and that story is far from over.

1923
01:32:49,356 --> 01:32:51,775
(cheering, applause)

1924
01:32:51,858 --> 01:32:55,237
TYLER: When I built my studio, I built it
in a neighborhood that is one of

1925
01:32:55,320 --> 01:32:59,199
the poorest Black neighborhoods in Atlanta
so that young Black kids can see

1926
01:32:59,283 --> 01:33:02,160
that a Black man did that,
and they can do it, too.

1927
01:33:02,244 --> 01:33:04,955
(applause)

1928
01:33:05,038 --> 01:33:07,874
The studio was once
a Confederate Army base,

1929
01:33:07,958 --> 01:33:11,253
which meant that there was
Confederate soldiers on that base

1930
01:33:11,336 --> 01:33:15,757
plotting and planning on
how to keep 3.9 million Negroes enslaved.

1931
01:33:15,841 --> 01:33:18,427
Now that land is owned by one Negro.

1932
01:33:18,510 --> 01:33:20,345
(cheering, applause)

1933
01:33:23,974 --> 01:33:26,184
I love you, guys. Thank you.

1934
01:33:28,186 --> 01:33:30,314
(cheering fades)

1935
01:33:31,648 --> 01:33:34,276
WOMAN:
What is this? What are we looking at?

1936
01:33:34,359 --> 01:33:38,655
We're looking at Ford McPherson,
which is gonna be Tyler Perry Studios.

1937
01:33:38,739 --> 01:33:41,742
-The new Tyler Perry Studio.
-The new Tyler Perry...

1938
01:33:41,825 --> 01:33:44,244
-The ultimate Tyler Perry Studio.
-Yes.

1939
01:33:44,328 --> 01:33:46,747
-And how excited are you?
-I'm really excited.

1940
01:33:46,830 --> 01:33:49,624
It's, um... it's overwhelming.

1941
01:33:49,708 --> 01:33:53,128
But what I feel is gonna happen here
is gonna be magical,

1942
01:33:53,211 --> 01:33:55,088
so I'm very excited.

1943
01:33:55,172 --> 01:33:57,174
♪ ♪

1944
01:34:02,262 --> 01:34:04,348
REED:
You have no idea what it is like

1945
01:34:04,431 --> 01:34:06,767
to acquire an asset
from the United States Army.

1946
01:34:06,850 --> 01:34:10,729
Things that you would need to do
in a traditional real estate transaction,

1947
01:34:10,812 --> 01:34:13,023
the Army will just tell them,
"We won't do it."

1948
01:34:13,106 --> 01:34:14,941
But I was mayor when this place was empty.

1949
01:34:15,025 --> 01:34:18,445
You think of Ford McPherson
being left vacant,

1950
01:34:18,528 --> 01:34:22,240
this was a situation
that could have gone very, very badly

1951
01:34:22,324 --> 01:34:26,078
and pulled down
an entire community of working people.

1952
01:34:26,161 --> 01:34:29,581
Because of what he's done
on Fort McPherson,

1953
01:34:29,664 --> 01:34:32,542
a quarter of a billion dollar investment
in a military base,

1954
01:34:32,626 --> 01:34:35,670
the city has an opportunity to benefit

1955
01:34:35,754 --> 01:34:39,674
because he's brought all of the property
values in the entire corridor up.

1956
01:34:39,758 --> 01:34:41,968
And so, he's just a constant giver.

1957
01:34:42,052 --> 01:34:44,805
The signal sender that this facility is

1958
01:34:44,888 --> 01:34:47,766
to the entire motion picture business,

1959
01:34:47,849 --> 01:34:50,185
the quality of relationships
that he brings onto this campus,

1960
01:34:50,268 --> 01:34:54,856
this base, is exactly in the hands
that it should be.

1961
01:34:54,940 --> 01:34:57,651
Welcome to the first day
of shooting here at...

1962
01:34:57,734 --> 01:34:59,027
-WOMAN: Yes!
-...Tyler Perry Studios.

