Black Music Month: Wayne Brady Part 2

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Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: What if y'all is on pay Bill From Quest Love Supreme, we are honoring Black History Month and re releasing an episode every day of June. However, we were also doing new episodes two. Last week we gave you Wayne Brady Part one, in that Wayne spoke about morning routines and why making the bet is important. He talked about favorite cereals and candy and even remembered a bully from his past. It's an amazing episode and you absolutely need to check it out of the cabin if you have well done, because here's part two. My friend Way bring Questlove, Fonte, Sugar, Steve and myself live in the studio, New York City.

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Speaker 3: Enjoy.

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Speaker 4: This is actually I think a good time to pivot into this question aside question which was so my version of this story was when I was a staff member of the Chappelle Show.

00:00:54
Speaker 5: Sorry to meaning sorry sound yeah because don't want to hear here.

00:00:58
Speaker 3: What's your version is?

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Speaker 4: Okay, I'm a staff member of Chappelle. I wouldn't go on location with those guys. I did all the music for season two, and so the roots just happened to be in La at the time when we.

00:01:10
Speaker 3: Were shooting a lot of the La Chappelle things.

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Speaker 4: And what you have to understand is that most shows are like planned week in advance.

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Speaker 3: They have a writing staff.

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Speaker 4: The genius of season two was the fact that Neil Brennan and Dave Chappelle were pretty much just flying off the seat of their pants knowing that on Thursday night they have to turn in that tape to Comedy Really, you're supposed to turn in like the Tuesday before, like days before.

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Speaker 3: I mean there would be times where.

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Speaker 4: Like maybe a half hour before the show's on the air, like the Sesame Street Oh yeah, Q tip thing, that snoop thing. I happen to know that they finished the edit maybe a half hour beforetime. Yeah, before airtime, like Comedy Central has to like approve things were standings like we went down to the wire.

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Speaker 3: So I do know that we had went out to.

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Speaker 4: The four seasons because we wanted to get our Sino to.

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Speaker 3: Do the whole Chiese things.

00:02:18
Speaker 4: Why don't you tell me the cheese was good, right, that whole thing, and also got uh Anthony Anderson to do the Ashy Larry You remember the dream, Yeah, what I remember was we have met Anthony Aji in the hotel lobby.

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Speaker 3: Anthony Gi the bar wash.

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Speaker 4: He's also the father Maya, Rudolph Fire and Bridesmaids, and he's legendary comic. We had spent so much time talking to him and our Senio was there like just comedian war stories from the seventies or whatever.

00:02:56
Speaker 3: That I had to go so I can go to the airport.

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Speaker 4: So what Neil will tell me when I landed? He says, dude, we just created a masterpiece. Like the way they were describing how the night was was like they had made Purple Rain and Thriller at once.

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Speaker 3: And I'm thinking, like, wait, from the whole from that sketch.

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Speaker 4: He says, no, man, He's like, so when you were leaving and checking out at the last minute, guess who we saw in the lobby. I was like, who it's a dog. We saw Wayne Brady and I said, oh my god, what happened? Because I instantly went back, Mooney, I'm what I'm expecting this is going to be like beef from Broccoli.

00:03:36
Speaker 3: I said, well went down? What went down?

00:03:37
Speaker 4: He says, no, man, we shot something, and so I'm under the belief that it was off the cuff.

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Speaker 3: You just happened to be in the lobby. You and Dave.

00:03:48
Speaker 4: Had a miacopa kind of understanding moment thing, and then it was like, so what are you doing?

00:03:52
Speaker 3: Do you want to shoot something?

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Speaker 4: And it was very off the cuff, and I was not prepared for any of those.

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Speaker 3: Things, like oh no, no, no, no no. It was so much different for you. All right, So what's your version of it?

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Speaker 5: Well, well, my version is, well, just going back to when the sketch aired, and I'll do it really really fast. And this isn't me complaining because I've said this before, like on the Breakfast Club, and there's always an asshole in the comments like like, well you shouldn't the reason that the sketch bothered me, And I'll just say it in that hill.

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Speaker 3: Jokes are jokes. I do comedy.

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Speaker 5: Everything jokes. A joke's fine. I just happened to come from a very very particular place, and you can't tell me what I can and can't feel.

00:04:28
Speaker 3: I feel.

00:04:29
Speaker 5: Paul Mooney, I worshiped at the shrine of Paul Mooney. I never said that Paul Mooney wasn't funny or Paul Mooney wasn't a genius and a writer. I love Paul Mooney, I love Dave. So imagine my shock. I'm sitting at home, I'm getting my barber. Came over to my spot. He's doing Da Da Da Da, and the Chappelle shows on. I'm excited. I was like, okay, show shout, we get through the whole thing. And then and then boom, Negro was Wayne Brady looked like him. I went, oh, oh, okay. I didn't laugh at it, not because I was like, I'm above being made fun of. If your joke is funny, please make fun of me. That's what we do.

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Speaker 3: But to me.

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Speaker 5: And now because you saw me talk to my bullies. Oh, also Kendra and Nicole and Nicole come on now.

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Speaker 4: It's as Adams Jones, Johnson Harris.

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Speaker 5: Race has always been a subject that has played because what does it mean to be black? You know, the kid that grew up watching certain things, doing certain things, liking certain things that have died, so those things for form you. So I've always had that in the back of my mind as a as a thing. So when I see that, I'm like, the joke isn't funny to me, It doesn't even scan because you're now making fun of Brian Gumbel, who like, say what you want to say. But but Brian gumble, this incredibly successful man in his own right, doing this thing. So now you're gonna use me to take down him or him to meet And then that means that I'm not black enough? And so does that mean that one of my comedic heroes, Dave Chappelle, who I've rocked with since Robin Hood men in tights and watching him at evenings at the Improv before he blew up. This dude really knows who I am. Oh, that's awesome, but nothing gonna shit on me. And Paul Mooney, who I love. He doesn't think I'm black enough. That's really wow. That shakes, which is why Wayne doesn't go out and talk to people because I don't want to deal with that shit sometimes. So I was already in my feelings about it from a race place and just from a joke point.

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Speaker 3: I didn't feel that it was a good joke. I thought it was too easy, so blah blah blah blah blah.

00:06:39
Speaker 5: So fuck those guys immediately, And I'm like, I don't give sex second and third chances. I am a I'm a very petty, angry person inside sometimes when it comes to certain things.

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Speaker 3: So I was already like.

