Episode 847 - Lee Daniels

Episode 847 • Released September 17, 2017 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Guest:Lock the gates!

00:00:09Marc:All right, let's do this.

00:00:10Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?

00:00:12Marc:What the fuck, buddies?

00:00:13Marc:What the fucking ears?

00:00:13Marc:What the fuck, Nicks?

00:00:14Marc:What's happening?

00:00:15Marc:I am Marc Maron.

00:00:17Marc:This is my podcast.

00:00:18Marc:How's it going?

00:00:19Marc:Today on the show, look at me setting up the show properly.

00:00:22Marc:Today on the show, Lee Daniels, the director, producer, writer of Empire, the butler, Monsters Ball.

00:00:34Marc:He's going to be here.

00:00:35Marc:We talked for about an hour.

00:00:37Marc:I had a tight window, but it was good.

00:00:40Marc:I think we locked in and we got some stuff done.

00:00:43Marc:We emotionally bonded and challenged each other a little bit.

00:00:47Marc:And it was exciting.

00:00:49Marc:It was moving.

00:00:50Marc:I needed one of those.

00:00:51Marc:I needed one of those where I'm like, ah, this is kind of, I don't know, making me have feels.

00:00:56Marc:Is that how the kids say it?

00:00:58Marc:Feels?

00:00:58Marc:Is that where we're at?

00:01:00Marc:So...

00:01:01Marc:What's happening?

00:01:02Marc:I'm sick.

00:01:03Marc:Not only do I have like four stitches in my mouth, now I've got a fucking cold.

00:01:08Marc:I'm sure you can hear it.

00:01:09Marc:But the show must go on.

00:01:11Marc:Okay?

00:01:12Marc:The show must go on.

00:01:15Marc:But if you're wondering why I sound weird, that's it.

00:01:17Marc:Those two things.

00:01:18Marc:Uh, Harry Dean Stanton passed away, which is sad.

00:01:23Marc:He was very old, but it's sad still.

00:01:26Marc:Nonetheless, does not matter.

00:01:28Marc:He was one of those guys that you just always thought was going to be there forever on some level.

00:01:33Marc:And he is because he's done so many movies.

00:01:35Marc:But we did repost the original interview I did with him, which if any of you have been with me for a long time, I was very insecure about.

00:01:44Marc:And a lot of people got mad at me.

00:01:46Marc:Because they said it was fine.

00:01:48Marc:He was old and I was too hard on myself.

00:01:51Marc:Or what did you expect, you idiot?

00:01:53Marc:He's an old man.

00:01:55Marc:But I just wanted to say that we did put that interview back up if you wanted to check in with that.

00:02:00Marc:I did see that new movie, Lucky, too.

00:02:02Marc:It would have to be his last movie.

00:02:04Marc:And I think it's a very personal movie for him, I think.

00:02:10Marc:And I'm not being paid to say this, and I don't know where I got the film or who sent it to me.

00:02:16Marc:It was directed by John Carroll Lynch, who is also an actor that you might remember played Francis McDormand's husband in Fargo.

00:02:26Marc:But the movie stars Harry Dean, and he's this 90-year-old atheist who has outlived and outsmoked his contemporaries.

00:02:33Marc:So it's not him, but it is him in a way, I believe.

00:02:36Marc:And it's a pretty great movie.

00:02:37Marc:David Lynch is in it, Ron Livingston.

00:02:39Marc:Tom Skerritt has a part in it.

00:02:41Marc:There's a lot of older cats that you haven't seen in a while.

00:02:44Marc:But I recommend it.

00:02:45Marc:I don't know where you can find it, but it's a good movie.

00:02:48Marc:It's called Lucky.

00:02:49Marc:And if you have a Jones to see the last film that Harry Dean Stanton did, I believe, I'm not mistaken, you should watch that because it's a poetic little movie.

00:03:02Marc:It's a little stylized, but it's great if you love Harry Dean.

00:03:08Marc:Okay?

00:03:09Marc:I just wanted to put that out there.

00:03:10Marc:I'm a little raw.

00:03:11Marc:I'm fucking sick.

00:03:14Marc:So here's what's going on.

00:03:15Marc:Let's read a couple emails.

00:03:16Marc:I want to talk about Eric Clapton for a minute.

00:03:18Marc:I talked about, oh, the teabag situation.

00:03:22Marc:That sounds dirty, but it's not.

00:03:24Marc:First, the emails.

00:03:27Marc:Here we go.

00:03:29Marc:It says, dude, subject line, dude, is that really your butt in glow?

00:03:34Marc:Please say yes.

00:03:36Marc:That's from Ross.

00:03:37Marc:So I wrote back, of course.

00:03:39Marc:And he wrote back, nice.

00:03:41Marc:I thought it was a nice exchange.

00:03:43Marc:I wanted to share it with you.

00:03:45Marc:Here's another one.

00:03:46Marc:Subject line, too good.

00:03:50Marc:My girlfriend farted in front of me for the first time while laughing watching Too Real.

00:03:54Marc:So thanks for that intimate moment and progression in our relationship.

00:03:58Marc:Your best work yet.

00:04:00Marc:glad to help out man that was from marcus that's a big moment for a couple and and i'm i'm you know i'm proud i'm proud of the special but at this moment i'm more proud that i facilitated that wonderful moment between you two and you're welcome and thank you for watching too real on netflix

00:04:18Marc:I appreciate that.

00:04:20Marc:Now, the tea issue.

00:04:21Marc:Let's get to the tea issue.

00:04:23Marc:As you know, I spoke about buying a bag of PG Tips that had 1,150 tea bags in it, which was too much.

00:04:31Marc:It's a lot of pressure.

00:04:32Marc:Don't think I'm going to make it.

00:04:33Marc:It's very intimidating.

00:04:35Marc:It's a harbinger of my mortality.

00:04:38Marc:There's a lot of problems with it.

00:04:40Marc:I've I've stuffed that big bag into a cabinet and I have a little tin for PG tips.

00:04:45Marc:So I'm just filling the tin.

00:04:46Marc:But I got an email after actually talking about unloading the PG tips.

00:04:53Marc:PG tips wanted Eagle Rock, which is close to me.

00:04:56Marc:My name is Will, and my wife and I recently moved to Eagle Rock from London.

00:04:59Marc:I was listening to your Lord WTF episode and heard you've over-ordered PG Tips tea bags.

00:05:04Marc:Like true English, we both drink quite a lot of PG Tips.

00:05:07Marc:Congrats, as it's the only tea.

00:05:10Marc:And are down to our last small box.

00:05:12Marc:So I'd be up for buying some off you if you wanted.

00:05:15Marc:No joke.

00:05:16Marc:Love the podcast, by the way.

00:05:17Marc:Cheers, Will.

00:05:19Marc:And I don't know what's going on with me, but I'm doing some fan outreach.

00:05:24Marc:And I wrote back, sure, I can meet you later today.

00:05:27Marc:I'll bring some.

00:05:28Marc:When is good?

00:05:29Marc:Marin.

00:05:29Marc:Will.

00:05:30Marc:Amazing.

00:05:31Marc:Afraid I'm at work the weekdays in Wilshire, but can either come meet you on the weekend or on my way home one night after work, if that's cool.

00:05:37Marc:Just let me know how much money.

00:05:38Marc:Thanks so much.

00:05:39Marc:And I said, maybe over the weekend, I don't need money.

00:05:42Marc:I have a lot of tea.

00:05:43Marc:Marin.

00:05:44Marc:He said, yeah, weekend is cool.

00:05:46Marc:I'm around.

00:05:46Marc:Great.

00:05:47Marc:Thank you so much.

00:05:48Marc:PG Tips is literally the only thing we get homesick for.

00:05:51Marc:And then he wrote, hey, Mark, let me know when it's good.

00:05:52Marc:Then he started pressure me a little bit.

00:05:54Marc:Let me know when it's good this weekend.

00:05:55Marc:I felt a Jones coming.

00:05:57Marc:Like, you know, I teased him.

00:05:58Marc:I teased him with this big drop.

00:06:00Marc:of PG Tips, which is a highly addictive substance.

00:06:03Marc:So he says, going to be on York Boulevard in about an hour if that works.

00:06:06Marc:I also have some vinyl for you to say thanks.

00:06:08Marc:Cheer as well.

00:06:09Marc:So now, like, you don't know.

00:06:11Marc:You email a mid-level celebrity like myself.

00:06:13Marc:You don't know if, like, I'm going to get back to you or what.

00:06:15Marc:So now he's sweetening the deal with vinyl.

00:06:18Marc:Like, he's like, he needs his stuff.

00:06:20Marc:But he's like, I don't know if Marin's really on the level with this shit.

00:06:23Marc:It's audacious that I would expect this to happen with a mid-level celebrity such as Marc Maron.

00:06:28Marc:That's what I'm projecting onto him.

00:06:30Marc:And then I said, I have to go by Rock Dog and Cat on Colorado next to the poke place in the strip mall.

00:06:37Marc:Can you be there at 430?

00:06:38Marc:I'll hand off the goods.

00:06:40Marc:And Will said, cool.

00:06:42Marc:See you then.

00:06:42Marc:No cops.

00:06:44Marc:So I did a tee drop in the parking lot of a strip mall.

00:06:47Marc:Did a PG tip tee drop for my English pal and got a couple records.

00:06:53Marc:I don't go crazy.

00:06:55Marc:I'm not going to be doing that every week.

00:06:56Marc:It's just I'm fragile.

00:06:58Marc:I'm vulnerable.

00:06:59Marc:I'm a little ill.

00:06:59Marc:I can't.

00:07:01Marc:I'll explain it later.

00:07:03Marc:Oh, man.

00:07:04Marc:So I went and saw Clapton.

00:07:07Marc:And as some of you know, I don't.

00:07:12Marc:Well, here's the thing.

00:07:13Marc:And I guess I can tell you.

00:07:15Yeah.

00:07:15Marc:I'm a tremendously big fan of Jimmy Vaughn.

00:07:21Marc:Now, I don't know if you know who Jimmy Vaughn is.