1963
01:34:59,111 --> 01:35:02,072
(cheering, applause)

1964
01:35:02,155 --> 01:35:06,159
REED:
And I can't tell you what it meant to me

1965
01:35:06,243 --> 01:35:09,704
that I gave the keys to this base
to a Black man.

1966
01:35:09,788 --> 01:35:11,790
♪ ♪

1967
01:35:13,333 --> 01:35:16,920
It was a star-studded night Saturday

1968
01:35:17,003 --> 01:35:20,173
as celebrities flooded Atlanta
to celebrate the grand opening

1969
01:35:20,257 --> 01:35:22,134
of Tyler Perry Studios.

1970
01:35:24,553 --> 01:35:27,764
The studio-- 330 acres--
sits on the grounds of

1971
01:35:27,848 --> 01:35:32,060
the former Fort McPherson army base
in southwest Atlanta.

1972
01:35:33,270 --> 01:35:38,150
Tyler Perry, known as the most successful
African American filmmaker...

1973
01:35:39,234 --> 01:35:41,278
...in history.

1974
01:35:42,821 --> 01:35:44,823
TYLER:
And this is my gift?

1975
01:35:45,115 --> 01:35:46,116
Yea.

1976
01:35:46,199 --> 01:35:48,493
-We love you, and we're proud of you.
-Aw.

1977
01:35:48,577 --> 01:35:49,786
Try not to cry.

1978
01:35:50,287 --> 01:35:52,497
Thank you. This is beautiful.
I'm gonna wear these tonight.

1979
01:35:52,706 --> 01:35:55,208
I'm gonna throw away this ribbon
for you, ok?

1980
01:35:55,500 --> 01:35:57,502
I have other cuff links,
but none as special as this.

1981
01:35:57,586 --> 01:35:59,087
This is real--
these are really, really special.

1982
01:35:59,171 --> 01:36:01,381
-I'll have them forever and ever.
-That's for you, Papa.

1983
01:36:01,465 --> 01:36:03,049
-Thank you.
-You can keep it-

1984
01:36:03,925 --> 01:36:06,678
And you can keep the card and the picture.

1985
01:36:06,761 --> 01:36:09,806
It says, "I love you, Papa."

1986
01:36:10,182 --> 01:36:12,726
Thank you, my love. Can I get a hug?

1987
01:36:12,809 --> 01:36:14,227
Ah, so wonderful.

1988
01:36:14,311 --> 01:36:17,564
REED:
I always felt that, for people of color,

1989
01:36:17,647 --> 01:36:19,858
Tyler has a Disney-like quality.

1990
01:36:19,941 --> 01:36:22,110
♪ ♪

1991
01:36:22,194 --> 01:36:25,489
HOBSON: The thing that is so remarkable
about Tyler's story,

1992
01:36:25,572 --> 01:36:28,867
he has this twin brain:
creative and business.

1993
01:36:28,950 --> 01:36:30,202
(cheering, applause)

1994
01:36:30,285 --> 01:36:31,828
Very few people have it.

1995
01:36:31,912 --> 01:36:36,374
It was so easy for me to know
that he was the right person to be

1996
01:36:36,458 --> 01:36:39,002
the steward for Fort McPherson.

1997
01:36:39,085 --> 01:36:41,213
My husband, George Lucas,
did the exact same thing.

1998
01:36:41,296 --> 01:36:44,674
He established his studio
outside of the Hollywood system,

1999
01:36:44,758 --> 01:36:48,303
and it gives me a lot of perspective
on what Tyler was up against.

2000
01:36:48,386 --> 01:36:52,516
And George did it as a white man,
and it was really hard.

2001
01:36:52,599 --> 01:36:55,727
And Tyler has done this as a Black man.

2002
01:36:55,810 --> 01:36:57,479
(laughs) You first--

2003
01:36:57,562 --> 01:37:00,524
you got to look in the mirror and have
an honest conversation with yourself.

2004
01:37:00,607 --> 01:37:04,611
Until Mr. Perry and this studio,
pretty much you had to go to white folk.