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Speaker 5: Well, I guess I can watch a Chappelle's show click, I can't enjoy the genius that is Dave Chappelle. Fast forward to I forget what the show was. It was an awards show. It might have been the Hoodies Steve Steve Harvey's Hoodies or something. But Donnelle was in the lobby bar. We were in the bar. Donnelle was with somebody else, and I recognize him immediately because I like the show. Oh it's it's Ashy laire, but you gonna drink my drink. He comes over so wonderful and gracious. Wayne, Hey, I'm Donelle. I play Actually I know who you are. I've seen your little playlids all right, just just through the energy.

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Speaker 3: And he was so sweet and Wayne blah blah blah. I said, oh, yeah, that's great.

00:07:42
Speaker 5: I love the show up until that whack ass joke by Paul Mooney blah da da da.

00:07:48
Speaker 3: But thanks.

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Speaker 5: He goes, Oh my god, I mean we you know, we have love for you. I was like, I was like, to be honest, I don't know, and I have to preface it I had been drinking. I had been drinking, so I was like, really, was that how you love me?

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Speaker 3: Black man? Is that really?

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Speaker 5: And so just going about my day cut to the next day. This is how fast the shit did happen. So I don't know the timeline that you're talking about in terms of when you came out to LA, but it happened where well. I was at the fourth season Hotel, so okay, so that might have been so so whenever I saw him. Then the next day I was doing my talk show. I get my assistant comes as I'm in the writer's room.

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Speaker 3: Wait, wait, you got a phone call? Who take Chappelle? I was like, why is no, you're lying? Take Shamelle?

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Speaker 5: Okay, Hello, hey man, it's Dave oh Man. Just so sweet as like, look, I didn't write that joke.

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Speaker 3: Mooney came up with it.

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Speaker 5: I really didn't like the shit either, but you know, I like the character and da da da No offense was meant now the fact that and now we live in a day and age, no one's going to backtrack on a joke for folks like I said what I said, and I said it like like I said, Dave was one of my God, he's one of my heroes. So that itself, we could have just stopped it there. It couldn't have gone any further. It's like, thank you, and I mean you didn't. Thanks, It's fine, it's cool. He goes, Hey, would you ever want to be on the show? Said, are you kidding me? It would be a dream of it. Well, then what are you doing doing this weekend? Or if this was a Friday or something. So I flew out. I said, I'll come to New York immediately. Great, I'm gonna puts you in touch with Neil and you guys decide what we're gonna do, and we're gonna do something great. But great, thanks Dave. I was on cloud nine. So I immediately started thinking of ideas. And this is where it is so cool. So I so I'm writing stuff on the plane. Neil had already worked out some stuff. So when I get to New York, it all happens like this. I get off the plane, we go to where you guys shot a think in Brooklyn or someplace whatever.

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Speaker 3: We get up.

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Speaker 5: As soon as soon as I get in, I go Neil's waiting for me. He's like, so, what do you want to do? Blah blah blah blah. He goes, We've got this idea of like doing this training day thing because you know, like you do your talk show. Oh and at this time, this is when I was leaving my talk show because I found out that because I told somebody off at Disney that they that they threatened me and said, uh said, oh, you know, if you don't do this particular thing, we always can find someone to do your show. And I said, oh, if you can find another Wayne Brady to do the Wayne Brady Show, please be my guest.

00:10:16
Speaker 3: I come back in. Tony Danzel's name is in the papers. But that's cool. I was like, great, I'm out of this bank. Goddamn questions. I'm having all the.

00:10:23
Speaker 5: Black people because they they they had a band ate not a band, because they were gonna say we never said that. Certain guests that I'd bring up, they'd go, oh, no, you can't do that, bla blah blah blah blah bah blah. So I was like, really, I had Missy Elliott bust the rhymes if you were black, and my favorite rapper, you were on that show the show at that time, so this was great. I was like yes, So In my mind, I was like, we need to do something that will burn burn the house down. Fuck it, let's go. So Neil's idea was the training day thing, and I said, well, if we're doing training day where I'm showing Dave through the neighborhood and doing shit, then we really need to lean into the fact of when folks are like, oh, Wayne, I love you because I see your talk show where you're this you're everybody's favorite black guy.

00:11:04
Speaker 3: Y blah blah blah blah.

00:11:05
Speaker 5: I said, I want to do a thing where a cop stops me and he started singing my jingle and I wrote that and then I'm gonna go but be behind him and I'm gonna kill him and.

00:11:14
Speaker 3: That will freak and that'll freak out Dave, and I want a microphone to come down.

00:11:20
Speaker 5: He go, great, well let's do that, and then we'll do the other thing with an ATM and you'll get your money. So like we'll follow the beats. I said, great, So we came up with it. So we had these two ideas and mushed them together. We shot it all night. We wrapped like six in the morning because I had to get back on a plane to go back to shoot and then I get a call like Monday.

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Speaker 3: He's like, dude, this is amazing. You aren't gonna be ready. I think we I think we've made history. Yes, and I knew it, Like not often are you in the middle of something. But I knew it as we're doing it, because there was such desparate worlds right of Dave and this and me that time of what folks thought of me and the gigs I was doing. It's like, well, wow, does that all fit together? And we weren't doing a sketch.

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Speaker 5: In my mind, I was like, no, I'm really doing this shit because I'm also showing you what I do as an actor. It's like, we're really doing this. And the way that he shot it, it was a beautiful thing that came together. And I knew that we made TV history.

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Speaker 4: I knew it, and I'm telling you this, like Rick James, we have a problem, right, Rick James and Prince they were excited about but we were more excited about the scripts because we had the scripts way before they were shot. But I do remember up until that point they were really excited about the racial Draft. But the way they were talking about how quickly this thing came together and how and I was I was disappointed because I couldn't add music to it.

00:12:54
Speaker 3: Like I said, all right, so what am I gonna do? What am I gonna do?

00:12:56
Speaker 4: They're like, it's done already, man, you just you wait till it comes and literally okay. So I mean that was that was the beginning of what we call like the viral face. How did your hour's perception of you or reaction? How did that change after that episode?

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Speaker 5: It was instantaneous because at that point, you know, the Chappelle Show was everywhere all the time. It was on a loop, so everywhere you went, and being on tour and going you know, to very various cities, I could see the reactions like if and right after that it was on tour, you know, like I was in Philly and New York and Atlanta and Chicago and Detroit, so I got to see firsthand black reaction to the sketch. Now, the thing is that I never wanted the narrative to be like all black people voted unanimously that Wayne Brady was corny or whatever, because that was not the case.

00:13:50
Speaker 3: More black people rocked with me than not. It was.

00:13:53
Speaker 5: It was some fine you couldn't say what you wanted to, but I did notice as soon as that sketch hit.