00:07:24Marc:Jimmy Vaughn is a guitar player.

00:07:27Marc:He's Stevie Ray Vaughn's older brother, and he had a band called the Fabulous Thunderbirds.

00:07:33Marc:And the first two Fabulous Thunderbirds records are, for my money, from where I'm sitting, two of the greatest sort of Texas blues records that you can own.

00:07:46Marc:Just beautiful fucking jump blues guitar player.

00:07:49Marc:I mean, he's like...

00:07:52Marc:He's a classicist of blues guitar playing and great blues music, a lot of it from the Texas guys.

00:08:00Marc:I guess what I'm getting at is, yes, I did interview Jimmy Vaughn, but that's not what this is about.

00:08:03Marc:Jimmy Vaughn and another cat that he plays guitar with, Billy Pittman, who I also know.

00:08:08Marc:They were opening for Clapton at the Forum.

00:08:11Marc:And after I talked to Jimmy in here, which you'll hear eventually, he let me play with him too.

00:08:16Marc:It was a real fucking honor.

00:08:17Marc:You gotta check out the first two fabulous Thunderbirds records.

00:08:20Marc:Girls Go Wild, What's the Word.

00:08:23Marc:Just get those two.

00:08:25Marc:I play guitar with those two records more than almost any other record.

00:08:28Marc:like even more than Peter Green, those first two fabulous Thunderbirds records.

00:08:32Marc:So for me, it was a real thrill and honor to hang out with Jimmy Vaughn.

00:08:36Marc:So they're opening for Clapton at the Forum.

00:08:38Marc:It's Jimmy Vaughn and his band, then Gary Clark, and then Clapton.

00:08:41Marc:Now, as some of you know,

00:08:44Marc:I respect Clapton, but I've been a little bored by him at times.

00:08:51Marc:But I went to see these guys and I watched Jimmy.

00:08:54Marc:I hung out and Jimmy showed me some licks and he gave me some strings.

00:08:56Marc:He told me I got to do flatwounds.

00:08:58Marc:That's where it's at.

00:08:59Marc:This is only important to guitar players.

00:09:01Marc:But like I watched Clapton and I think I figured it out.

00:09:05Marc:He's always been pretty laid back, right?

00:09:09Marc:It's just as he got older, you know, he doesn't put any effort into, you know, he'll just wear some stonewashed jeans, maybe some cargo pants, Birkenstocks or Dock Siders and just a short sleeve shirt.

00:09:21Marc:And I don't know what I'm expecting from a 71-year-old man.

00:09:24Marc:But, you know, he's just very grounded and has nothing to fucking prove.

00:09:28Marc:And he just sat there.

00:09:30Marc:He did, like, three fucking rockers.

00:09:32Marc:And he sat down with an acoustic and did a bunch of his hits on acoustic.

00:09:35Marc:And then he picked up the electric again, did White Room and some other shit.

00:09:39Marc:And, you know...

00:09:42Marc:I'm not saying it was riveting, but it was pleasant.

00:09:46Marc:And the one thing that I felt was that when he did lay out a lead, and he's really done his homework on the acoustic blues playing over the years, man.

00:09:53Marc:He really fucking knocks that shit out.

00:09:55Marc:That was really some of the best.

00:09:57Marc:The acoustic blues.

00:09:58Marc:And that's probably where he's at.

00:09:59Marc:He's a real blues guy.

00:10:01Marc:He's not going to run around like Mick Jagger.

00:10:04Marc:He's just going to be up there, be slow hand, lay back, take it easy, not talk to the audience, do his fucking job.

00:10:11Marc:He seems like a very grounded, sober, spiritual dude in a way that's almost shy.

00:10:18Marc:But I'll tell you the one thing, like one thing I'd love to see, like, you know, when they do hit that lead, like during White Room or whatever, during one of the classic old ones, what do you do?

00:10:26Marc:A Key to the Highway, you know?

00:10:28Marc:It's like, can't we just lay out a 20-minute jam?

00:10:31Marc:You know, can't we just do that?

00:10:33Marc:Because when he'd get on those runs, I'm like, that's why he's fucking great.

00:10:36Marc:Those runs are outstanding.

00:10:38Marc:These blues runs.

00:10:39Marc:And I'm like, yeah, I'm just watching his fingers on the big screen.

00:10:43Marc:Anyway, I'm sorry.

00:10:46Marc:that I dismissed Eric Clapton for being boring.

00:10:51Marc:He's a wizard, and it's a lot of responsibility to be a guitar hero and to hold that mantle, and he fucking did, and I'm sorry, Eric.

00:11:04Marc:All right?

00:11:05Marc:Not that you listened, not that I talked to you, not that I even met you, but there you have it.

00:11:09Marc:Okay?

00:11:10Marc:If it's...

00:11:11Marc:Great job.

00:11:13Marc:I just wish maybe a 12-minute lead.

00:11:15Marc:12-minute jam.

00:11:16Marc:Just fucking lay it out cream style, right?

00:11:19Marc:Why not?

00:11:20Marc:Maybe I left too soon.

00:11:21Marc:Did you do that?

00:11:22Marc:Are you still playing now?

00:11:23Marc:I don't know.

00:11:24Marc:Maybe the show is continuing.

00:11:26Marc:okay lee daniels was in and out here he uh he was he was doing a junket doing other interviews you know he's got his show um empire and star uh premieres the the new season on september 27th my birthday and i was happy to talk to him it was kind of intense this is me and lee daniels

00:11:53Marc:So you had a production call right there, right?

00:12:03Marc:Just walking in.

00:12:04Marc:You're dealing with some... Dude.

00:12:07Marc:What?

00:12:08Marc:It's hard.

00:12:10Guest:Is it?

00:12:10Guest:It is, yeah.

00:12:11Marc:For which show?

00:12:12Guest:Star.

00:12:13Guest:Uh-huh.

00:12:13Guest:And it was about music.

00:12:16Guest:Yeah.

00:12:16Guest:It's just so hard.

00:12:17Guest:It's so hard.

00:12:18Marc:But you deal with that every day.

00:12:19Guest:I know, but I was literally, we're trying to find a song about... Yeah.

00:12:23Guest:in one of the episodes as a finale number, that's sort of like about where we are right now as a country.

00:12:31Guest:And I wanted it to be my interpretation of We Are The World, a hipper sort of, but I remember when We Are The World was done, I felt that even though they had all those stars there, it felt a little, little like cutie.

00:12:46Guest:Sure, yeah.

00:12:46Guest:Almost like Disneyland-y.

00:12:47Guest:Oh, absolutely, yeah.

00:12:49Guest:But it was what it was.

00:12:50Guest:And so I'm trying to find a rougher,

00:12:53Guest:grittier version of that song that song not that song exactly but sort of like an inspiration that you know because we're in a fucked up place right now bad so i so i'm just trying to find a song that is uh that why don't you hire a bunch of cats to cover that thing we do oh yeah that was the call that i was making as we're walking into the door are we recording

00:13:16Guest:Yeah.

00:13:19Guest:Okay.

00:13:19Guest:Well, that's exciting.

00:13:20Guest:Yeah.

00:13:22Guest:And then you're shifting gears and I'm thinking as I'm driving up, okay, where am I going?

00:13:26Guest:What am I doing?

00:13:27Marc:Right now?

00:13:28Guest:Tonight?

00:13:28Guest:As I walk into here right now to this great space that is filled with such- You got to ground yourself.

00:13:34Guest:Yeah.

00:13:34Guest:I'm adjusting to it because it's a pretty afro pic and everything.

00:13:38Guest:It's pretty, it's my kind of style.

00:13:41Guest:It really is my kind of style.

00:13:42Guest:You like clutter?

00:13:43Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:13:44Guest:Historical clutter?

00:13:45Guest:Yeah.

00:13:46Yeah.

00:13:46Marc:Is that what your house looks like?

00:13:50Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:13:50Marc:Well, that's good.

00:13:51Marc:I appreciate it, guys.

00:13:53Marc:A collector.

00:13:53Marc:Yeah.

00:13:54Marc:Your collector.

00:13:54Marc:My mother calls it junk.

00:13:56Marc:Yeah.

00:13:56Marc:Well, I mean, I don't know why.

00:13:57Guest:It's comforting to me.

00:13:59Guest:It's very soothing.

00:14:00Guest:I feel right at home trying to figure out.

00:14:02Guest:Already, I'm going to attack the books, and I'm loving that thing right there that I grew up with.

00:14:08Guest:The troll doll?

00:14:09Guest:Yeah, man.

00:14:09Guest:Yeah.

00:14:10Marc:yeah there's a lot of stuff well then you got the bible it's like it's it's a little bit you go from the bible to homeboy over there yeah to which one out of tyson tyson yeah that's just a weird picture that somebody put uh yeah that that somebody put the tattoo that i used for my logo on a bunch of different people and that was what that was so what's so you don't live here

00:14:34Guest:i don't i do you do i did man i'm homeless right now i live in new york you're breaking my heart uh i'm not home no i ain't that kind of homeless i've been that homeless yeah but i'm not i'm not that kind of homeless but i i um i prefer that kind of homeless actually really yeah because if you know i know what time it is you know what i mean but this is a level playing field

00:14:54Guest:when you got when you got nothing you got nothing left exactly yeah but um the um this is a different type of a homeless in that my spirit my home is new york you know right and um and i've shows in in atlanta and in new york and in chicago so i go back and forth between both cities empires in chicago no kidding yeah shooting in chicago you shoot all there

00:15:21Guest:So I stay at a hotel there, and then I stay at a hotel in Chicago.

00:15:24Guest:Nice hotel.

00:15:27Guest:I like Chicago.

00:15:29Guest:I do, too.

00:15:30Guest:In the summertime or in the autumn.

00:15:32Guest:I can't mess with that winter.

00:15:34Marc:I didn't know about Chicago for years, and I started playing there and working there, and I was like, this is a real city with its own thing.

00:15:40Marc:It's really grounded.

00:15:41Marc:It's a good place.

00:15:42Marc:I mean, I know it's got its problems, but I mean, it's a nice city.