2005
01:37:04,694 --> 01:37:08,865
But he figured out that there's a place
I can do what I want to do,

2006
01:37:08,949 --> 01:37:11,952
and he is the tip of the spear
that proved we can do it.

2007
01:37:12,035 --> 01:37:13,703
♪ ♪

2008
01:37:13,787 --> 01:37:16,039
The grand opening was amazing.

2009
01:37:16,122 --> 01:37:18,500
It was a Black reunion.

2010
01:37:22,546 --> 01:37:25,507
Colin Kaepernick, Cicely Tyson,

2011
01:37:25,590 --> 01:37:27,092
Jay-Z, Beyoncé.

2012
01:37:27,175 --> 01:37:32,681
That was very much the feeling
that we deserve as a culture.

2013
01:37:34,432 --> 01:37:37,102
REPORTER:
Tonight was a monumental night,

2014
01:37:37,185 --> 01:37:39,771
not just for Tyler Perry
but for everyone here in Atlanta.

2015
01:37:40,146 --> 01:37:41,815
Superfans! (We're fans!)

2016
01:37:41,898 --> 01:37:43,358
We're stargazers!

2017
01:37:43,984 --> 01:37:46,194
This is just incredible.

2018
01:37:46,278 --> 01:37:49,489
And particularly for him to be in Atlanta.

2019
01:37:49,573 --> 01:37:51,700
-MAN: Yes.
-Like, this is civil rights.

2020
01:37:51,783 --> 01:37:53,952
This is movement. This is everything.

2021
01:37:54,035 --> 01:37:57,163
Rise up, Tyler Perry, rise up!

2022
01:37:57,247 --> 01:38:00,542
REPORTER 2: Your name is now
on a soundstage at Tyler Perry Studios.

2023
01:38:00,625 --> 01:38:02,919
What does that feel like?

2024
01:38:03,128 --> 01:38:06,131
I never thought a Black man would own
a studio, a massive studio like this.

2025
01:38:06,214 --> 01:38:09,593
Tyler has an acumen and a determination
that's greater than most of us have.

2026
01:38:11,261 --> 01:38:12,679
That's right, yeah. That's right, brother.

2027
01:38:12,762 --> 01:38:14,431
TYLER:
Tonight means about inspiration.

2028
01:38:14,514 --> 01:38:18,393
And tonight means how many people
can I cause to dream bigger.

2029
01:38:18,476 --> 01:38:20,186
If that happens tonight,
then I did what I was supposed to do.

2030
01:38:20,270 --> 01:38:21,563
Thank you. Thank you.

2031
01:38:21,646 --> 01:38:24,482
SPIKE: This is monumental, 'cause what
he's done has never been done before.

2032
01:38:24,566 --> 01:38:26,526
A Black man and do that?
It's a beautiful Black thing.

2033
01:38:26,610 --> 01:38:28,320
OPRAH: It's not just important
for the Black culture.

2034
01:38:28,403 --> 01:38:29,904
It's important for culture.

2035
01:38:29,988 --> 01:38:32,198
Tyler Perry, who said,
"I won't ask you for your money.

2036
01:38:32,282 --> 01:38:34,284
I won't ask you for your studios."

2037
01:38:34,367 --> 01:38:36,703
He did it his way.

2038
01:38:36,786 --> 01:38:38,788
(silence)

2039
01:38:41,625 --> 01:38:43,501
-Take a breath.
-Yeah, no, I'm good.

2040
01:38:43,585 --> 01:38:46,296
I'm just, like-- want to
get through this next moment.

2041
01:38:46,379 --> 01:38:47,631
All right, ready?

2042
01:38:47,714 --> 01:38:50,425
(busy chatter)

2043
01:38:50,508 --> 01:38:52,677
Thank you so much. Thank you so much.

2044
01:38:53,053 --> 01:38:54,679
You know me.
I'm sneaky and I wanna look.

2045
01:38:54,763 --> 01:38:56,848
-Yeah, yeah. -I took my private tour
the day I came in here.

2046
01:38:56,931 --> 01:38:58,058
God blessed you, man.

2047
01:38:58,141 --> 01:39:00,143
-Didn't he do it?
-Amazing.