00:13:59
Speaker 3: This is the thing that I.

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Speaker 5: Got, which I loathe to this day, but I know where it comes from. When like there's a particular cat comes up, Yo, Wayne, Nigga, that's that, dude, I'm gonna slap me a home, It's like, no, no, man, it's actually, it's actually, it's actually, it's actually Choko.

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Speaker 3: That's what I meant. That's what I meant. I gotta tell you something. I gotta tell you something. I didn't fuck with you before. I didn't.

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Speaker 5: I didn't we get all honest, I didn't fuck with you before. I was like, well, thanks for telling me you're in the thoughts I did. Really you didn't digest my okay, fine, but.

00:14:34
Speaker 4: Now now.

00:14:37
Speaker 5: Now, nigga, now now hug me now, man now, And then I'm like, well, thank you. But the funny thing is, oh, so you love me now? Because I had hoes, made Dave take drugs and it was yeah, I get I get it, I get it. But the thing that I love the most about it is whatever you reaction and whatever you felt, and I feel it to this day. It's a classic sketch. It's in the Museum of Television History. I'd love Dave, and I thank Dave, and I thank Neil for and I thank Donnelle for coming up to me because I got a chance to do something that was so dope, and I see the effects of it today that people got to see because I was doing a Disney talk show, I was doing an a ABC talk show, I was on a Who's Line at night.

00:15:25
Speaker 3: I was doing those things.

00:15:26
Speaker 5: Now, the people that followed my act, that saw me in the comedy clubs and theaters, they knew that it's kind of like the Bob Saget thing.

00:15:33
Speaker 3: My act is my acting.

00:15:35
Speaker 5: And you tell folks, just because you watched whose Line or your kid likes Sophia the first, don't bring your kids to my show because it's not that kind of show.

00:15:43
Speaker 3: So it's not that.

00:15:44
Speaker 5: So I felt that that began a shift where folks to your point earlier, where folks say that they didn't really don't know me, they know the things that I do. I feel that was a step in people going, Okay, I guess there's more to the person than I thought. And if it takes an event like that to make you open your mind.

00:16:01
Speaker 3: Then cool. I don't care where it comes from as as it comes Well, then I'll ask you something I thought. We're on our way to being best friends.

00:16:11
Speaker 6: We started with we wanted to be friends friends is so exciting, yes, sir, And this is an objective question, so I don't know if I can get a definitive answer.

00:16:24
Speaker 5: Of course, is the grass greener on the other side? Well, you know, I would not know still because and this is a larger conversation for a thing. I I have issues where I still feel where now it's mostly oddly enough, ironically it's white Hollywood and white studio exects, and I don't even say agents that I've had in the past and people because black is black to me. We are not a monolith. That's what Whiz is about. Come see the Whiz until June tenth.

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Speaker 3: So until June. Oh no, no, but you got a seed in general. But just know that's ony. So black is all these beautiful things.

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Speaker 5: But the problem is that when we call each other out and we go, oh, you're not black of this or your experiences in this, there are people on the other side listening, like studio execs and like other people that they're oh, so that's not black enough, So what is black? Jamal tell me what is black? And he's like, well, I don't mess with that, dude, but I think that dude. Okay, great. So my problem on the grass side isn't even with my own folks. I love my folks, and my folks mess with me. It's how I am perceived. I think even for roles even in series that I know that I would kill it, I am by by the gatekeeper who maybe the show creators black, but the studio.

00:17:42
Speaker 3: Head is like, oh no, I wouldn't consider Wayne Brady for that. Are there three roles that got away? Three rules that got away?

00:17:48
Speaker 5: No?

00:17:49
Speaker 3: Three? Is there one?

00:17:50
Speaker 7: What role?

00:17:52
Speaker 3: I almost had it? Well?

00:17:53
Speaker 5: I have a few that I have almost had it that that I'm not going to blame on race because maybe I wasn't the dude on the day, but I was offered some a couple of things and then offers got oh because of it. But the one that sticks out in my head that and I feel that we're going so long, so I'm trying to make things cool. Okay, this is not a great movie by any stretch, but it was one of the ones. It was around the Chappelle thing that I was like, I'm gonna show folks what the fuck I do. It was snakes on the plane.

00:18:25
Speaker 3: And here's the thing. It was for the role of the rapper. Now, now the dude that got it, that's my boy.

00:18:31
Speaker 5: Flex. I did a movie with Flex. I love Flex. So if I'm happy that, yeah, she said. I was like doing another Flex So if anybody got it, I was happy because flexing, yes, that's fam But what I did and my audition was so genius.

00:18:49
Speaker 3: I have to say this ship was genius. It was for the rapper.

00:18:53
Speaker 5: I looked at the script like, uh, not a great script, the concept you said. I was like, screw it, I'm gonna go in. So I hired two actors to play my bodyguards, and I hired a couple girls to be my video.

00:19:08
Speaker 3: Vixens, and I for the audition.

00:19:11
Speaker 5: For the audition, I'll never forget, I drove in traffic, Like if any of you were actors back in the day in la if you had to go over to Santa Monica to audition for this day, it was horrible getting there. I spent about an hour an hour and a half in traffic, and I came up with the idea. I said, I could do this script. But what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna be this dude and then I'm going to freestyle what's in I'm in a freestyle the story of Snakes on a plane, and then I'm gonna walk out.

00:19:42
Speaker 3: So I get there.

00:19:44
Speaker 5: I timed it so that my time was don't even know what time. My time was like four thirty. Now, keep keep in mind, I'm in full like I'm in my Adidas thing. I've got chains, the whole nine. I've got these rings, my shit to the side. I walk in and the dude, the one of the bodyguards, has a boombox where the track. I walked in the casting office click, boom booms, boom boots, the boom booms walking there are actors waiting. I walked right through. I walked right through into the Wait. Wait, you can't go boom to a click? Hey, how you doing?

00:20:18
Speaker 3: Oh? Wait is it yo? I'm not waiting.

00:20:20
Speaker 5: I'm gonna read that ship. Blah blah blah. Went on this whole thing about the script, like that script. Look, he hit the thing and I did all. I can't even remember what I said that it was based basically because you want me to explain. I got snakes on a plane that's up with their legs and the contempt, and we got this dude and want to sit next guy in the Sam Sam said, fuck these planes.

00:20:37
Speaker 3: You know who I am, but I call them in. I do this about a da da dad. And when it's finished, like I, I.