00:15:45Marc:Don't you think?

00:15:46Marc:Yeah.

00:15:46Marc:Atlanta, I never really got a handle on Atlanta.

00:15:49Guest:It's not bad.

00:15:50Marc:Yeah.

00:15:50Guest:It's not bad.

00:15:52Guest:There's some good groovy folks.

00:15:54Guest:It's as nice as Chicago.

00:15:55Guest:Yeah?

00:15:56Guest:Yeah.

00:15:56Marc:And now it's like a big, it's like the hub of show business.

00:16:00Marc:I'm told.

00:16:01Marc:Yeah.

00:16:01Marc:What are you shooting there?

00:16:02Marc:You know, right?

00:16:02Marc:There's shooting all kinds of shit there.

00:16:04Guest:I'm not, I'm not, you know, you get into your bubble of what it is.

00:16:07Guest:So you really don't know about other people's worlds.

00:16:10Guest:Yeah.

00:16:10Guest:But where'd you grow up?

00:16:11Guest:Philadelphia.

00:16:13Guest:When it was tough.

00:16:14Guest:Yes.

00:16:15Guest:oh my god yeah yeah the move experience rizzo yeah has mayor experience um yeah and it was it was i like philly now that's beautiful right it's really um well what you go downtown yeah beautiful yeah and then you step into north philadelphia and you step into the into the depths of west philadelphia yeah

00:16:36Guest:And you see the countless rows of homes that are abandoned.

00:16:40Guest:And then you see one little home, like row homes.

00:16:43Guest:And you see one, like all these abandoned homes.

00:16:45Guest:Yeah.

00:16:45Guest:Boarded up even.

00:16:46Guest:Yeah.

00:16:46Guest:And you'll see a person living on that street.

00:16:49Guest:Yeah.

00:16:49Guest:Literally one family out of a 13 row home.

00:16:53Guest:Yeah.

00:16:53Guest:Family.

00:16:53Guest:It's pretty intense.

00:16:54Guest:Why is that?

00:16:56Guest:What happened?

00:16:56Yeah.

00:16:57Guest:I don't know.

00:16:59Guest:You don't know?

00:17:00Guest:It's really deep.

00:17:01Guest:It's really, yeah.

00:17:02Guest:But it's not like- I drove, my brother had a family that lived in Philadelphia and I drove down the street and I was like, all these abandoned homes and then there was this house.

00:17:15Marc:And it's just the way it is.

00:17:17Marc:It's not like Detroit.

00:17:19Marc:It didn't die.

00:17:20Guest:I'm sorry, but certain parts of Philadelphia, it's bad.

00:17:24Guest:It just died.

00:17:24Guest:It's gone.

00:17:26Guest:And the houses are just there.

00:17:27Guest:What about where you grew up?

00:17:28Guest:Is it still alive?

00:17:30Guest:Yeah.

00:17:30Guest:It's so funny.

00:17:31Guest:It's secular.

00:17:32Guest:When we moved in...

00:17:34Guest:We were the first black family that lived on our street in West Winfield.

00:17:39Guest:Yeah.

00:17:39Guest:And a bunch of white people lived there.

00:17:43Guest:And then they sort of skirted off to the suburbs.

00:17:46Guest:Right after you moved there?

00:17:47Guest:Yeah.

00:17:48Guest:And then it became all black.

00:17:50Guest:And now, because there's a college there, St.

00:17:55Guest:Joe's, it's now...

00:18:00Guest:It's now white again with sprinkles of African-American families.

00:18:06Marc:So it all comes back around.

00:18:08Marc:But when you grew up there, it was just a working class neighborhood?

00:18:12Marc:Yeah.

00:18:13Marc:Lower middle class.

00:18:14Marc:Yeah.

00:18:15Marc:It was a middle class neighborhood that became lower middle class.

00:18:18Marc:Uh-huh.

00:18:18Marc:And what was your family's, what did your old man do?

00:18:22Marc:He was a cop.

00:18:23Marc:Really?

00:18:24Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:18:24Guest:He was a cop that worked for Rizzo, Frank Rizzo.

00:18:26Guest:Oh, wow.

00:18:26Guest:Yeah.

00:18:27Guest:You know, when you think of some of my earliest memories were a group of white men crying over my father's body in blue.

00:18:37Guest:How old were you?

00:18:39Guest:Fifteen.

00:18:40Guest:Uh-huh.

00:18:42Guest:That's when they start?

00:18:42Guest:Those are some of your earliest memories?

00:18:45Guest:I mean, you know.

00:18:45Guest:Yeah.

00:18:45Guest:No, I know.

00:18:46Guest:My earliest memory was pooping in my grandfather's shoe.

00:18:52Guest:You did that?

00:18:53Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:18:53Guest:On purpose, I would imagine.

00:18:55Guest:I don't know.

00:18:55Marc:I don't remember.

00:18:56Marc:I just remember pooping in my grandfather's shoe.

00:18:59Marc:That's a very tough coincidence to accept.

00:19:03Marc:It doesn't sound like it just happened.

00:19:06Marc:But your father was killed on duty?

00:19:09Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:19:09Marc:Gunned down?

00:19:12Guest:He lived the way he died, which was a violent death.

00:19:18Marc:He was a violent man?

00:19:20Marc:How many siblings you got?

00:19:21Marc:Four.

00:19:22Marc:Yeah.

00:19:22Marc:And it was a violent family?

00:19:27Marc:um not all the time yeah just a lot of stuff going on explosive sorry you went through that that's i thought it was normal it's hard to process have you processed it i mean do you have you worked through it i'm working through it yeah yeah i worked through it through my work yeah yeah and then i learned that that wasn't enough so now you know i know therapy and

00:19:51Guest:Yeah?

00:19:52Guest:Yeah.

00:19:53Marc:Do you work through it in your work or were you avoiding it through your work?

00:19:57Marc:Do you know what I mean?

00:19:58Marc:Like, I know people, artists, you know, create stuff that resonates with them and moves them through stuff, but a lot of times you seem like a very busy guy.

00:20:05Marc:So I imagine that sometimes, you know, just working gets you away from, you know, whatever emotions that you... Wow, that's a very powerful statement and I think it's accurate.

00:20:15Guest:It's very accurate because you don't... And then you come back and, whoa, you still got the same problems.

00:20:20Guest:Right.

00:20:21Guest:But I do everything that I do.

00:20:25Guest:It comes from a place of experience.

00:20:28Guest:And so it is really therapeutic.

00:20:33Guest:But then I come back to still what you just said.

00:20:37Guest:Yeah, who you are.

00:20:38Guest:And so I'm 57.

00:20:40Guest:And so for the first time ever, I've been in therapy.

00:20:43Guest:Yeah.

00:20:44Guest:And it seems to be working.

00:20:45Guest:You look good.

00:20:46Guest:I feel good, man.

00:20:47Guest:I feel good.

00:20:49Guest:I'm glad it's working.

00:20:52Guest:I'm not drinking.

00:20:53Guest:I'm going through this sober thing.

00:20:54Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:20:56Marc:I've been sober a long time.

00:20:57Marc:Me, too.

00:20:57Marc:I'm in AA.

00:20:58Marc:Yeah, me, too.

00:20:59Marc:I don't know whether I should.

00:21:01Marc:You're not supposed to, but that's all right.

00:21:02Marc:I'm not supposed to say it.

00:21:03Marc:I talk about it all the time.

00:21:03Marc:I'm not supposed to.

00:21:04Marc:No.

00:21:05Marc:Why?

00:21:06Marc:According to the program.

00:21:08Marc:Do you want to know originally why?

00:21:10Marc:Yeah.

00:21:11Marc:They didn't want people who were famous people talking about it because they didn't want those people to... They don't want to have public representatives of the program.

00:21:20Marc:Because let's say that somebody gets sober because of you.

00:21:23Marc:You said AA, right?

00:21:24Marc:And then all of a sudden, maybe you don't stay sober.

00:21:27Marc:Then whoever... Then they're like...

00:21:30Marc:Well, that's the reason I got sober.

00:21:33Marc:Right?

00:21:33Marc:You know what I'm saying?

00:21:35Marc:Yeah.

00:21:36Marc:Can we delete this part then?

00:21:37Marc:No, no, no.

00:21:38Marc:I talk about it all the time.

00:21:39Marc:I'm just telling you what the tradition means.

00:21:40Marc:How long have you been sober?

00:21:44Marc:Six months.

00:21:45Marc:Oh, so you're, you're in it.

00:21:46Guest:So you're doing it.

00:21:47Guest:I mean, no.

00:21:47Guest:Yeah.

00:21:48Guest:I got sober.

00:21:49Guest:Yeah.

00:21:49Guest:And then I got sober.

00:21:50Guest:I mean, I was, I was like, I was, um, I was on drugs.

00:21:55Guest:Yeah.

00:21:56Guest:You know, some 15 years ago.

00:21:58Guest:Right.

00:21:59Guest:And then I got, and so I, and I drank.

00:22:01Guest:Yeah.

00:22:02Guest:And then I recently just said, uh-uh.

00:22:04Guest:Right.

00:22:05Guest:I need a, it's a, I don't know why.

00:22:07Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:22:07Guest:Well, good.

00:22:08Guest:So this is an exciting time.

00:22:09Marc:You're going to find out a lot about yourself.

00:22:10Guest:Well, I'm knowing that I'm having difficulty now having sober sex.

00:22:14Guest:Yeah.

00:22:15Marc:That's something that's... Not as loose as you used to be.

00:22:19Guest:Maybe that's something to do with me being 57, too.

00:22:21Guest:Sure.

00:22:22Guest:Not really like, you know, something... Yeah, yeah.

00:22:25Guest:Well, yeah, it's a little more, you know, you can't hide from yourself as much.

00:22:29Guest:Yeah.

00:22:29Guest:Yeah, it's hard, man.

00:22:31Guest:I think, you know, I've been really honest with who I am and what I've been through.

00:22:39Guest:And a lot of people are receptive and a lot of people are not.

00:22:43Guest:And I never cared, really, as long as I'm staying and living in my truth even when I was high, saying, I'm high.