2048
01:39:00,435 --> 01:39:02,354
(indistinct chatter)

2049
01:39:04,230 --> 01:39:06,274
When people see me and you together...

2050
01:39:06,358 --> 01:39:08,318
It's powerful!

2051
01:39:08,401 --> 01:39:09,819
Come on, man.

2052
01:39:09,903 --> 01:39:11,655
Let's get this legendary joint.

2053
01:39:11,738 --> 01:39:13,365
-Black Excellence right here.

2054
01:39:14,449 --> 01:39:17,369
That is so cool.
I got stories to tell you.

2055
01:39:17,452 --> 01:39:19,579
What's up, baby?

2056
01:39:19,663 --> 01:39:22,707
(lively chatter, laughter)

2057
01:39:22,791 --> 01:39:25,168
TYLER: Wow, look at you in your tux.
We got our bow ties on.

2058
01:39:25,251 --> 01:39:28,004
Looking good. Looking good.

2059
01:39:28,088 --> 01:39:29,422
Walk around with me?

2060
01:39:29,506 --> 01:39:31,508
♪ ♪

2061
01:39:34,344 --> 01:39:36,638
How are you?

2062
01:39:36,721 --> 01:39:39,140
-MAN: Is Tyler right next to me?
-I just got to... I just got to...

2063
01:39:39,224 --> 01:39:41,101
I just got a whole other thing.
What's up, man?

2064
01:39:41,184 --> 01:39:42,769
How you doing, man? Let's-let's...

2065
01:39:42,852 --> 01:39:45,313
-Want to step out?
-Yeah, we're gonna get it started.

2066
01:39:45,397 --> 01:39:49,317
WHOOPI: I got to the studio,
and it says, "Tyler Perry Studios,"

2067
01:39:49,401 --> 01:39:52,237
and I was like, "Wait a minute."

2068
01:39:52,320 --> 01:39:55,073
And then I realized I've met

2069
01:39:55,156 --> 01:40:00,412
the first Black owner of a movie studio.

2070
01:40:00,495 --> 01:40:04,457
Not just of a movie studio,
of the movie studio

2071
01:40:04,541 --> 01:40:10,130
that beats just about
every other studio in Hollywood.

2072
01:40:10,213 --> 01:40:15,093
He say, "You know,
I'm gonna name a soundstage after you."

2073
01:40:15,301 --> 01:40:17,053
ANNOUNCER (over speakers):
The Whoopi Goldberg Soundstage.

2074
01:40:17,137 --> 01:40:20,098
(cheering, applause)

2075
01:40:23,768 --> 01:40:25,895
WHOOPI:
Not to be a bitch or anything,

2076
01:40:25,979 --> 01:40:29,274
but it'll never happen in L.A.

2077
01:40:29,357 --> 01:40:32,277
I'm not that to them.

2078
01:40:33,987 --> 01:40:38,074
But it made me understand that,

2079
01:40:38,158 --> 01:40:41,828
if I went tomorrow,

2080
01:40:41,911 --> 01:40:44,622
the movie business is in good hands.

2081
01:40:47,834 --> 01:40:49,377
TYLER:
I want to thank all the honorees

2082
01:40:49,461 --> 01:40:51,588
for lending their name
to this historic moment.

2083
01:40:51,671 --> 01:40:53,882
400 years this year.

2084
01:40:53,965 --> 01:40:56,885
This is also the year of Jubilee,

2085
01:40:56,968 --> 01:41:00,638
and for this moment to happen

2086
01:41:00,722 --> 01:41:05,101
and happen for me is beyond anything
I could have ever imagined.

2087
01:41:06,853 --> 01:41:08,146
We all have a destiny.

2088
01:41:08,229 --> 01:41:11,566
We all have ancestors
and people who have prayed for us,

2089
01:41:11,649 --> 01:41:15,278
people who've endured all kinds of things
so that we could stand in this position.

2090
01:41:16,571 --> 01:41:17,864
I want you to think about this.

2091
01:41:17,947 --> 01:41:20,200
Why are you here?