00:20:42
Speaker 5: Cleared their desk of these paper by flash dance of like the good shots in the scripts, I was like, because of clear ship, and I through the script because I'm reading this ship, let's go. Walked right back out, walked out of the casting office, went to my car, and it was like, oh, hey, thanks, here's fifty bucks. Thank you so much. You guys were great. I'm good as I'm driving home. By the time I get home, I have on my next til.

00:21:09
Speaker 3: I had a cease and desist. I had a message from.

00:21:16
Speaker 5: My agent call nine one one oh. They wanted to offer me the role. They really liked you for this role is.

00:21:28
Speaker 3: I was like, I did it.

00:21:30
Speaker 5: It actually worked, and it was that thing of I've got a name, you see me on TV every day of these things. I'm still begging and fighting people to get into rooms. And I'm even trying to get into this whack movie. So at least I was like, at least I know that I'm good, and this thing happened, and now it pays off. Now here's where I'm gonna be careful because all I know is what I was told by my reps at this time.

00:21:54
Speaker 3: So they get a call.

00:21:54
Speaker 5: I'm not gonna name who the person was, but somebody who was in a position of power at the studio. When, of course these names are being run up the flag pole, Wayne Brady's name comes up, and this white person says, oh, no, uh uh, not Wayne Brady.

00:22:13
Speaker 3: He's not black enough. No, he's not black black, He's not black black black black. There's always an expert air quotes.

00:22:23
Speaker 5: Yeah, but I love how he hit black black. So I'm not black black. But so so then Flex gets it and that's cool. And I found out this information because I guess somebody at some point in the chain felt so bad they were like, I just want you to know. So I was like, okay, So that one stung me, not because I didn't do a great job, but because I knew it would be something that i'd be facing. And I'm not gonna boohoo because it's something that just as black actors, black people, black lawyers, black we face a certain thing. The naivete that I had up until that point was, well, surely if I'm really dope and you've seen me do things and I'm a great actor, I do broad I do, surely I should get the job. Like Nope, because I don't think that you are based on blah blah blah. I was like, oh, I'm an adult, now, fuck it, I get it. So so that helped me understand. So so that's that's the one that got away that I was disappointed in, not because of I didn't get it, but because I.

00:23:26
Speaker 3: Was like, man, you're being judged.

00:23:28
Speaker 5: If I'm dealing dealing with this, then that sucks for the actor who is coming up and doesn't have any cloud or doesn't have a thing to fall back on.

00:23:39
Speaker 4: So so that made me very sympathetic to that. Ah damn, man, I'm sorry you didn't get that, and it's this could have been.

00:23:46
Speaker 3: That movie was terrible though, right, I mean it was a commercial.

00:23:51
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, it was actually one of the first movies I remember like that really went viral, Like yeah, because the campaign.

00:24:04
Speaker 3: That later because they was like people, right, I don't.

00:24:10
Speaker 5: Even say right, like, am I right? Thinking that Sam was already doing this thing? Of course he was Sam Jackson. But but I feel like that line in that boost kind of made the mythos of Sam Jackson where in every movie you got to say mother that that and and the tarantine Tino joint, so like those are the two that cemented Sam as that dude.

00:24:35
Speaker 4: All right, So, speaking of which, what secret talent do you have that the general public is not aware of?

00:24:43
Speaker 5: I was afraid you'd ask me this questions I saw you ask some I think you asked, uh Hannibal this, Yes, you know the reality is, And here's my secret. I don't have secret talents because I've worked so hard to make the talents that I do loud like I sing, I dance, I act, I write.

00:25:06
Speaker 3: I can do these things.

00:25:07
Speaker 5: I need you to know those things because if you don't know them, then I can't. But the regular life talent shit, I don't. I honestly he said Tumblr. I mean one time, Tumblr. I really don't know if I do have any other talents that are of merit.

00:25:26
Speaker 3: So let me remix it. What secret talents do you have in the kitchen that we're not aware of.

00:25:35
Speaker 5: I'm a master at mixing my cereals. And I don't say that lightly. My ratios are on points. They are beautiful.

00:25:46
Speaker 3: It's a real talent. And I can make. I'm a good baker makers. Yeah, yes, I can bake. Well.

00:25:54
Speaker 4: Who are the three people that you text the most each day? Who are the top three people?

00:26:00
Speaker 3: Doesn't text? I will I do your anti technology? Now? Oh, I'm not a FaceTime.

00:26:08
Speaker 5: But I do text text. I text my daughter, but she gets mad because I do like to like the FaceTime her. But I text my daughter to check check in. I text my daughter, I text Mandy. What what three people do you communicate with your phone every day?

00:26:20
Speaker 2: You know?

00:26:21
Speaker 3: And my and my chief of staff Sarah. Those are the three people that that I text with the most. Maybe your staff can about to say, there you go? All right? Before you ask him what kind of laundry detergent he uses?

00:26:36
Speaker 9: Can I ask a real question? Yes, I'm kind of I'm kind of obsessed with let's make a deal. Oh yeah, I was wondering.

00:26:44
Speaker 3: Besides, like what it's like. I don't think we've ever had like a but like what's that like? In general?

00:26:51
Speaker 9: But but also did you. Were you a fan of the old Let's Make a Deal with Monty Hall and.

00:26:57
Speaker 3: No, okay, and and I don't say that in a bad way.

00:27:01
Speaker 5: I used to watch it because that's what was on when my grandmother would watch what you know, It's like being black, and and your mom watches the story story right, So there was a progression. You would watch the Price is Right at some point because they were all on CBS, and then I think she would switch over to ABC to watch Monty and then she'd watch the Story. So I would watch it just by being around. But any game show that I liked, I was a snob because I liked Jeopardy. I liked anything that I had to that was skilled, skill based or trivia. So so so I wasn't really checking so much for Let's Make a Deal as a kid because I don't yeah, because that wasn't my thing. So later in life when I was offered Let's Make a Deal, I turned it down a few times because in my mind, and this was before game show hosting became cool, I created that lane. It was I, well, this is my fifteenth season, so I guess go go back to what I'm doing.

00:27:57
Speaker 3: The show.

00:28:00
Speaker 5: Is twenty one, since she was born in two thousand and three. So I started the show, which was a so so two thousand and something. When I was offered it. Game shows were kind of game shows, And in my mind when I think a game show host, I think of the game show hosts that we grew up on, which were cool.

00:28:18
Speaker 3: But you know, the guys with.

00:28:19
Speaker 5: Long, long long mics and and and Jean and I love and love al right, so you have let me kiss you?

00:28:28
Speaker 3: And why you Richard Dawson, that whole thing. So I was like, game shows are that?