00:22:55Guest:But I'm living in my truth.

00:22:56Guest:I'm truly high.

00:22:58Guest:I'm high.

00:22:59Guest:And people would look at me like, he's high for saying that he's high.

00:23:06Guest:Well, that's an interesting thing.

00:23:07Guest:Oh, my God.

00:23:08Guest:Where's this interview going?

00:23:09Marc:Well, how far along are you in the Richard Pryor movie?

00:23:12Guest:I'm not.

00:23:13Guest:I know.

00:23:15Guest:I related to it so much because I did what he did.

00:23:21Guest:I was on cocaine.

00:23:23Guest:Yeah.

00:23:27Guest:we were gonna do it yeah and then i just sort of just i don't know i just i got caught up in tv land and it really it sucks you in it dry you're very demanding yeah it's not like i'm going away for six months to make a movie i didn't know that though when i signed up for it i didn't even know that the show was going to be it i didn't even know this show was going to get picked up i literally am fire yeah yeah that's the first and so i didn't know that we were going to get picked up so well we did i did it as a

00:23:54Guest:you know what?

00:23:55Guest:Whitney Cummings came in.

00:23:56Guest:Do you know who she is?

00:23:57Guest:Sure.

00:23:57Guest:She came over and said, why are you poor?

00:24:00Guest:I'm going, she says, you get these Oscars for people, but you're like, why are you?

00:24:04Guest:When did she say this to you?

00:24:05Guest:Well, you say she just came over?

00:24:07Guest:How did you know?

00:24:07Guest:Because she was friends, you know?

00:24:08Guest:Yeah, sure.

00:24:09Guest:She came over and she was like- To your house.

00:24:10Guest:Mm, New York.

00:24:11Guest:And she says, Lee, I get a lot of money.

00:24:14Guest:I get a lot of money.

00:24:15Guest:And if you do a TV show, you can get a lot of money.

00:24:17Guest:And I go, really?

00:24:17Guest:What kind of money?

00:24:19Guest:And then she told me what kind of money.

00:24:20Guest:And I said, are you... And she said, yeah.

00:24:24Guest:And that's just like a... I said, okay.

00:24:27Guest:So when my partner...

00:24:28Guest:um who wrote the butler came to me and said okay let's just do another movie about um we had in common um we loved on um king lear yeah and we wanted to do a family about a black sort of hip-hop thing yeah you know we were gonna do um it as a film yeah and i said no let's do it as a tv show right because i think i'm told by my friend whitney that we can make money so in television yeah and so

00:24:56Guest:We didn't think that the pilot was going to get picked up because no one was buying African American anything.

00:25:01Guest:So we literally went off to do, we were going to do, I was going to do Richard Pryor afterwards.

00:25:07Guest:And then it got picked up, which meant, oh my God, okay, that's great.

00:25:12Guest:Got to make more.

00:25:13Guest:You got to do 13 more.

00:25:16Guest:And I said, well, what does that mean?

00:25:17Guest:So now we had to sit and think about what that meant as a season.

00:25:21Guest:Yeah.

00:25:22Guest:And that's time consuming.

00:25:24Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:25:24Guest:And you've got a writing room.

00:25:25Guest:You've got a crew.

00:25:27Guest:It was so deep.

00:25:29Guest:And then I am making money.

00:25:31Guest:Yeah.

00:25:32Guest:And then they say, hey, Lee, you want a deal?

00:25:35Guest:Yeah.

00:25:36Guest:Oh, sure.

00:25:37Guest:Yeah, we like you over here.

00:25:38Guest:You're making money.

00:25:40Guest:We had no idea.

00:25:42Guest:So that's the kind of money.

00:25:43Guest:Because I really have never been motivated by money.

00:25:45Guest:Yeah, right.

00:25:46Guest:You know, the minute...

00:25:49Guest:Maybe I have been motivated by money.

00:25:50Guest:Got to be a little bit.

00:25:54Guest:I always wanted to do it to make sure it's important or that I could make my kids proud at the end.

00:26:01Guest:That's what's important for me.

00:26:06Guest:But the kids were going to college, and so I said, that is the most phallic.

00:26:11Guest:This is crazy, this room.

00:26:12Guest:I love this room.

00:26:13Guest:It's a mushroom, but is it really a penis head?

00:26:15Guest:What is it exactly?

00:26:16Marc:It's a mushroom, but I mean, it could be a colorful penis head.

00:26:21Marc:A mosaic giant penis head.

00:26:24Marc:Yeah.

00:26:25Marc:So you're saying kids are in college.

00:26:27Guest:I said I had to put the kids through college.

00:26:31Guest:How many kids you got?

00:26:33Guest:Two.

00:26:34Guest:Twins.

00:26:35Guest:Yeah.

00:26:36Guest:And 21 now.

00:26:39Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:26:39Guest:And they wanted to go to expensive schools.

00:26:42Guest:So I was sort of forced into the TV world.

00:26:45Guest:But then it became a job.

00:26:48Guest:There's no end.

00:26:52Guest:Oh, yes, there is.

00:26:55Guest:Yeah, there is.

00:26:56Guest:Okay.

00:26:58Guest:Not in the foreseeable future, really, right?

00:27:00Guest:No, because they just keep spitting around.

00:27:03Guest:What do you mean?

00:27:04Guest:I'm forcing myself to do a film.

00:27:09Guest:But going back to the Richard Pryor of it all, I'm no longer at this point going to direct it.

00:27:14Guest:I'm going to produce it.

00:27:15Marc:Oh, okay.

00:27:16Marc:Okay, so Epps is still moving forward.

00:27:18Marc:Oh, for sure.

00:27:19Marc:And there's a script being written?

00:27:20Marc:The script has been written.

00:27:22Guest:By you?

00:27:22Guest:No.

00:27:23Guest:Well, I did a pass on the script.

00:27:24Guest:Bill Condon.

00:27:25Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:27:26Guest:He's an incredible writer.

00:27:28Guest:It's very Bob Fosse.

00:27:29Guest:Oh, good.

00:27:30Guest:Well, that's good.

00:27:31Guest:All that jazz, except... And he's going to direct it, too?

00:27:35Guest:No, Bill's not.

00:27:36Guest:He was going to direct it, but no, he's not.

00:27:38Guest:So we're looking for a director right now.

00:27:41Guest:Oh, so what book they based it on?

00:27:43Guest:They didn't base it off anything.

00:27:45Guest:They just put it together.

00:27:46Guest:They put it together, you know, from... His life.

00:27:49Guest:Yeah, the document, a couple of documentaries.

00:27:52Guest:That's exciting.

00:27:53Guest:Some of the kids, the wife.

00:27:55Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:27:55Marc:Yeah, the wife, some of the kids.

00:27:57Marc:Not all the kids, but a couple of them.

00:27:59Marc:But let's, I mean, like I'm sort of fascinated with like the sort of nuts and bolts of how you got to where you are from, like, was show business the thing in the beginning when you were a kid?

00:28:11Marc:Was that what you saw yourself doing?

00:28:14Marc:Because you're like a mogul.

00:28:16Marc:And you've done a lot of different elements of show business.

00:28:19Marc:You've been a manager, a producer, a writer, an actor a bit, a director.

00:28:24Guest:Well, I'm not really an actor.

00:28:25Guest:I only acted because there's nobody else to stand and say the lines that was good.

00:28:29Guest:So I had to come in and say, you know what I mean?

00:28:30Guest:Right, right.

00:28:31Guest:But I mean, but all that other stuff, you know, and you came up.

00:28:34Guest:I'm not an actor.

00:28:35Guest:Okay.

00:28:35Guest:I tried it.

00:28:36Guest:You know, I tried.

00:28:37Guest:Hey, I'm in the first episode of my new season because, again, you know,

00:28:41Marc:It's nice.

00:28:42Marc:I'd say one word.

00:28:43Marc:That's nice.

00:28:44Marc:It's like signing a thing.

00:28:45Marc:You know what I mean?

00:28:46Marc:There's a guy.

00:28:47Marc:It's like Hitchcock in his movie.

00:28:49Marc:Yeah, a little bit.

00:28:50Marc:But how do you get from Philly to here?

00:28:52Marc:I mean, I know it's a long story.

00:28:54Guest:The first book I read was literally, this is exactly how it happened.

00:29:01Guest:I went to the public library.

00:29:03Guest:I went into the theater section.

00:29:06Guest:I saw a book that was titled, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee.

00:29:11Guest:I read the book in the library.

00:29:14Guest:I got a library card.

00:29:15Guest:I came home.

00:29:17Guest:I had all my friends on the stoop and my sisters and my brother.

00:29:21Guest:act out all the parts martha and george really everybody yep and and and it sort of just took over from that point you did a stoop production of uh stoop production yeah of who's afraid of virginia wolf and then i went to edward halby many years later to ask if i could do it black and he said no did you really that must have hurt a little a little did he give you any reason or that was the end of

00:29:50Marc:What a bastard.

00:29:52Guest:I don't know.

00:29:52Marc:I guess he sees it a certain way, and I understand that.

00:29:55Marc:Yeah, but it's a play.

00:29:55Marc:You release it out into the world.

00:29:59Marc:I'm not going to argue with you or Edward Albee.

00:30:01Marc:I'd love to do it as a play.

00:30:02Marc:I'd love it.

00:30:03Marc:I think it's a great play.

00:30:04Marc:You could probably do, oh, you wanted to do a movie?

00:30:07Marc:Yeah.

00:30:08Marc:Oh, you could probably do a play.

00:30:10Marc:I don't think he allowed it.

00:30:11Marc:That's a condition?

00:30:13Marc:Like, that would be crazy.

00:30:14Marc:I believe so.

00:30:14Marc:By the way, this can't be done by black people.

00:30:16Marc:I believe so.

00:30:17Marc:Don't quote me.

00:30:18Marc:I won't.

00:30:19Marc:So you go from there to, like, how old were you when that happens?

00:30:23Marc:Eight or nine.

00:30:23Marc:Oh, really?

00:30:24Marc:So you wanted to be in show business from that point on?