2092
01:41:20,283 --> 01:41:21,576
What is this moment for?

2093
01:41:21,659 --> 01:41:23,328
It ain't just about a party.

2094
01:41:23,411 --> 01:41:26,748
It's about a dream in you

2095
01:41:26,831 --> 01:41:31,127
that we all get to stand here,
everybody represented equally.

2096
01:41:32,378 --> 01:41:35,840
This is what America is,

2097
01:41:35,924 --> 01:41:39,177
as a people's destiny
are tied into your dream.

2098
01:41:39,260 --> 01:41:42,597
♪ ♪

2099
01:41:58,404 --> 01:42:01,699
BISHOP JAKES: Young people,
it don't happen the first day.

2100
01:42:01,783 --> 01:42:04,702
Don't be upset
if it doesn't happen when you're 20,

2101
01:42:04,786 --> 01:42:06,788
and it didn't happen when you were 25,

2102
01:42:06,871 --> 01:42:08,832
and it didn't happen
when you thought it was gonna happen.

2103
01:42:08,915 --> 01:42:11,251
That doesn't mean
it's not going to happen.

2104
01:42:11,334 --> 01:42:14,128
You see Tyler now,
but you didn't see him then.

2105
01:42:14,212 --> 01:42:15,797
Tyler is 50 years old.

2106
01:42:15,880 --> 01:42:19,008
-Greatness takes a while.
-(crowd cheers)

2107
01:42:19,092 --> 01:42:22,971
Greatness takes a while.
Greatness takes a while.

2108
01:42:23,054 --> 01:42:25,056
Greatness takes a while.

2109
01:42:25,139 --> 01:42:27,016
You can't get there overnight.

2110
01:42:27,100 --> 01:42:29,978
But if you withstand the storm,

2111
01:42:30,061 --> 01:42:32,397
and the attack and the tests
and the winds and the wave,

2112
01:42:32,480 --> 01:42:34,858
something good is
going to come out of this.

2113
01:42:34,941 --> 01:42:36,192
(applause)

2114
01:42:36,276 --> 01:42:38,111
God opens up a door.

2115
01:42:38,194 --> 01:42:41,865
An amazing door, and
somebody finally hears you or sees you

2116
01:42:41,948 --> 01:42:45,618
or notices you,
and they open up a door for you.

2117
01:42:45,702 --> 01:42:48,788
And I want to thank Tyler Perry
for not stopping

2118
01:42:48,872 --> 01:42:50,540
at having a door for yourself.

2119
01:42:50,623 --> 01:42:54,294
But your door is our platform.

2120
01:42:54,377 --> 01:42:58,423
You opened up a door so that people
who would never get noticed anywhere else

2121
01:42:58,506 --> 01:43:01,509
could walk through and have a chance,

2122
01:43:01,593 --> 01:43:04,512
and that deserves a clap
and that deserves a shout,

2123
01:43:04,596 --> 01:43:07,056
and that deserves emulating and imitating.

2124
01:43:07,140 --> 01:43:10,101
That deserves praising God.

2125
01:43:12,353 --> 01:43:15,440
But you floated on top of
what other people drowned in,

2126
01:43:15,523 --> 01:43:19,986
and if you never succeed,
you ought to shout because you survived.

2127
01:43:20,069 --> 01:43:22,113
(applause)

2128
01:43:22,196 --> 01:43:26,743
You must be willing first to be a survivor
before you can be successful.

2129
01:43:26,826 --> 01:43:29,871
Everything that went wrong in your life

2130
01:43:29,954 --> 01:43:33,875
is what made everything go right
in your life.

2131
01:43:33,958 --> 01:43:35,209
(applause)

2132
01:43:38,838 --> 01:43:40,298
TYLER:
I, uh...

2133
01:43:41,799 --> 01:43:43,801
(applause)

2134
01:43:45,720 --> 01:43:47,388
Yeah.

2135
01:43:47,472 --> 01:43:50,141
♪ ♪

2136
01:43:57,148 --> 01:43:59,317
I just, uh...