00:28:33
Speaker 5: Like being being a game show host almost I felt had a taste to some people, especially in the entertainment business, like being it's something that could be parodied easily, like a weather man or a bad DJ. Hey this is Jimmy, and that you could easily make fun of it and do a shorthand. So I was like, why would I do that? Why would I do that thing? I'm not going to be made fun of for doing that thing. So, and it was nothing against the show. I say, no, you've got the wrong guy because on that show, and you correct me if I'm wrong, you just say hello. Irma from Pakoima you're addressed as a bread do you have a quarter?

00:29:11
Speaker 3: That's lovely, And that's lovely that they do that. But I have a skill set that exceeds that.

00:29:15
Speaker 5: So no, no, thank you until Mike, Mike Richards, who was the EP at the time, he said, Monty Hall really wants to meet you. And I was like, I'm not going to say no to meeting Monty Hall, especially because my mom doesn't know.

00:29:26
Speaker 3: And no, no, no. When I started the show.

00:29:28
Speaker 5: When I started the show was alive and Monty I had lunch at Monty's house and he was so lovely, and I said, Monty, thank you so much, sir, But I'm getting ready to write a sitcom. I've got a deal for that. I've got things that I need need to do. I don't do this. He goes, no, I don't want you to. I want you to do what you do. That's the only way that this show is going to work for a new audience. Because they tried various iterations of it, like with Billy Bush I think was one of the last ones, and they and they tried like a like an adult, let's make a deal, is like if you have a dildo in your pocket, I was like, well, that's crass.

00:30:04
Speaker 3: That's not gonna fly.

00:30:05
Speaker 8: So I know.

00:30:06
Speaker 3: So it was was it Drew Carrey? Was he doing it? So he said I want you to do? He said, well, what do you mean? What would I do?

00:30:15
Speaker 5: He's like, no, you're funny and the improv that you do and the things and the characters. I said, really, okay, Well if you're cool with it. Then I thought about it, and I tried to do the business. Mind I'm like, well, like with my talk show, and I remember being in people's homes. It's a very powerful thing, being able to touch people every day. And I also did it because my grandma, you know, I'm like, if I can do something that my grandma likes? So I said yes, and I started it, and I remember being clowned at first, and I'm and what's funny is right? As I got clowned by a couple of people out here whispers. Then, oddly enough, a season or two later, then other men of color were doing game shows with very lucrative contracts. And now and now you can't you throw a rock at TV. Michael Strahan, myself, Steve Anthony Anderson, Jamie Fox, we did all comedy guys Shazam.

00:31:14
Speaker 3: I'll beat Shazam's. It's all a thing. But as I did it, it was like, look at this game show, corny, how much is he making for that? And what season is? And I really wasn't making it.

00:31:26
Speaker 5: And I'll say, and I wasn't making what I feel I should have now because I know what I bring, like the thing that I've created with that show, with the improv, with characters being able to couch it in this it's so much fun and I'm glad that people love it. But I take pride in the fact that I've helped along with our team because everybody on that staff gets me and they're like, Okay, let let's support that vision.

00:31:50
Speaker 4: Even though you say you don't text that your FaceTime or whatever, I'm saying communicating not texting.

00:31:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, who are.

00:31:57
Speaker 4: The three most famous people that you've texted in your phone scroll right now?

00:32:04
Speaker 3: Like ever, no, no, no, just in the last hour or two since.

00:32:08
Speaker 5: You in the last I haven't texted anyone famous in the last hour two The.

00:32:11
Speaker 4: Most famous name in your your scroll at the top of your scroll right now is who Sugar Steve?

00:32:19
Speaker 5: Oh, well, that's it, rachu oh okay, now raised famous to musicians. Yeah, dancing with the stars fame. So Rachu texted me that that that was great and I don't think anybody else that. Oh and Ben Vereen, who like if you know, you know Ben, Ben is like my godfather.

00:32:48
Speaker 3: So between he's in communication with you. Yes, then leave you and why don't you love me? We want her on the shelves if you can, you know, put in a good word.

00:33:00
Speaker 4: I don't know if this is she would love to come, She would love to all right, slight weird question, bring it? Have you ever almost been arrested?

00:33:12
Speaker 3: Yes? Are you allowed to talk about it?

00:33:15
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, because the case is finished. No, no, it was like you wanted to know about me, man, you wanted to know.

00:33:25
Speaker 3: Yes.

00:33:26
Speaker 5: Once as a kid, I was almost arrested for driving without a license because a friend of mine was drunk and I was trying to to drive him home and I was doing the thing of somebody who really I was driving very slow?

00:33:44
Speaker 3: Oh I was, but.

00:33:47
Speaker 5: And of course if you see somebody going this then and so even back then, I think I had a gift for Gab. I let the machine take over and he's like, hey, let me see your drivers look, I'll tell you off the bat. I'm officer. I don't have a license. I'm I don't have a license.

00:34:03
Speaker 3: This is not my car.

00:34:05
Speaker 5: And contrary to what you may be thinking, I didn't steal it. This happens to be my friend's car. As you can see, my friend is intoxicated. He's drunk. When we were at a Disney party, we both work at Walt Disney World right up the street. I wanted to make sure that he got home. I took his keys from him. So I would never let my friend get behind the wheel of a car because his death would be on my conscience. So if I'm going to get in trouble for that, then I guess I'm ready to go to jail. Oh okay, well, just drive a little faster. And how far away is it live? He lives two minutes away, all right?

00:34:37
Speaker 3: And I and I got off. That works. You know, that's the one time that that worked.

00:34:47
Speaker 5: And and I've been stopped once or twice by cops and by the grace of God or social media or TV.

00:34:54
Speaker 3: Hey, you know what, I love that that's your pel thing.

00:35:00
Speaker 4: Well you go, oh man, that's awesome, Oh.

00:35:06
Speaker 3: Man, aren't you tigger? The pinching tiger.

00:35:09
Speaker 4: Well, my kid is like when I was a kid, I was pinched by a tigger. Of all your birthdays, what was the best one ever that you remember? Wow, you are amazing.

00:35:20
Speaker 5: These these questions you've never been asked before, never been asked before.

00:35:24
Speaker 4: I look, I said that in one of the interview people I normally wouldn't talk to, like younger whatever, And I want to ask questions that just aren't about your press junket.

00:35:35
Speaker 3: The best birthday ever, I think you might have already given it.

00:35:40
Speaker 2: I think you know.