00:30:26Guest:I didn't know that it was show business.

00:30:27Guest:But you liked it.

00:30:28Guest:I didn't know what it was.

00:30:29Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:30:29Guest:Because it wasn't any really, there weren't, you know, my grandfather owned a, um,

00:30:35Guest:He was the manager of a theater.

00:30:38Guest:So I saw a lot of black exploitation films as a kid.

00:30:42Guest:Shaft and Superfly and Claudine and The Lady Sings the Blues.

00:30:47Guest:There was a period of wonderful cinema with people.

00:30:52Guest:And then there was some great television at the time, Norman Lear television.

00:30:56Guest:Yeah.

00:30:56Guest:was inspirational, but I didn't really know that that was what, I didn't know that that was called a director or a writer or a creator.

00:31:03Guest:Yeah.

00:31:04Guest:I just knew that I wanted to be a part of something that I didn't know what it was.

00:31:08Guest:So I went to school.

00:31:10Guest:Where at?

00:31:11Guest:I went to Lindenwood Colleges in St.

00:31:15Guest:Louis, in St.

00:31:16Guest:Charles, Missouri.

00:31:17Guest:Uh-huh.

00:31:18Guest:I don't know why.

00:31:18Guest:You don't know why.

00:31:20Guest:That was the only place that probably would accept me.

00:31:22Guest:You graduated high school and you ended up in Missouri.

00:31:24Guest:Went to an all-white high school.

00:31:25Guest:All white high school, which is really interesting, back in the 70s.

00:31:29Guest:How was that for you?

00:31:30Guest:Fantastic.

00:31:31Guest:My neighbor was a butler.

00:31:34Guest:I ended up doing a movie because of him called The Butler.

00:31:37Guest:And my mom knew that early on that I would get in trouble.

00:31:41Guest:The vice principal of my junior high school said that I would amount to nothing, that I was going to end up dead.

00:31:49Guest:And my mother said, no, he won't.

00:31:51Guest:And Mr. Brodsky is his name.

00:31:53Guest:And so my neighbor worked for a chauffeur that owned the Philadelphia Eagles.

00:32:01Guest:And he lived in Villanova.

00:32:04Guest:And so he said, well, why don't we use his address?

00:32:10Guest:Ed Snyder was his name.

00:32:11Guest:And we used his address.

00:32:12Guest:And he was kind enough to let me.

00:32:14Guest:And I went to an all, I literally was transported from an all African-American world to a completely where I was the only spot in the spot, okay?

00:32:23Guest:So it was just me and maybe a couple others.

00:32:27Guest:And it was great.

00:32:28Guest:I didn't experience racism at all, which is, I don't know how that is, but I didn't, or I was too naive to see it.

00:32:34Guest:Yeah.

00:32:35Guest:This is high school.

00:32:36Guest:You would have known.

00:32:37Guest:Yeah, I would have known.

00:32:38Guest:Sure.

00:32:38Guest:Yeah.

00:32:39Guest:I auditioned for a play called The Sound of Music, and I couldn't understand why it was that they wouldn't give me the role of something Von Trapp.

00:32:50Guest:And I was like, why?

00:32:51Guest:I did a better audition than this knucklehead.

00:32:54Guest:Yeah.

00:32:55Guest:They gave me Max instead.

00:32:57Guest:I played the Nazi, I think.

00:32:59Guest:Nazi sympathizer.

00:33:02Guest:That's all right.

00:33:02Guest:That's pretty good casting.

00:33:04Guest:There's some power in that.

00:33:06Guest:It was my first... It's an irony.

00:33:07Guest:It was my first job ever.

00:33:09Guest:And the bug was there.

00:33:12Guest:Again, I didn't know what it was.

00:33:13Guest:And so I went to college to study political science because I wanted to make my dead father happy.

00:33:19Guest:Yeah.

00:33:20Guest:Because he wanted me to be a lawyer.

00:33:22Marc:And...

00:33:23Marc:Isn't that weird how you still honor them, even if your feelings are mixed about them, that you still honor them, even when you may not want to?

00:33:33Marc:Did you feel that during that?

00:33:35Marc:Like, why am I doing that?

00:33:37Guest:Yes.

00:33:39Marc:Do you?

00:33:40Marc:Well, I do like, you know, I what I find is that, you know, my father is still alive and, you know, he is sort of receded a bit in my psyche and in my heart.

00:33:50Marc:But but, you know, I do do things like him.

00:33:53Marc:And I you know, when I talk to him.

00:33:56Marc:I have to make sure that I have some very serious boundaries around who I am and who he is.

00:34:03Marc:And sometimes it's emotional.

00:34:05Marc:But I try not to show that because I can't afford it.

00:34:09Marc:And I'm 53.

00:34:10Guest:You know, and I'm going to be stealing what you just did.

00:34:12Guest:Would you just share it with me?

00:34:14Guest:Yeah.

00:34:14Guest:I'm stealing that for a scene or two.

00:34:16Marc:Okay.

00:34:18Guest:I'm serious because it was so visceral.

00:34:20Guest:Okay.

00:34:21Guest:You can.

00:34:22Guest:Sometimes you get out of ideas.

00:34:23Guest:Yeah.

00:34:24Guest:So, you know, they stay with you.

00:34:25Guest:Yeah.

00:34:26Guest:And I steal that moment that what you just said.

00:34:28Guest:Good.

00:34:28Guest:And you'll go, wait a minute.

00:34:29Guest:That's it.

00:34:31Guest:If you're looking maybe episode 12 in of Empire or one of these shows.

00:34:36Marc:Or Star.

00:34:37Guest:That would be me talking to somebody.

00:34:40Guest:Well, good.

00:34:41Guest:So, all right.

00:34:41Guest:So, you don't do the law thing.

00:34:43Guest:I don't do the law thing.

00:34:44Guest:I go to...

00:34:45Guest:yeah I don't do the law thing and um the political science thing and second year into school yeah I just decided that was it was a wrap I was going with this girl um from Hawaii yeah and um and just sort of I was I was finding out who I was sexually yeah you know and uh and then another trial and error

00:35:08Guest:Yeah, another girl I dated just said, you know, you're gay, don't you?

00:35:12Guest:And I go, no.

00:35:14Guest:She says, yeah, you are.

00:35:20Guest:So I said, I said, I want to go to Hollywood.

00:35:23Guest:Yeah.

00:35:23Guest:And she said, okay, here's 70 bucks.

00:35:26Guest:So I think it's either, she gave me 70 bucks, I took a bus, and I landed in Hollywood.

00:35:31Guest:And that was that?

00:35:32Guest:Yes.

00:35:32Guest:No plan.

00:35:33Guest:No.

00:35:33Guest:I'm here.

00:35:34Guest:I swear.

00:35:34Guest:I knew he gay.

00:35:37Uh-huh.

00:35:38Guest:Is that crazy?

00:35:39Guest:No.

00:35:40Guest:That's crazy.

00:35:40Guest:I was homeless for a little bit.

00:35:43Guest:Then I had a nursing agency.

00:35:44Guest:I went to work at a nursing agency.

00:35:47Guest:At those times, I don't know whether they still have them, but the classified ads in the LA Times.

00:35:51Guest:And I went and I saw a receptionist and I became a receptionist at a nursing agency.

00:35:56Guest:Just because it was a job?

00:35:57Guest:It was a job.

00:35:58Guest:Oh, interesting.

00:35:59Guest:I knew I had a good voice.

00:36:01Guest:I knew that.

00:36:02Guest:Yeah.

00:36:04Guest:It was a sales job.

00:36:05Guest:And so I was selling nurses.

00:36:07Guest:And I had nothing of nursing.

00:36:08Guest:And I could, if your mom got sick or if your dad got sick and they wanted in-home care.

00:36:15Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:36:16Guest:Or if your wife was having a baby and they needed a nanny or whatever.

00:36:19Guest:Oh, that kind of stuff.

00:36:20Guest:So it was literally like a booking agency for nurses.

00:36:22Guest:For nurses.

00:36:23Guest:And so, and then a year in, they made me the manager because I was a good sales rep.

00:36:28Guest:And then

00:36:29Guest:After that, I was like, why am I doing this?

00:36:31Guest:Oh, and I was living out of a church.

00:36:34Guest:I was homeless, and then I moved into a church, and then I was directing theater.

00:36:40Guest:That's how it started.

00:36:41Guest:I directed theater in the church, because they had a theater in the back of the church.

00:36:46Guest:And so I was directing in Baldwin Hills.

00:36:48Guest:So I was directing theater in the back of a church.

00:36:51Guest:They just let you live there?

00:36:52Guest:Well, he found out.

00:36:53Guest:Yeah, they found out.

00:36:54Guest:They found out.

00:36:55Guest:But then I moved.

00:36:56Guest:I mean, it wasn't long.

00:36:57Guest:It was like three weeks or two weeks or something.

00:37:00Guest:Oh, okay.

00:37:00Guest:It wasn't short-lived.

00:37:01Guest:I mean, when you're homeless, you go from place to place.

00:37:03Guest:You know what I mean?

00:37:04Guest:So that was a place.

00:37:05Guest:But I remained at that church.

00:37:08Guest:And they had a theater and I was directing one acts.

00:37:11Guest:Still unaware of what it was that I wanted to do.

00:37:14Guest:I went back from acting to directing.

00:37:21Guest:And then I got a job.

00:37:23Guest:I got my first apartment in Hollywood.

00:37:25Guest:Where was the job?

00:37:27Guest:The nursing agency.

00:37:29Guest:And then a year into the nursing agency, after they made me manager, I was like, wait a minute, hold on.

00:37:35Guest:Something's wrong with this picture.

00:37:36Guest:I...

00:37:37Guest:can do this myself.

00:37:39Guest:And so I ended up taking five of their nurses and I had become friends with all of the, how you get their work there is you become intimate friends with discharge planners at different hospitals and or social workers at different hospitals that call in for help.

00:37:54Guest:And most of them were African-American women.

00:37:58Guest:And so they would give me work.

00:38:00Guest:And before I knew I had my own nursing agency.

