Writer/Director Tyler Perry Does "Bad" All By Himself

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Monday, 11 January 2010 04:50

Written by Brad Balfour

Sitting at a conference table almost too full with cast members of the 2009 film I Can Do Bad All By Myself -- being released on DVD on January 12, 2010 -- the mulit-hyphenated Tyler Perry came to Manhattan to offer a lively Q&A session with a broad range of press people. While his latest film is remotely based on an early play of his of the same name, Perry's feature focuses more on his on-going positive message of redemption and growth than the antics of his flippant but caring Grandma Madea character. And again, once it opened it topped the box office.

Perry's films have grossed just under $400 million worldwide as of July 2009. And to add to his list of accomplishments, Perry co-produced — with Oprah Winfrey — director Lee Daniels' critically acclaimed hit Precious based on the novel by Sapphire — a movie that has won top audience awards at both the Sundance and Toronto Film Festivals, was the centerpiece film at the 2009 New York Film Festival -- likely to be an Oscar contender in several catgeories.

Coming from poverty and homelessness, Perry has gone on to make an incredible success of himself, first as a writer/director/producer of plays, then as the creator of films and television series. Through his female alter-ego, Madea, he became a huge comic phenomenon, and a whole industry in and of itself.

Besides producing plays, film and television out his huge Atlanta-based production studio, the 40-year-old multi-hyphenate has become a media mogul and motivational speaker with various charities under his auspices.

In I Can Do Bad All by Myself, Madea (Perry) catches 16-year-old Jennifer (Hope Olaide Wilson) with her two younger brothers looting her home. The big-mouthed, wise-cracking granny takes matters into her own hands and delivers the young delinquents to their only relative, aunt April (Taraji P. Henson), a hard-drinking nightclub singer who lives off her married boyfriend Raymond (Bryan J. White). April wants nothing to do with the kids, who live with their missing grandma. When a handsome Latino immigrant, Sandino (Adam Rodriguez), is sent by the pastor of their neighborhood church (Pastor Marvin Winans), he trades work for a place to live in her basement.

The closer April and Sandino grow, the more she realizes the importance of faith and family. Once she's told by church elder Wilma (legendaryy songstress Gladys Knight) that her mom has died, she knows she has to take care of the kids, and reluctantly sees her life in a different light.

Things come to a head — Ray and Sandino fight; Sandino proposes to April — and her best friend, bartender Tanya (hip-hop soul singer Mary J Blige), sings a song that is both the film's title and its signature statement: "I Can Do Bad All By Myself."

Q: What's the key to your success especially with this subject matter.

TP: I'm just a man that has used what I've learned in this life and I've tried to put it in film. I don't want to just do film to make a movie for people to see; to blow up something, to kill somebody, explosions. None of that is attractive to me because what I've tried to do with my work and with my life is inspire and motivate people because I've come through too much hell to be able to sit in this seat.

I have a tremendous debt to pay so I want to just pay it forward and pass it on to other people; that's why I keep doing positive movies. This is what I know for sure; you reap what you sow. That's why I think I've been so successful; god is just blessing me and honoring everything that I'm doing.

Q: Your films are based on your plays; you've been able to work out the experience before a live audience. How has that experience of working in theater educated you and what your plans are with theater going forward.

TP: There's nothing like a live performance; it's immediate. And being on the circuit that I was on for a very long time doing 300 shows a year, most of them sold out, for 10 years straight, I learned a great deal. What will work and what won't work and how far I can go and how far I can't. And I'm still writing from those experiences. Everybody at the table can attest to that immediate give and take from an audience, and you take that and you go with it.

Q: You have a knack for talking about contemporary issues as you do in this film with the child molestation element.

TP: In writing this and talking about molestation and sexual abuse, it is very very clear to me that a lot of our own issues, including myself as a person, are a result from what has happened to us as children. So when I was thinking about April and her, "I don't care about anybody but myself," where would that come from? And molestation is the root to so many things, so I wanted to explore it a little bit and I think that when people really see it, they get it. They understand that, "Wait a minute; is this why I'm this way?"

Because it's happened to so many people, and [because whatever goes on in this house stays in this house and nothing ever gets covered], that's why I wanted to address it. I think that as people see it they'll really get it.

Let me say this to everybody here; I'm speaking to people, for the most part, my base, my core audience, that everybody has ignored for years. And we are a people that exist and need to be spoken to in a way that we get, in a way that we understand. And I'm just really really fortunate and blessed to have that opportunity to do that.

Q: What are your thoughts on the current status of African-American women who are not getting married at the same rates of other ethnic groups or white women, particularly because you cast another ethnic minority in a role that is the love interest for an African-American woman. Were you subtly suggesting that African-American women need to exercise other options [laughs]?

TP: I want to make sure that this is clear:Hell, no! No, the thing is this: I didn't suggest anything, I didn't even know those stats. I was once accused of being anti-Semitic last time I was here doing a press conference because one of the attorneys in Diary of a Mad Black Women got an award called the Feinstein award and they said that was anti-Semitic because I named the award after a Jewish person.

I don't get it. It's kind of similar to this; I'm just writing. I'm not thinking about what race a person is because I don't live my life that way. I just write the story and I thought these two would be a good look and be good for each other with his story, his problems, his issues that he's worked through, and her with hers. He could have been Tyrone Jackson, it wouldn't have mattered, but in this case it just happened to be somebody who's Latin.

I had the same issue in the first two movies; a couple of critics went off because all of my heroes seem to be light-skinned. It's not something I was even thinking about, it just happened. And so I went and found some dark skinned heroes in the next one. So I will take this into consideration; next time I will make sure that the black woman finds a black man.

Q: While white and Hispanic women may be on their second husbands, many African-American women have never been married by the time they are in their 30s and 40s. One reason for that is that African-American men are more likely to marry outside of their race.

TP: It doesn't matter who they are or where they come from, but my point was that part of the reason that a lot of people are not married is because they have this list of what they want their men to be, have, make. And more important to the point of what Adam was making, it doesn't matter if the person has nothing; if they can bring you love and the love you need then that should be enough.

Q: You do allow for some ad-libbing; not everything is scripted. Were there parts of the movie where you were allowed the cast to expand their roles?

TP: Well, there is this one scene. Iit was a really serious scene where Taraji and Adam are sitting on the sofa, and we're shooting the scene and Taraji leans over and she starts to kiss him, but it wasn't in the script. So I'm looking through the script and I'm sitting at the monitor watching and I just sit back and see how long it's going to go. I don't understand how when you're kissing somebody you put your tongue in their mouth and you're supposed to be acting, when there's no camera inside your mouth to see the tongue.

So the kisses went on and on and on and I sat there waiting for them to finish and they just kept kissing. I have it on video; it's a long, long, long, long, long kiss and they wouldn't stop. So I finally said "Cut" and I said, "What the hell was that? Where did that come from?" Taraji was like, "What? It's in the script." "Show it to me." So they "ad-lippped."

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