00:35:43
Speaker 5: It's the birthday that I found out that my ex wife was pregnant. And my gift was she told me for my for my twenty ninth birthday, that was her gift. She she told me, I'm pregnant because I wanted a baby, and she wasn't necessarily on board because she was a dancer and an actress and at that point, you know, and and she would have to give up her thing. So I was kind of in my feelings about it. And little did I know that she was working to make my dream come true. I guess, and it happened. And so on my birthday, on my twenty ninth birthday, She said, uh, this is your gift. Yeah, no, my was it thirtieth birthday? On my third thirtieth birthday?

00:36:23
Speaker 3: Yeah?

00:36:23
Speaker 4: Okay, that's what's up. What was your childhood nickname or what is it? Do you have a nickname that people call you?

00:36:30
Speaker 5: Yeah, and now I have to address the camera again. One of the childhood nicknames that I remember is there was a time when and I hope that you're remembering all this, bill, because when we do my one man show that I talked to you about, all these stories are going in it. So we have to write songs to go with these things. Okay, so we need to and then and then Mere you can executive produce.

00:36:54
Speaker 3: Okay, Okay, great.

00:36:55
Speaker 5: So I was actually called gas Man for and I don't even know. And this was, like I want to say, this was maybe at the end, maybe it was eighth or ninth grade, So this wasn't like I was a child. And the reason I was called gas man is because my grandmother, God bless her, she uses mothballs. I don't know if everybody still uses mothballs, but have you smelled smelled a moth ball?

00:37:19
Speaker 3: Okay, so so you know what a mothball? Smells like.

00:37:22
Speaker 5: Now, imagine every drawer has mothballs. What is the purpose of mothballs to keep away moths?

00:37:30
Speaker 1: Wow?

00:37:31
Speaker 3: Edit that out please, or some would say, or some would say to attract them. I don't know that. Yeah, that's going to be our commercial. What are mothballs for fun?

00:37:46
Speaker 5: What?

00:37:46
Speaker 3: Hey?

00:37:47
Speaker 5: Normally when you put a mothball in, you drop a ball or two and that should do the job in each thing. My grandmother nothing like no moderation, mothballs, a coating of mothballs, and all of the drawers, so all of my clothing that was always folded up in my drawers, and of course you don't smell outside the house until so I started to get called gas man on gas man on the bus going to school. And then also besides gas man, then there were you know, kids can be clever, especially we beautiful kids in the hood with minds that can freestyle and make and make things up.

00:38:29
Speaker 3: So there were always songs, great songs about gas man, the gas man. Who who that gas man?

00:38:37
Speaker 5: You know they would put put some Uncle Luke on it gas man gas man or or because then my mom she shopped very practically for me. She's like when I don't have to spend all this money on your clothes. You always look clean. You look clean and dressed. My shoes, so my shoes, Bubbos make fine. I heard the bubbos thing. But yeah, so gas Man in Bobo's ah okay oh and Jamaic make Jamaica fuck is what it is? Jamake make Oh?

00:39:08
Speaker 3: Yeah. They reduce everybody down to children are shitty people. Children. No, that's true. Children a shitty people because you're limited.

00:39:20
Speaker 10: You you kids kids have because you know, because they're little little drunks that depend on you, and our prefuntal cortex isn't really formed to what twenty five really so they have no empathy, no sympathy, no filter, no filter.

00:39:36
Speaker 3: So I get it.

00:39:37
Speaker 5: So that's why I say, man, that's all in the past, and thank you because they give me great stories.

00:39:42
Speaker 3: There you go, thank you, gas Man with me?

00:39:46
Speaker 4: What theme often occurs in your dream? Is there running theme that happens in your dreams?

00:39:55
Speaker 3: Easy? Too.

00:39:56
Speaker 5: I feel in this session I've been able to unload more than the therapist I've seen from the.

00:40:03
Speaker 3: Says you, what I've ever been like this is like us doing true and your friends.

00:40:07
Speaker 7: But I have a belief that dreams are kind of absolutely the I feel like dreams are how you get communicated to from other entities.

00:40:19
Speaker 3: Yes, and you're not.

00:40:20
Speaker 5: I feel like my father's talking to me through my dreams. Yeah, I'm so glad. Yes, I absolutely feel that I know that my father talks to me. I know that my grandmother talks to me sometimes. And besides them talking to me, I feel that your dreams keep you safe. That they're almost an early warning system for some of the ship that you may do in real life that you realize in your subconscious or things that you're afraid of. Two of my running that I that I've had the same dreams since I was a child. We were the only house on our street on Casino Avenue. Because people loved and respecting my grandmother, we were the only house that that was never broken into, and in fact, if somebody broke in, like there was once where my next door neighbors to the left, this this this this this white family, the only white white fam family on our side neighborhood. They were getting broken into, and my grandmother walked outside and she actually saw the kid and it was one of my school kids. She's like, what are you doing. Oh, I'm sorry, miss Valerie. You know, I'm just She's like, don't go in to mine house doing it. And and instead of being brawling towards her or doing something, he was like, I'm sorry, man, you know what and didn't go in. Oh oh they got him later, Oh yeah, sure right. But I was always afraid. So my whole thing growing up was I was always afraid of somebody breaking into because I never felt that our house was safe enough. So I always checked the locks. We had a we we had the old we had, oh and the pull thing you do, so we had that. But I never felt that our windows were safe, and I was always wondering if somebody's gonna break into the back door. So I've kept that throughout my entire life. Like clockwork, every couple of days, I always.

00:42:07
Speaker 3: Have that dream.

00:42:07
Speaker 5: Nope, no matter what house, no matter what apartment I used to live in was, I have the recurring dream of I have to defend myself. No, that's the thing. I defend myself. I have to defend my family, I have to defend my property. I have to because if they get in, then we'll we'll be in danger. So that's always been my thing is I have to defend.

00:42:29
Speaker 3: Ah, Okay, I dream about trains. You said there were two dreams.

00:42:34
Speaker 5: Oh, the other one's flying. I'm always flying fear of flying or you're always flying. No, I'm always flying. I'm two. But it's because but not on the plane, by yourself, by myself. Oh my god, that's another three thousand revelations.

00:42:48
Speaker 4: Oh well, he told me a story like Selo taught him Astroid traveling Andre three thousand.

00:42:54
Speaker 3: Wow. Yeah, he goes into detail about that. Okay.