2137
01:43:59,400 --> 01:44:04,656
My entire intention,
Gelila and I both, is just to raise

2138
01:44:04,739 --> 01:44:08,284
a good, amazing, wonderful person,
who's...

2139
01:44:10,787 --> 01:44:14,248
...incredible, who honors God,

2140
01:44:14,332 --> 01:44:17,210
who... (sniffles)

2141
01:44:17,293 --> 01:44:22,173
I just realized it was 11 years ago,
I was sitting there when I did this--

2142
01:44:22,256 --> 01:44:25,385
(voice breaking):
I was with my mother, who died in 2009.

2143
01:44:25,468 --> 01:44:29,180
And now I'm here with him, and-and...

2144
01:44:29,263 --> 01:44:31,265
(applause)

2145
01:44:32,767 --> 01:44:37,188
There is a circle of life that goes on.

2146
01:44:37,271 --> 01:44:39,399
I done forgot
everything I'm supposed to say.

2147
01:44:40,608 --> 01:44:42,568
(fading):
But thank you to everybody...

2148
01:44:42,652 --> 01:44:43,945
(waves sloshing)

2149
01:44:52,662 --> 01:44:55,873
LUCKY:
God protected Tyler in the essence of,

2150
01:44:55,957 --> 01:44:58,835
"Be still. Have peace.

2151
01:44:58,918 --> 01:45:01,421
I got you covered.
You know, I'm protecting you."

2152
01:45:01,504 --> 01:45:04,549
So he brought him through all that stuff
to bring him to where he's at today

2153
01:45:04,632 --> 01:45:06,509
and who he is today,

2154
01:45:06,592 --> 01:45:12,015
because in order to endure all that pain
and suffering and chaos,

2155
01:45:12,098 --> 01:45:14,475
God got to have something
in store for you.

2156
01:45:14,559 --> 01:45:16,436
♪ How great ♪

2157
01:45:16,519 --> 01:45:18,896
♪ Is our God ♪

2158
01:45:18,980 --> 01:45:20,857
♪ Sing with me ♪

2159
01:45:20,940 --> 01:45:23,443
♪ How great ♪

2160
01:45:23,526 --> 01:45:26,279
♪ Is our God ♪

2161
01:45:26,362 --> 01:45:27,905
♪ All will see ♪

2162
01:45:27,989 --> 01:45:30,533
♪ How great... ♪

2163
01:45:30,616 --> 01:45:32,994
OPRAH:
Do not play him small,

2164
01:45:33,077 --> 01:45:35,872
because he is not just

2165
01:45:35,955 --> 01:45:40,752
some lucky, rich Negro turned Black man.

2166
01:45:41,753 --> 01:45:45,757
To take what he saw as an opportunity

2167
01:45:45,840 --> 01:45:48,009
to reach a group of people

2168
01:45:48,092 --> 01:45:53,264
and to turn that into this soon-to-be
multibillion-dollar enterprise

2169
01:45:53,347 --> 01:45:56,893
is what everybody else is trying to do.

2170
01:45:56,976 --> 01:45:59,937
REED:
I think it's an important story to tell,

2171
01:46:00,021 --> 01:46:02,356
because folks need to understand that

2172
01:46:02,440 --> 01:46:05,151
how hard he works
and how hard all of this is

2173
01:46:05,234 --> 01:46:07,236
to create the opportunities,

2174
01:46:07,320 --> 01:46:10,490
that now, really,
the world is just catching up with.

2175
01:46:10,573 --> 01:46:14,035
PASEORNEK:
And let's remember, the audience decides.

2176
01:46:14,118 --> 01:46:16,704
It's not the critics.
It's not a bunch of intellectuals.

2177
01:46:16,788 --> 01:46:20,750
It's the audience that decides:
Is this good or is this bad?

2178
01:46:20,833 --> 01:46:23,211
And I challenge anyone

2179
01:46:23,294 --> 01:46:28,716
to come up with the same run of success
that this man has had.

2180
01:46:28,800 --> 01:46:31,344
TYLER: Thank you, everybody,
for all your hard work.

