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Sun, 13 Aug 2000 15:16:46 EDT
by Veronica Mixon
It was unheard of - especially in the entertainment
news - where mainstream media like "Entertainment
Tonight," People" and "Entertainment Weekly"ignored
the quartet because they were not Gen X or white.
Nevertheless, these four men have made their mark.
"THE ORIGINAL KINGS OF COMEDY" premiered at the
Fourth annual Urbanworld Film Festival in New
York on August 5th. It's an outrageous verbal
testament to black life and the foibles of an
energetic people. The comics touch on black attitudes
about love, sex, religion, work, white people
and relationships.
Forty-three-year-old Steve Harvey plays host
and he bases his success on his first hosting
job, "It's Showtime at the Apollo"in 1983.
For the last four years, he's played vice-principle
Steve Hightower on "The Steve Harvey Show."
Cedric the Entertainer played the Reverend in
the Martin Lawrence hit, "Big Momma's House"and
he's also worked on "The Steve Harvey Show."
Bernie Mac has appeared in over seventeen films
including "Life"with Lawrence and Eddie
Murphy, "The Player's Club," "BAPS"opposite
Halle Berry, "Booty Call"and "Get on
the Bus." The youngest member of the group,
D.L. Hughley stars in a sitcom about a black middle-class
couple in "The Hughleys." He has appeared
in "Inspector Gadget"and "Double Rush."
When I sat down with the comics, they were funny,
honest and cool.
THE INTERVIEW
I saw the show at Radio City Music Hall and
I remember it was much dirtier. Did you have to
change the show for the big screen?
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Bernie: When you write your joke - that's
your signature. When you have an opportunity to
put your signature on film, you must do it. That's
what you work for. It's no different than doing
an album back in the day. Your presentation might
have changed somewhat. Plus you might have edited
in some instance in terms of picking our best
joke if people bend over laughing because five
years from now, you can remember.
Were any of you afraid of offending TV audience?
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Steve: I've had the stand-up persona for
fifteen years. They just put me on television
in 1993. They threaten me every year [saying]
I won't be back on the WB [Warner Brothers network].
So with that in mind, what do I care what the
people on the TV side think? It don't make me
no difference, man. Everything ain't for kids.
When you're at home with your kids, do you sleep
with your bedroom door open? No, you don't. You
shut your door because it ain't for the kids.
My stand-up is me. They can't cancel that. They
can't threaten it not to come back [next]
season. It has sold and made me more money than
all the television combined. So, no, I have no
worries about offending my audience.
How did you come to comedy? When did you know
what you wanted to do?
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Cedric: I was eighteen months. [Laughs]
Mine started in the freshman year in high school
where you do the "cafeteria jones" and I was pretty
good at it. I never thought I could do it professionally
until after college. The first time I got on stage,
I won five hundred dollars and that was it. I
won some money. I knew that was it and I was on
my way.
Steve: I wanted to do this as a youth but
I had no inkling - not the slight clue how to
get it, how to practice it, how to get towards
it so it didn't happen for me until later in life.
Like Ced [Cedric] after college but my college
career ended rather abruptly. I was trying to
go to class but they asked me to just quit coming.
[They] sent a notice to
my Momma and them let them know that they didn't
want to come back down there. After that, my inability
to hold a job kinda forced me into comedy. I'm
not really - I can't be no where every day eight
to five, not five days a week. Three of those
days I ain't gonna make it. And one of those days,
I'm gonna need a sick day so ... I'll show up
once a week and that ain't a good employee record.
So, that sort of pushed me into comedy.
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D.J.: I was never good at anything else.
I wasn't an athlete. I wasn't smart in school.
The only way you could get girls where I grew
up was if you could make them laugh. I knew that
the most intrinsically beautiful thing you could
do was to make people laugh. And, to know that
I could do that... I didn't know that you could
make a living at it because we only saw one comic
at a time. I went to see a cat named Robin Harris
at the Comedy Act Theatre. I realized that he
was like everyone that I'd grown up with and he
made me laugh. So, it wasn't that big a stretch
for me because you didn't have to be cerebral
and talk about stuff that nobody could relate
to so, I'd say that those things forced me into
the business.
Bernie: I was young. I'd really want to.
My brother kinda forced me into it. 'Stick with
him' and being at the Regal Theatre and watching
all of the entertainers come through. I was under
his wing at four or five. I still didn't have
no idea of what I was doing. I was following him.
He'd tell me do this and [when]
I got on stage, I did it and I feel in love with
it. My first monologue was at eight [years
old] at a church banquet and it just transact
from there - all through school, church choir,
talent shows, etc.
D.J.: It's hard to imagine Bernie at a
church banquet. [They all laugh.]
Steve: [Laughing]
I just saw you at the banquet with whole church
going [jesters with arms in air].
Bernie: But, you know, acting in school
plays, etc. At that time, I was just glad to get
in front of anybody. I was playing a lot of sports
and stuff but just being in front of an audience.
I knew I was a ham whether playing baseball or
performing. I knew that a nine to five was [not]
going to [give me] this
rush.
If you had your druthers, could other comedians
be part of the royal family of comics?
Steve: Druthers?
Cedric: Not at any disrespect to any other
comics out there but after performing with these
brothers for two years, I just don't see nobody
fitting to this unit. We belong to each other
like this is your foxhole and you're going down
in it. I'm a Chris Rock fan. I love Jamie Foxx
- that's my man. But, I don't know if I want to
be on tour with them. With this tour, we've become
our own family and it's hard to think of anyone
else being in one of these spots.
Steve: I have to agree with that. Somebody
asked us that the other day but they said dead
or alive. We said, Richard Pryor, Moms Mably,
Robin Harris but that can't be. When you've been
in it with the same guys, I would hate to destroy
the chemistry. You cannot create chemistry. It
either exists or it doesn't.
D.J.: There are only a few comics and
four of them on tour. There's a genuine respect
and admiration for one another.
Bernie: It's hard to substitute. We've
got a championship run and one hundred years of
experience.
Are you still angry that you didn't get mainstream
media attention?
Steve: You know, I'm sure we all feel the
same. It's all right. It's OK. We beat the horse
the first year of the tour. Even on the second
year, every night I stood on there and got on
that soapbox and talked about the media not giving
us any coverage. I do understand and I do know
for a fact that if [we were]
four other guys of the same skin tone and four
different names - i.e. [Jerry]
Seinfeld, Tim Allen, Drew Carey and Robin Williams
- had they gotten together and sold this many
tickets, they'd have been on the cover of People,
Time Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, GQ,etc.
But, that wasn't the case. We just put the work
in. We are who we are whether you recognize [us]
or not. [Together] we are
a force to be dealt with. My old man use to say,
'it can never come too late.
Cedric: This is a funny movie. It's not
a black movie, etc. "Buffy"is going to
this night, "Dawson's Creek"etc. But, all
the Black shows are going to Sunday night.
D.J.: They moved us [TV's
"The Hughleys"] to Friday and forgot
to put us in half the TV Guides. If the rules
were the same, I wouldn't care. "Sports Night"-
we beat them every time. Jerry Seinfeld took four
years before it became a hit. They wouldn't do
that for us. You can't call anything that generates
$45 millions an underground event.
Veronica
Mixon is a member of the Online Film Critics,
a feature writer for E!Online, Roughcut and the
film editor at Carib News. She has written film
reviews for APBnews and Houston Review.
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