00:42:58
Speaker 4: I'm always obsessed with trains, be it sole train or like the subway. There was a point where I was obsessed. There's an obsession I have with During the pandemic, I discovered a YouTube page of a guy whose goal was to just track from soup to nuts, like one end to the other end of any train line and anywhere America. So during the pandemic, I would actually pretend I was going to school, like I get on the mark and frank for elevated train at fifteen, get off a fifteenth street, and then I changed the channel to the subway and literally, I don't know why I have an obsession with train routes on YouTube where the guy just gets on the front car and oh, so you're seeing the POV right, Yeah, like I can I pretend that now. I know now that the next level of the VR thing is they're now going to create worlds. What was the movie the movie where the little boy and d gets separated from his family and he uses Google Earth. Yes, he uses Google Earth to find his village. Like he got separated from his township for twenty years and then you know, as a three year old, he remember there was a water tower.

00:44:20
Speaker 3: He zoomed right.

00:44:22
Speaker 4: He got lost on the train system as a three year old and didn't know where he lived, and then he just lived all over. He got adopted by a well to do family, and he told his well to do family, it's my dream to find my birth family. And they's like, well, if you go on if you remember this water tower thing very specific as a three year old, we can go on Google Earth and look for it.

00:44:43
Speaker 3: And that's how.

00:44:45
Speaker 4: He was reunited with his family. But yeah, like they're going to create worlds like that on what's Apple the yeah, whatever, so.

00:44:57
Speaker 5: That you go on Oculus and you use your it's it's not amazing technology, but I've done I'm using the Google Earth to look around. And now on the Apple Pro, I've done the same thing. I love the Apple Pro. They're like that that thing is amazing. So how do you use it's? What's should I use it to? To watch movies? Because you really can make that. You can make an imax. Yeah, you can go in the movie theater and you can be watching the movie. Or if I am doing work that you actually can type, there's there's a virtual screen. I look at my emails, you can go online. And the great thing because of the past, you can do these things as you're just in the world.

00:45:40
Speaker 3: It's great. Yeah.

00:45:41
Speaker 4: Seriously, during twenty twenty, during like the pandemic, got two oculuses and.

00:45:51
Speaker 3: To be trapped in the house. But with those things on, like I.

00:45:54
Speaker 4: Would build worlds and malls and everything, and literally we'd have date night, like you don't on the roller coaster and let's walk in the mall and it felt real like I built. We would do like virtual ping pong and this this resort like a Pocono's type of resort thing, but it really felt like we were there.

00:46:16
Speaker 3: Like Mike's girlfriend and I did the same thing and we would go she would go to sing.

00:46:23
Speaker 5: Karaoke, that there'd be these virtual karaoke bars which just the avatars and everybody would sing, and I would go along with her until my avatar would just and sit in the audience and watch, sit and watch, and sometimes I'd sing because at that point nobody knows who anybody is, so upus I would do that, and we'd go to virtual Disney.

00:46:41
Speaker 3: And I'm not try that yet.

00:46:43
Speaker 5: It's so cool. That's when I fell in love with the Oculus. I'm certain now it's more advanced like I had it when it first came out.

00:46:49
Speaker 4: This new Oculus is much better. And then I tapered off, like once we went outside, I stopped going on it. But I can only imagine now in twenty twenty four that it's super advance.

00:46:59
Speaker 3: And it's great. I can't wait for that shout out to Oculus.

00:47:07
Speaker 4: If five records define who you are as a human being, what five records in your record collection best describes who you are?

00:47:17
Speaker 3: In my record collection? Oh man, Okay, you know what.

00:47:22
Speaker 5: I'm gonna go through my Apple Music real fast because I don't have records in the records are in storage.

00:47:30
Speaker 3: So I have to remember which ones I have.

00:47:32
Speaker 5: Okay, so just off the top of my head, because that's a really deep, deep question, I'd say, oh, you know what, the Miseducation of Lauren Hill okay four And I can't tell you exactly why I love that record so much. And I felt like I was being spoken to in terms of being a creative because she was finding her voice and finding her.

00:47:57
Speaker 3: Thing then and then Zion.

00:48:01
Speaker 5: That was released right as Miley was was born, so it was the first time that I knew about having a child. And some people wanted to clown her for her MTV performance when she broke down crying, but I was like, no, I get it. I finally get what it's like to love somebody that much, to break down, cry and not care what you think. That's one of my FAE favorites. Kidd and play Too Hype Kid and play too Hype.

00:48:29
Speaker 3: Yes.

00:48:29
Speaker 5: And the reason is, I don't know if it's because of a It's not because of a trait. It's because of a time. It's like, that's when I saw these dudes dancing and having a good time. Hip hop wasn't you know that ear of hip hop wasn't serious And when I saw them dancing, they gave me the courage because I would sing and dance in my house. Nobody knew that I could sing or dance until the first time that I did a musical on stage.

00:49:00
Speaker 3: Your family didn't know about your talent, nobody, I how'd you hide that? In my room? I did a lot of things in my room. You have a voice like I did you know rejecting the shower? Nobody I would.

00:49:11
Speaker 5: Nobody would know because because the couple times that I would do things, my my grandmother said, stop running around in that nonsense. I was like, Okay, got it, nonsense. Can't do it in front of you, safety, won't do it in front of anybody.

00:49:22
Speaker 3: I got it.

00:49:23
Speaker 5: But it wasn't until so So when SO that came out in like eighty eight or eighty nine. Eighty okay, so eighty eight, So I was a so So I was a That was at the beginning of my of my junior year, and that's when I started doing theater and I saw those guys dancing and Hammer came out around that time and to hype, So I was like, okay, you know what, I'm gonna learn those dances, and with my crippling ass social anxiety, I'm gonna go to a school dance and I'm gonna get up and I'm do the whole thing.

00:49:55
Speaker 3: But I'm dude. They gave me the courage to go out and do that.

00:50:00
Speaker 5: And so that was one of those things that I just copied their their moves getting funky.

00:50:05
Speaker 3: Still, oh, come on, man, lets you go getting funky. I love that. Didn't play Lauren Hill.

00:50:14
Speaker 5: Prince's purple Rain. Okay, uh, you know it's a little oh and and that's not it. That's not it either, that purple rain. I think for our generation that that like watching someone that I didn't even know what the whole story was about. It made me feel some kind of way like watching this this guy sing about sex and these girls and you know, like vanity and watching.

00:50:44
Speaker 3: This whole thing felt dangerous. It felt like I hadn't seen anything like that.

00:50:48
Speaker 4: I assume that your parents are strict or Christian if they're from the Islands.

00:50:53
Speaker 3: It wasn't even about being Christian if she was very much. But Prince was the devil.

00:50:58
Speaker 5: She wasn't consistent. There were certain things that were bad, but she's like Prince. Then it be yo, that's rare, that's Prince. But but the Prince was everyone's favorite target.

00:51:09
Speaker 3: I love Prince.