00:38:02Guest:And I had like several hundred nurses that were working for me.

00:38:06Guest:I worked out of my apartment.

00:38:07Guest:I ended up moving in Wellshire and La Brea, my offices.

00:38:09Guest:So you were a nurse agent.

00:38:12Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:38:12Guest:Still directing theater.

00:38:15Guest:One acts in Baldwin Hill at the church.

00:38:17Guest:No, I was at that point on Melrose sometimes.

00:38:20Guest:We were at the Zephyr.

00:38:21Guest:Oh, yeah, sure.

00:38:21Guest:Yeah, and I had grown a little bit.

00:38:24Guest:So you were casting and you were directing.

00:38:26Guest:No, I wasn't casting yet.

00:38:27Guest:I was still in theater, and then I still had the nursing agency.

00:38:31Guest:But I mean, how were you putting the plays on?

00:38:33Marc:You were directing it, so you cast it, right?

00:38:35Guest:Yeah.

00:38:35Marc:So you were putting the whole show together.

00:38:37Marc:Yeah.

00:38:37Marc:So that's how you were starting in show business and you were booking nurses.

00:38:41Marc:Yes, from my, but I was, yeah.

00:38:43Guest:Got it.

00:38:45Guest:And then the producer of Purple Rain came in.

00:38:49Guest:Yeah.

00:38:50Guest:And asked me if I wanted to, like he was a client

00:38:55Guest:And he said, what do you want to do?

00:38:56Guest:Oh, at your nursing office.

00:38:59Guest:He happened to come in because you pay the nurse.

00:39:01Guest:I made a lot of money, by the way.

00:39:03Guest:That was a lot of money to be made.

00:39:04Guest:And by the way, we were the first nursing agency to be under contract with AIDS Project LA.

00:39:10Guest:Oh, wow.

00:39:10Guest:Which is crazy because no one wanted to touch people with AIDS back in those days.

00:39:15Guest:And our nurses did.

00:39:16Guest:And so...

00:39:17Guest:We made a lot of money.

00:39:18Guest:And then, you know, that's when the drug use began a lot because I didn't really, you know.

00:39:25Guest:You had money.

00:39:25Guest:A lot of money.

00:39:26Guest:Running a lot of nurses.

00:39:29Guest:And not running a lot of taxes.

00:39:31Guest:Do you know what I mean?

00:39:32Guest:Yeah.

00:39:32Guest:You know, and.

00:39:34Guest:So, yeah, let the party begin.

00:39:36Guest:Yes.

00:39:36Marc:And so.

00:39:37Marc:So the guy from Purple Rain.

00:39:38Guest:I came in and I ended up doing casting.

00:39:43Guest:I was casting.

00:39:46Guest:What do you mean?

00:39:47Guest:He said, what do you want to do?

00:39:49Guest:I said, I'm in the entertainment business.

00:39:51Guest:He said, how can you be in the entertainment business when you're taking care of my father?

00:39:54Guest:I said,

00:39:56Guest:Well, I want to be in the entertainment business.

00:39:59Guest:He said, well, this is what you do.

00:40:00Guest:You become a PA.

00:40:01Guest:I said, PA, okay.

00:40:03Guest:So then- With a successful business.

00:40:05Guest:You're running your own business and the guy offers, he says, a PA job.

00:40:08Guest:Yeah.

00:40:08Guest:I sold the nursing agency.

00:40:10Guest:To become a PA.

00:40:11Guest:I sold the nursing agency for a lot of money.

00:40:13Guest:And I drove on to the set of Warner Brothers with a Armani suit, a Porsche, and a Newport cigarette.

00:40:20Guest:Uh-huh.

00:40:20Guest:Yeah.

00:40:20Guest:And ready for my PA job.

00:40:24Right.

00:40:25Guest:And that didn't last very long.

00:40:27Guest:I went into casting and then became friendly with Prince.

00:40:30Guest:Wait, I'm sorry.

00:40:33Guest:So you PA'd on Purple Rain?

00:40:35Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:40:35Guest:That was casting sort of, but I was fired.

00:40:39Guest:I mean, if you IMDB me, I'm not even listed as credit.

00:40:44Marc:But you go as a PA and they use you for casting?

00:40:47Guest:Yeah, because it was all about... It was all about...

00:40:52Guest:our connection and it was the suits against you know right the black men like i we knew i had an eye for talent then yeah and i didn't know that that was my god gift then your connection with prince you mean after you met prince yes right okay so we yeah the irony is is that clarence williams iii was in that film yeah and i i cast him in that and then years later i get to direct him in the butler

00:41:17Guest:Yeah.

00:41:17Guest:That's crazy, crazy.

00:41:18Guest:It was like crazy, crazy, crazy.

00:41:21Guest:Yeah.

00:41:21Guest:Luke from Mod Squad.

00:41:23Guest:Yeah, I know.

00:41:24Guest:He's good.

00:41:24Guest:He's so good.

00:41:25Marc:He's so good.

00:41:25Marc:Anyway, so... American Gangster.

00:41:27Marc:He was a good American Gangster.

00:41:28Marc:Genius.

00:41:29Marc:Good in your movie.

00:41:29Marc:Yeah, yeah, he's great.

00:41:30Marc:But... So that starts you.

00:41:33Marc:Now, was Prince... And then... Were you friends with Prince?

00:41:36Guest:Did you get... Friendly-ish.

00:41:38Guest:Okay, okay.

00:41:39Guest:Do you know what I mean?

00:41:39Guest:Sure.

00:41:41Guest:In the beginning, you know, yeah.

00:41:42Guest:And then we did Under the Cherry Moon.

00:41:45Mm-hmm.

00:41:45Guest:And then the music videos, a bunch of music videos.

00:41:48Guest:With Prince.

00:41:49Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:41:50Guest:So that's a good way to play.

00:41:51Guest:But Warner was really happy with me.

00:41:52Guest:Yeah.

00:41:52Guest:And I started working over at Warner Brothers and...

00:41:56Guest:And I was like head of minority talent.

00:41:59Guest:They called it that?

00:41:59Guest:I don't know what the hell.

00:42:00Guest:It was something like that.

00:42:01Guest:I don't know.

00:42:02Guest:And it's like, all I know is, is that, you know, I was casting and it was like before it was pre Spike Lee and post the black exploitation era.

00:42:10Guest:So I was sitting there with a pencil and a suit feeling important.

00:42:16Guest:Like I was a businessman, you know, on the Warner lot.

00:42:19Guest:Minority talent.

00:42:22Guest:I guess something like that.

00:42:24Marc:So you were a casting agent at the studio, basically.

00:42:32Marc:Sort of, yeah.

00:42:33Marc:Yes.

00:42:34Marc:Kind of development, too?

00:42:36Guest:No development at all.

00:42:38Guest:And then I discuss it.

00:42:39Guest:Wait a minute.

00:42:39Guest:Hold on.

00:42:41Guest:i didn't um i wasn't getting fulfilled so i kept part of the job was watching going to theater right and watching um i had long given up the desire or didn't even know like i had no longer done directing yeah theater and so i was going to see plays and part of it was seeing all these black plays in new york in l.a in chicago and um what year is this this i don't know yeah um what's going on what were the big plays gossip but colonists morgan freeman oh yeah

00:43:10Guest:I guess it was just post-Dreamgirls, post-Dreamgirls, because I was a kid when Dreamgirls was out.

00:43:16Guest:So I don't remember the year.

00:43:18Guest:But you're scouting.

00:43:20Guest:Talent.

00:43:20Guest:Yeah.

00:43:21Guest:But for what?

00:43:22Guest:I don't know.

00:43:23Marc:Exactly.

00:43:23Marc:Minority scouting.

00:43:24Marc:So I decided...

00:43:27Guest:She's making a dossier of minority talent.

00:43:30Guest:And so with that, oh, and I met this wonderful woman who changed my life.

00:43:35Guest:Her name was Paula Kelly.

00:43:37Guest:And I had seen her in Sweet Charity in the film.

00:43:42Guest:Sweet Charity with Shirley MacLaine and Chita Rivera.

00:43:44Guest:And I saw her in Sophisticated Ladies with Gregory Hines on Broadway.

00:43:47Guest:And I said, why aren't you working?

00:43:49Guest:I need to see you working.

00:43:50Guest:I said, light bulb.

00:43:52Guest:I'm going to manage you.

00:43:53Guest:And so I opened a management company where I was managing actors.

00:44:01Guest:you know i come you know i came from a place where as a kid you know most of like a lot of my family members yeah and neighbors were drug dealers so you know or pimps and you know so you need a hustle is that yeah and so i figured you know i would do it with actors and so it was really you pimp nurses for a while yeah yeah sort of um

00:44:27Guest:And how did you start to build?

00:44:29Guest:I had a good reputation.

00:44:30Guest:Well, I don't know whether it was a good reputation.

00:44:32Guest:I made sure that my talent was working.

00:44:36Guest:The problem was that they did not have roles that I felt were suitable for the actors that I was working with.

00:44:43Guest:And it was embarrassing telling them that they could just play a pimp or a drug dealer or a prostitute at the time.

00:44:50Guest:But I learned the game.

00:44:52Guest:I started representing young white kids.

00:44:54Guest:and that's when it changed you know yeah and so um and then that took me around the world yeah you know and i represented i don't know from and then i ended up representing european nastasia kinski um ashwarya rai in india yeah it's like you know the baliwood princess and what changed the game for me was when i started representing a kid named wes bentley i found him in a play and he then started in american beauty and oh that's that movie that the movie then my my big break

00:45:23Marc:The documentary.

00:45:24Marc:My Big Break?

00:45:25Marc:About Wes and the people he lived with.

00:45:27Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:45:28Guest:Good for you.

00:45:29Guest:Good for you.

00:45:31Marc:I haven't seen it, though.

00:45:32Guest:What do you mean?

00:45:33Marc:Should I see it?

00:45:34Marc:Well, I knew you were featured in it somehow.

00:45:37Marc:How?

00:45:38Marc:Well, I mean, Wes is in it.

00:45:40Marc:Yeah, I have to see it.