2181
01:46:31,427 --> 01:46:33,596
I am beyond moved. I am inspired.

2182
01:46:33,679 --> 01:46:37,225
My hope beyond anything
is that you caught it.

2183
01:46:37,308 --> 01:46:39,435
Some people who worked with me
20 years ago may know what that means,

2184
01:46:39,519 --> 01:46:42,605
because there's a wave
that's been happening for a long time.

2185
01:46:42,688 --> 01:46:47,276
And I've watched the ones that catch it go
and do amazing things, with or without me.

2186
01:46:47,360 --> 01:46:49,570
So I hope you caught it.
I hope you've honored it.

2187
01:46:49,654 --> 01:46:52,406
I hope you realize how delicate it is,

2188
01:46:52,490 --> 01:46:54,700
how fleeting it is, how it's like dust--
can be gone in a second.

2189
01:46:54,784 --> 01:46:56,744
I hope you just saw it.

2190
01:46:56,828 --> 01:46:58,329
'Cause it's so pure. It's so special.

2191
01:46:58,412 --> 01:46:59,622
It's nothing but God.

2192
01:46:59,705 --> 01:47:03,376
There's some people in this room
who have tremendous talents,

2193
01:47:03,459 --> 01:47:06,504
and they are just amazing at what they do,

2194
01:47:06,587 --> 01:47:08,923
but there's some things going on
in their lives that,

2195
01:47:09,006 --> 01:47:14,387
if they could ever connect their pain
to what their gift is,

2196
01:47:14,470 --> 01:47:17,140
that gift would change
and shift into something else

2197
01:47:17,223 --> 01:47:19,100
that would not only be the bridge
that brings them over

2198
01:47:19,183 --> 01:47:22,478
but could bring others over with them.

2199
01:47:22,562 --> 01:47:25,022
LUCKY:
A lot of us go through things.

2200
01:47:25,106 --> 01:47:27,692
He went through some stuff, man,

2201
01:47:27,775 --> 01:47:28,943
that could've destroyed him.

2202
01:47:29,026 --> 01:47:32,071
It could've destroyed him psychologically
where he went under the bridge

2203
01:47:32,155 --> 01:47:35,575
in a cardboard box
and disappeared off the planet

2204
01:47:35,658 --> 01:47:36,784
because of what he had been through.

2205
01:47:36,868 --> 01:47:40,163
But he didn't do that. He was resilient.

2206
01:47:40,246 --> 01:47:41,664
He did the opposite.

2207
01:47:41,747 --> 01:47:42,957
He fought the demons.

2208
01:47:43,040 --> 01:47:45,168
He fought the naysayers,
the dream snatchers,

2209
01:47:45,251 --> 01:47:49,172
the haters, the people that was opposing.

2210
01:47:49,255 --> 01:47:51,382
People saying, "You're not gonna become."

2211
01:47:51,465 --> 01:47:53,634
"I have to become."

2212
01:47:53,718 --> 01:47:55,386
And he became.

2213
01:47:56,470 --> 01:47:58,014
AMAN:
Why do you work so hard?

2214
01:47:58,097 --> 01:48:00,391
TYLER:
Why do I work so hard?

2215
01:48:00,474 --> 01:48:03,978
Because I want you to have
a really good future,

2216
01:48:04,061 --> 01:48:08,357
and I want us to have a really good life.

2217
01:48:08,441 --> 01:48:13,321
And we can travel and have fun
and help other people.

2218
01:48:13,404 --> 01:48:14,739
So, don't you think that's a good idea?

2219
01:48:14,822 --> 01:48:16,490
-Mm-hmm.
-Okay.

2220
01:48:16,574 --> 01:48:18,284
-AMAN: And you're my hero.
-TYLER: I'm your hero?

2221
01:48:18,367 --> 01:48:21,454
Aw. Love you. You're my hero.

2222
01:48:21,537 --> 01:48:23,456
-Appreciate that, baby. I love you.
-AMAN: You, too.

2223
01:48:24,832 --> 01:48:26,792
TYLER:
Always on to the next thing.

2224
01:48:26,876 --> 01:48:28,419
You live in the moment,
but you plan ahead.

2225
01:48:28,502 --> 01:48:30,671
Focused on the next step,
thinking about the next step,

2226
01:48:30,755 --> 01:48:31,839
but you're in the moment.

2227
01:48:32,924 --> 01:48:35,176
That doesn't mean you're unsatisfied.

2228
01:48:35,259 --> 01:48:39,513
That just means that there's always
something that you feel is left to do.

2229
01:48:42,475 --> 01:48:44,227
For me, anyway.

2230
01:48:45,770 --> 01:48:48,356
(song ends)

2231
01:48:50,441 --> 01:48:52,068
This is empty, and I'm done.

2232
01:48:52,151 --> 01:48:53,653
(sets object down)

2233
01:48:54,737 --> 01:48:56,239
(sighs)

2234
01:48:56,322 --> 01:48:58,407
MAN: Well, if you can,
if you could just look right here

2235
01:48:58,491 --> 01:49:01,869
and say your name and who you are.

2236
01:49:01,953 --> 01:49:03,746
Why?

2237
01:49:03,829 --> 01:49:05,623
You don't know I'm Tyler Perry?

2238
01:49:05,706 --> 01:49:08,417
MAN:
I know who you are, but I want to know...

2239
01:49:08,501 --> 01:49:11,170
who you think you are.
Do you think you're a director?

2240
01:49:11,254 --> 01:49:13,089
What-what defines you?

2241
01:49:13,172 --> 01:49:16,717
"I'm Tyler Perry, and I'm a father.
I'm..." Whatever you want to say.

2242
01:49:16,801 --> 01:49:19,804
("A Song for Mama" by Boyz II Men playing)

2243
01:49:34,986 --> 01:49:37,280
I'm Tyler Perry, and I'm Maxine's baby.

2244
01:49:38,281 --> 01:49:42,326
♪ Mama, mama ♪

2245
01:49:42,410 --> 01:49:48,457
-♪ You know I love you ♪
-♪ You know I love you ♪

2246
01:49:48,541 --> 01:49:50,876
♪ You know I love you ♪

2247
01:49:50,960 --> 01:49:53,129
♪ Mama ♪

2248
01:49:53,212 --> 01:49:54,922
-♪ Ooh ♪
-♪ Mama ♪

2249
01:49:55,006 --> 01:49:57,758
♪ You're the queen of my heart ♪

2250
01:49:57,842 --> 01:50:00,261
♪ You are ♪

2251
01:50:00,344 --> 01:50:03,848
♪ Your love is like tears from the stars ♪

2252
01:50:03,931 --> 01:50:06,642
♪ Your love is like
tears from the stars ♪

2253
01:50:06,726 --> 01:50:13,107
-♪ Mama, I just want you to know ♪
-♪ Mama, I just want you to know ♪

2254
01:50:13,190 --> 01:50:16,360
♪ Loving you is like food to my soul ♪

2255
01:50:16,444 --> 01:50:22,491
♪ Loving you is like food to my soul ♪

2256
01:50:25,036 --> 01:50:28,205
♪ Oh ♪

2257
01:50:28,289 --> 01:50:30,541
♪ Yeah ♪

2258
01:50:30,624 --> 01:50:35,421
♪ You are the food to my soul ♪

2259
01:50:35,504 --> 01:50:40,009
♪ Yes, you are. ♪

2260
01:50:47,725 --> 01:50:50,728
("Senaye" by Rophnan playing)

2261
01:50:57,068 --> 01:50:59,070
(singing in foreign language)

2262
01:51:27,098 --> 01:51:29,100
♪ ♪

2263
01:51:57,128 --> 01:51:59,130
♪ ♪

2264
01:52:28,159 --> 01:52:30,161
♪ ♪

2265
01:53:00,191 --> 01:53:02,193
♪ ♪

2266
01:53:32,223 --> 01:53:34,225
♪ ♪

2267
01:54:04,255 --> 01:54:06,257
♪ ♪

2268
01:54:45,838 --> 01:54:47,840
(song fades)