00:45:41Marc:I'm about halfway through it.

00:45:42Guest:Is it going to be good?

00:45:43Marc:What's weird to watch?

00:45:45Marc:They were all high.

00:45:46Marc:Well, no.

00:45:47Guest:Well, they were all high.

00:45:48Guest:I don't know.

00:45:48Guest:We were all high for sure.

00:45:49Guest:But there was two or three of them made it out of that house.

00:45:53Guest:Wes and then Michael Shannon.

00:45:54Guest:I found him in Chicago.

00:45:55Guest:Was Michael Shannon?

00:45:57Guest:You managed him at the beginning?

00:45:58Guest:In the very beginning.

00:45:59Guest:I got him his first job.

00:46:00Guest:I got him a sad card in the movie that I produced.

00:46:02Guest:It was the second film called The Woodsman.

00:46:05Guest:Yeah.

00:46:05Guest:With Kevin Bacon?

00:46:06Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:46:07Guest:Kira Sedgwick, I produced that.

00:46:08Guest:That was my second.

00:46:09Guest:My first movie, so I ended up leaving management because I got tired of telling African-American actors, you can only play this.

00:46:16Guest:I got to create something.

00:46:18Guest:I got to realize I got to take it.

00:46:19Guest:I got to up my game.

00:46:20Marc:What was the name of your management agency?

00:46:21Marc:Lee Daniels, a management company.

00:46:23Marc:So you did all right with it.

00:46:24Marc:How long were you doing that?

00:46:26Guest:I don't know.

00:46:26Guest:eight years so that's how wow what that's an amazing story really so then i said i got tired of that and i said i'm gonna i'm gonna make my own destiny yeah then i ended up uh producing my first film and it was you know i don't know how i did it but we did it in uh monsters ball that's a that's a uh that's a real hammer of the movie

00:46:48Guest:a nice way to start a career i didn't know that i was doing what i was doing but i just was doing it yeah doing whatever i could do to make sure that this movie this vision was um was executed how did that come to you the writers came to me because they at the time there was um there were many incarnations i believe sean penn

00:47:08Guest:Robert De Niro and Marlon Brando were attached at one time.

00:47:13Guest:Oh, wow.

00:47:15Guest:That's big.

00:47:16Guest:Yeah.

00:47:17Guest:And they just couldn't get the movie made.

00:47:19Guest:And so the writers came to me and I said, I'll do it.

00:47:24Guest:Let's figure it out.

00:47:25Guest:And Wes Bentley was going to star.

00:47:28Guest:He didn't.

00:47:30Guest:And so I got Heath to star instead because he was a friend of Wes's.

00:47:35Guest:And that really began my career as a producer.

00:47:42Guest:You know, Puffy, I don't know what, I guess as a producer, you could say that.

00:47:47Guest:Why wouldn't you say that?

00:47:49Guest:What would you say?

00:47:50Guest:Well, because I did more than that.

00:47:51Guest:I mean, I was very much involved with the acting.

00:47:56Marc:Sure.

00:47:57Marc:You knew what you wanted.

00:47:58Marc:You knew it.

00:47:59Marc:You saw it.

00:48:00Marc:So you sort of were a secret co-director?

00:48:03Marc:I don't know whether I could.

00:48:04Guest:I don't think that that's the right word to say.

00:48:06Guest:Because as a director now, I would take deep offense to it.

00:48:08Guest:I think Mark Forrester is a genius.

00:48:10Guest:But I knew I wanted performances.

00:48:13Guest:And I learned from Mark how to hold a camera.

00:48:16Guest:And I learned really.

00:48:18Guest:On set.

00:48:19Guest:Literally.

00:48:20Guest:I learned the makings of how to direct.

00:48:23Guest:In that medium.

00:48:26Guest:Uh-huh.

00:48:26Guest:And also from the medium from when I was on set with other actors.

00:48:31Marc:So this is how you went to school?

00:48:36Guest:On set.

00:48:37Guest:I learned how to direct from other directors that I respect.

00:48:41Guest:I put my actors with directors that I respected.

00:48:45Guest:And now we're at the point where you're going to direct a movie.

00:48:48Guest:Yeah.

00:48:49Guest:And it was the first movie I directed.

00:48:50Guest:Well, I was getting cocky.

00:48:52Guest:I was getting cocky and I was still...

00:48:55Guest:Sure.

00:48:55Guest:Yeah.

00:48:57Guest:And I believed the press.

00:48:59Guest:On you.

00:49:00Guest:After Monster's Ball.

00:49:00Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:49:01Guest:Yeah.

00:49:01Marc:You believe it.

00:49:02Marc:Yeah.

00:49:03Marc:And you're doing coke.

00:49:04Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:49:04Marc:Oh, that's a bad combination.

00:49:06Marc:And bass.

00:49:06Marc:Oh, you're bassing too?

00:49:07Marc:Whatever.

00:49:07Marc:I got whatever.

00:49:08Guest:Yeah, sure.

00:49:09Guest:I've never done heroin.

00:49:10Guest:Oh, that's a lie.

00:49:11Guest:I did it once.

00:49:11Guest:I threw up.

00:49:12Guest:I couldn't take it anymore.

00:49:13Marc:I had the exact same experience with heroin.

00:49:14Marc:Never ever.

00:49:15Marc:Did you?

00:49:15Marc:The exact same experience.

00:49:15Marc:I'll never do it again.

00:49:16Marc:Snorted it.

00:49:17Marc:Me too.

00:49:18Marc:Got itchy.

00:49:19Marc:Oh, my God.

00:49:19Marc:Threw up.

00:49:20Marc:Me too.

00:49:21Marc:Yeah.

00:49:21Marc:And I'm like, I don't need this.

00:49:22Marc:Never.

00:49:23Marc:Did you even get high?

00:49:24Marc:No, not that.

00:49:25Marc:I don't remember.

00:49:26Marc:I tried it one other time where I smoked it and I definitely felt the high, but still not for me.

00:49:30Marc:I go up.

00:49:31Marc:I don't like to go down.

00:49:32Marc:Yeah, me too.

00:49:34Guest:Dude, we would have been trouble if we do each other.

00:49:36Guest:But anyway, so why not?

00:49:38Guest:I mean, he was a critic's darling.

00:49:40Guest:And the same thing with Woodsman.

00:49:41Guest:You know, we won Cannes.

00:49:42Guest:it was heavy man kevin playing a child molester well yeah but the thing was i wanted to not i remember after monsters ball like okay he's the he's new on the scene yeah what are they gonna and so i got offered all these black films right just were in everything that i didn't want my clients as a manager to do right you know they're like he's the minority guy leprechauns from the hood part seven oh i was like what's one two three four five six

00:50:07Guest:yeah you know what is that i never even heard it and then and stuff so i wanted to do something different and i had gotten my kids my kids my you know my i raised my brother's kids i got my what happened he's going to jail oh and he called me up and he said can you come my wife is gonna have some kids and she won't take care of them can you take care of them i was like no

00:50:27Guest:No.

00:50:28Guest:I'm partying.

00:50:28Guest:Yes, exactly.

00:50:29Guest:I was in Palm Springs at a white party.

00:50:31Guest:High as a kite.

00:50:32Guest:I had no intention.

00:50:34Guest:But my partner at the time, who was a very famous casting director in LA, in New York, wanted kids.

00:50:43Guest:And so...

00:50:45Guest:Three days after they were born, I got them.

00:50:52Guest:I didn't want them at first.

00:50:58Guest:The mother rang the doorbell of my mother's house.

00:51:03Guest:and left two bassinets down in philadelphia in the winter and took off before my mom opened the door you're kidding me and my mom said almost biblical it is it is and my mom yeah it is wow let me look at it like that my mom said called me up and said listen i've raised all of you and i've raised all these other grandkids yeah i'm not raised no more yeah so i'm calling social services if you don't come get them

00:51:27Guest:so i said really and my partner was like okay that's what i want to do so we ended up um taking them and um and that's when i got off of um drugs right because i was you know i remember them like they were two ish yeah maybe yeah they were in front of the tv yeah and i was living on the upper west side

00:51:50Guest:And I remember stepping over them and going out to the man around the corner and realizing that I had left them in the house.

00:51:59Guest:And I said, that's it.

00:52:02Guest:And that was the end.

00:52:03Guest:And that was the end.

00:52:05Marc:Is that beautiful, though?

00:52:06Guest:That was the end of the drugs.

00:52:08Guest:Yes.

00:52:09Marc:Well, just the fact that you realized that you were putting these young lives in danger.

00:52:15Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:52:16Marc:And that was more powerful than drugs.

00:52:19Marc:Yeah.

00:52:20Marc:That's good.

00:52:21Guest:Yeah.

00:52:21Guest:You got a good heart.

00:52:23Guest:Yeah.

00:52:23Guest:I thought that, you know, I thought when I got them that I was saving them and they ended up saving me.

00:52:32Guest:That's sometimes the way it works.

00:52:34Guest:So your brother's still in jail or is he out?

00:52:36Guest:He just came out recently.

00:52:37Guest:No kidding.

00:52:37Guest:It was great.

00:52:38Guest:He was FaceTiming me with my sister and...

00:52:40Guest:In the car he hadn't been in jail for forever and like years, years and years.

00:52:45Guest:And he's FaceTiming me and you could see that he was like, it was like the Jetsons.

00:52:49Guest:He was trying to figure out how to hold the FaceTime.

00:52:51Guest:It was hysterical.

00:52:54Marc:That's wild.

00:52:55Guest:Yeah.

00:52:56Marc:Now you guys, have you seen him in person yet?

00:52:59Marc:I did.

00:52:59Marc:I saw him last Sunday and for the first time.

00:53:02Guest:Oh my, how was that?

00:53:03Guest:Powerful.

00:53:04Guest:I can't imagine.

00:53:05Guest:He sent me a letter towards, we separated.

00:53:07Guest:Yeah.

00:53:08Guest:We didn't, we weren't friends.

00:53:10Guest:Yeah.

00:53:10Guest:We were very close.

00:53:11Guest:Yeah.

00:53:12Guest:And then he went in one direction and I went in another direction.

00:53:15Guest:He sent me a letter from jail.

00:53:17Guest:Yeah.

00:53:18Guest:And he said, I'm sorry for hating you all these years.

00:53:21Guest:Oh.

00:53:21Guest:Just because.

00:53:24Guest:I guess I was gay.

00:53:26Guest:Yeah.

00:53:26Guest:And it affected me deeply.

00:53:28Marc:Yeah.

00:53:28Yeah.

00:53:29Marc:And are you guys alright?

00:53:35Guest:I mean, you know, this is all right as we can do with all the years that have been separated.

00:53:40Guest:You know?

00:53:41Marc:So more to come.

00:53:43Guest:Yeah.

00:53:44Guest:We'll see.

00:53:44Guest:I think we're okay.

00:53:45Guest:We're going through it in a good way.

00:53:48Guest:Lookit, he was so happy.

00:53:49Guest:I gave him a whole box of clothes, like a whole bunch of clothes.

00:53:53Guest:I don't know whether this person will be sharing with everybody, but I gave him a whole bunch of clothes.

00:53:56Guest:I don't care.

00:53:56Guest:He don't care either.

00:53:57Guest:Yeah.

00:53:58Guest:I gave him a whole bunch of clothes and...

00:54:03Guest:What you take for granted, what I take for granted, I forget.

00:54:07Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:54:09Marc:Well, he must have been appreciative.

00:54:11Guest:He is very appreciative.

00:54:12Guest:He came dressed up looking like a... When I saw him, I said, damn, you look like Lee Daniels.

00:54:20Marc:So how do you get, like, well, I imagine it's gonna be interesting with the kids now too, huh?

00:54:26Guest:Yeah.

00:54:27Guest:I mean, literally, this is what I'm going through right now in my life.

00:54:30Guest:Wow.

00:54:31Guest:I gotta write about it.

00:54:33Marc:I'm making TV.

00:54:35Guest:That's why I go into the world to escape.

00:54:37Guest:Yeah.

00:54:38Guest:Because when I come back, I gotta deal with this mess.

00:54:40Guest:Well, is it a mess or is it just- It's not a mess, but it's messy.

00:54:44Guest:It's heavy.

00:54:44Guest:It's messy.

00:54:45Guest:Yeah.

00:54:46Guest:it's just we're trying to make we're trying to make a lot the kids are great yeah they're fantastic it's just us that you know and how he's dealing with it yeah what's gonna happen his issues oh yeah yeah yeah but the kids are solid they're just like they're clear she's in paris spending my money in schools and film school he's in new york modeling making a lot of money uh-huh he's fabulous everybody's good and then you got the old man's out yeah and that's like now what happens oh man there's a movie coming

00:55:14Marc:Wow.

00:55:14Marc:Well, that's interesting.

00:55:16Marc:So let's talk about, we're going to run out of time because I know you've got to run in about 10 minutes.

00:55:20Marc:So let's talk about, I want to talk about how Precious happened.

00:55:24Marc:How did you come across that story?

00:55:26Marc:Sapphire is amazing.

00:55:28Marc:Didn't she just?

00:55:29Guest:I tore the force.

00:55:30Marc:Unbelievable.

00:55:30Marc:Did you read the book?

00:55:31Marc:I did read the book.

00:55:34Marc:She's written a few things.

00:55:35Guest:It shook me to my core.

00:55:38Guest:She shook me to my core.

00:55:39Guest:I couldn't sleep.

00:55:40Guest:How did you come across the book?

00:55:42Guest:It was part of my sobriety.

00:55:44Guest:Get out.

00:55:45Guest:I had that in a book called Ice, which by the way, you should see by Ray Schell.

00:55:48Guest:I had to own that too.

00:55:49Guest:That's going to be something else that I'm turning.

00:55:50Guest:Ice.

00:55:51Guest:Iced, dude.

00:55:52Guest:Iced.

00:55:53Guest:Rush out and get a copy if you can get a copy.

00:55:55Guest:I mean, it's out of print, but it's pretty good.

00:55:57Guest:So I had Precious, I push, and iced.

00:56:00Guest:And they sort of, and this other thing, Paperboy, that Pete Dexter did.

00:56:09Guest:And the three of those books got me sober, helped me with my sobriety.

00:56:14Guest:And...

00:56:15Marc:How so?

00:56:16Marc:By connecting you to other people's experience, your heart?

00:56:19Guest:I don't know what it was about all of it, but I think that the African-American experience viewed from that, really, I don't know.

00:56:29Guest:Yeah, I hear you.

00:56:30Guest:It's part of what I was going through.

00:56:32Marc:Yeah.

00:56:33Guest:And I decided to say I want to make it a movie.

00:56:36Guest:And when I went to everybody with all the awards that I had, they were like, no.

00:56:43Guest:So I had to go out and raise money for it.

00:56:44Guest:And I did.

00:56:45Guest:And we made a great film I'm really proud of.

00:56:49Marc:Unbelievable.

00:56:50Marc:Unbelievable film.

00:56:51Marc:And you did it all on your own.

00:56:53Marc:They turned you away.

00:56:54Marc:Yes.

00:56:55Guest:But I'm used to being turned away.

00:56:57Guest:Yeah.

00:56:58Guest:From the very beginning, from Monsters Ballon, they said, well, because nobody wanted to see the movie.

00:57:03Guest:Who wants to see a movie, an interracial, you know?

00:57:06Marc:But isn't that a tremendous, in retrospect, now with Empire, isn't that a tremendous misunderstanding of the audience?

00:57:15Marc:Oh, for sure.

00:57:16Guest:I mean, you know, I, yeah, I think that, you know, they continue to underestimate the intelligence of the American public.

00:57:24Guest:That's for sure.

00:57:25Guest:Not just the African American public, but the American public of what it is that is.

00:57:30Guest:So it's my job and it's other, it's, it's filmmakers jobs to educate, say, okay, this is what you're gonna see.

00:57:38Yeah.

00:57:38Guest:Right.

00:57:39Marc:This is what you're going to see.

00:57:40Marc:And when you do it your way, you can do that.

00:57:43Marc:Yeah.

00:57:43Marc:Right?

00:57:44Marc:Yep.

00:57:44Marc:Because I just saw the headline of some article that because of franchises, directors are interchangeable.

00:57:49Marc:But that's why people like you who have artistic freedom and license and want to push the boundaries, you've got to keep making your own movies.

00:57:59Marc:Yes.

00:58:00Marc:Yeah.

00:58:00Marc:And now you can.

00:58:03Yeah.

00:58:03Guest:It's like, which one?

00:58:05Guest:That's the question.

00:58:06Guest:That's the question.

00:58:07Guest:But I'm excited with Empire and Star.

00:58:10Guest:I think that that...

00:58:14Guest:And I'm not complaining about TV.

00:58:16Guest:I shouldn't complain about TV because it really is.

00:58:18Guest:I'm enjoying telling stories.

00:58:20Marc:It's a lot more immediate, isn't it, than movies in a way?

00:58:23Marc:And you can shift and move.

00:58:25Marc:Yeah.

00:58:26Guest:I mean, if you can assign people you trust, you got to hand over your baby to somebody.

00:58:34Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:58:35Guest:And pray that the actors know who they, like, that they understand what this vision is.

00:58:43Guest:So you've got to pray that the showrunner knows and the actors remember.

00:58:48Marc:And then you saw it.

00:58:50Marc:Well, have you been, like, you know, coming into that, I mean, how much, because you've got some pretty powerful actors.

00:58:56Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:58:57Marc:And, you know, when, I would imagine after a season, you don't have to ride them too much.

00:59:03Marc:No.

00:59:04Marc:They get it.

00:59:04Guest:Yeah.

00:59:05Guest:I'm good with, I'm good, I'm good, I'm good with both shows, as a matter of fact.

00:59:08Guest:I think, yes, I think that they're, I have enormous talent on this show.

00:59:13Guest:I've been blessed.

00:59:14Guest:I've been really blessed, you know.

00:59:17Guest:As I sit here and I can actually laugh about the homeless joke that I'm homeless and yet I started out homeless.

00:59:27Guest:And I preferred that homeless because that homeless, at least I knew...

00:59:32Marc:how to dream i'm dreamed yeah you know and i'm and i'm shifting my spirits like wherever the couch is and also we open this conversation by talking about how horrible things are in the country and and in reaction to that you know given that you are telling a lot of these stories that you tell how do you adjust now do you adjust

00:59:57Marc:Do you push harder?

00:59:59Marc:Are you making adjustments in your mind, given that we are now living in unabashed... I've learned that... Am I allowed to curse?

01:00:11Guest:Yeah.

01:00:11Guest:I don't give a fuck.

01:00:12Guest:That's what I've learned.

01:00:14Guest:That I will say what the fuck I want to say.

01:00:16Guest:I will write what the fuck I want to do, because that's exactly what they're doing right now in the White House.

01:00:21Guest:And I think that you...

01:00:24Guest:I will try to do it with dignity.

01:00:27Guest:It makes me know that I'm right, that my spirit is right, and it's clean, and that it's from a pure place.

01:00:37Guest:And though, as I said before, a lot of people may not want to hear it,

01:00:43Guest:I'm going to say it.

01:00:44Guest:Yeah, you got to.

01:00:46Guest:You got to.

01:00:48Guest:Thanks for talking, man.

01:00:49Guest:It was beautiful.

01:00:49Guest:Yeah, man.

01:00:55Marc:Okay, that's it.

01:00:57Marc:That is it.

01:00:58Marc:That's the show.

01:00:59Marc:Don't forget to pre-order your copy of Waiting for the Punch and then enter yourself in our podcast, Fan Sweepstakes.

01:01:04Marc:Go to markmarinbook.com to pre-order and enter the sweepstakes.

01:01:09Marc:I wasn't going to play guitar because I'm sick.

01:01:11Marc:But people have been liking the dirty guitar.

01:01:12Marc:I'm going to go in the house and I'm going to get my Stratocaster.

01:01:35guitar solo

01:02:01Marc:Boomer lives!