00:51:10
Speaker 5: The thing that I didn't like is that was my first time really seeing and and recognizing what homophobia was because you know, my grandmother look at Prince, Oh, Prince Princess, and Auntie Man is Auntie Man.

00:51:22
Speaker 3: You know.

00:51:24
Speaker 5: He's gay because he didn't know that's an auntie min is own and and so my other rel is my man. Nah, that's Auntie Mini. Don Seron and his ass all hanging outs and I don't know who he so, but I was like, I don't, hey, I don't think so look at that's actually cool. So watching this dude, I was like, I wish I had that confidence. That guy's wearing frills and he's on a motorcycle and that and all those women want him. That's cool. So so definitely Prince run DMC rock Box okay, because that was probably my introduction to hip hop. Okay, like a lot of other kids. I'd heard, I guess on the radio and Dad's car uh to hip hop hip and I'd heard that in the message when I was little, But rock Box was I think it was like ten maybe because USA night Flight.

00:52:22
Speaker 3: I don't remember that.

00:52:23
Speaker 5: I remember it Okay, So you would say, that's how I would get on my music because I would take it, take a tape recorder, and I'd record for all of the videos USA Night Flight, so I would just wait, so rock Box Band but ten because I did, And then I was like, what are these That wasn't like the hip hop because that wasn't to the right, to the left, every buddy jay wasn't that, And these guys are in the leather and what are they doing?

00:52:47
Speaker 3: So that made me so I got.

00:52:49
Speaker 5: Into run dmc, which led me to ll cool J, which led me to that whole movement, which which so that was really pivotal. That's when I started freestyling because I wanted to learn their song. But then I would just take words that they used and then just try to wrap along with them.

00:53:06
Speaker 4: How did you develop your confidence for improv and freestyling, Because I feel like if I could just lose one aspect, like when I told you at the top of the episode about like the whole Norm McDonald embracing silence and a bomb joke or whatever, like now I'm a little fearless with it, but I believe that really good freestylers you lend treik. If you let your brain go one hundred per all the answers are there and it's quick.

00:53:40
Speaker 3: How do you let go?

00:53:41
Speaker 4: Because you kind of revealed or out yourself as a person who's like guarded and that sort of thing, but you're also in a profession with a creativity that requires you just to be geranimo, like just fall over and pray that there's a soft.

00:53:58
Speaker 3: Landing when you land. That's where I feel safe. Yeah, I saw.

00:54:01
Speaker 8: I remember it was an episode of Who's Line? And I think this was an episode that really because you were the reason I watched who Was Line? Like straight up, I'm like you're like for real, I'm like, yo, I want to monster on. Yeah, and so like it was one you know, and you had been killing it. I was like, all fuck with this, dude, because that was my first time really hearing about you. You did a character, it was like a superhero sketch. You did a character called the Ballroom Brawler bro that ship.

00:54:26
Speaker 3: I think I remember you threw yourself the entire dog. That shit was hilarious.

00:54:31
Speaker 5: Like see with that freedom that you talk about, and you even said when I teach improv like I can't speak for anybody else's thing, But I know that all my ship comes from being that kid who sat in that room. If I didn't have anybody to play with, I had to think and I had to create. And then the things that I watched, I if I mimicked it, I had to be all the parts. So it just made sense to me.

00:54:58
Speaker 3: Were your only child, was it?

00:55:00
Speaker 5: I have a sister that was raised with me partially, but it wasn't until I was ten, So for the most part, I was raised only child. So I found ways to be creative on my own that I didn't know. Nobody put a label on it. Like I hadn't met Keith Johnstone, who who's one of the fathers of improvisation, and so I hadn't met them. I didn't even know there was a word for it. So cut to later when I actually started doing improv with the group that I was with from Orlando called the called sac Theater, and then seven of us moved out to la and became the House full of Honkeys, and that's how I got Who's line. I didn't know that there was an organized thing for it. So when they were like, oh, yeah, it's theater where you make up, I said, oh, yeah, that's fine because I could always bend on that freestyle like I would just freestyle for my friends, or we can do yeah. So if you want me to and characters, sure, I'll just make make stuff up in scenarios great because I didn't know what the thing was. But my methodology of doing it is I have to act everything out to make it tactile. So when you see a scene like that, and that's how I do my thing is I know how it's supposed to look and feel, and I can do the musical improv because I love music and I'm a songwriter, so I just think of an improv a song as my first draft. So I feel safe in that, which is weird because I feel weird about every other thing and nervous. But with that, it's like, oh, I yeah, you just trust fall Yeah, yeah, because I know that something will be there.

00:56:25
Speaker 3: Now.

00:56:25
Speaker 5: Will it be the most brilliant thing all the time. No, and it's not supposed to be. The One thing I did learn later is with the yesand also comes with and Bill can back me up on this and the sense of Okay, I'll go for it, jeronimo, I hit it great. I don't hit it better because I got to come back around and justify whatever happened. And if I'm on stage with partners, I've just given you a lane to let you jump in and save me. So you have to embrace that failure. And that's one of the rules that Keith Johnson and the father of theater sports, that I never understood. He's like, you have to be willing to fail improvisation. By definition, you shouldn't be getting laughs, you shouldn't be successful because it goes against our primal building character right right, like, it goes against the thing of I want you to like me, and I want you to understand what I'm saying. I don't want you to root for my downfall. When you watch an improv show, whether you know it or not, you are rooting to see what's he gonna say. There's no way that he's gonna rhyme hypothalamus. Nope, not gonna happen. Orange get out of here. That's not gonna happen. He sucks Orange door hinge. If someone comes up with that, m'm ryman, okay.

00:57:46
Speaker 4: So Jimmy obviously started a culture at thirty Rock in which he was known to break character a lot, which was frowned upon a lot at that show, like no matter what, don't break character.

00:58:00
Speaker 3: But now that Jimmy sort of make it like a coup like cutey thing.

00:58:05
Speaker 4: Then you know, you see people look down this weekend, watch SNL, watch Kristy Wig and everyone break character.

00:58:14
Speaker 3: But that level of chaos.

00:58:19
Speaker 4: I do dig, but you know, sometimes I'll just get in my head like I won't know where to go.

00:58:25
Speaker 3: Cons and callsis rhymes with hypothalamus worseman.

00:58:34
Speaker 4: Okay, but I'm a guy who I don't know if you ever see in a micro bigulius don't think twice of course, yes, okay, So is there a general rule like if you're in a group of people, like the temptation to not show off or show out. Like there's a point where they tell Keegan Michael Key like all right, well, don't do your bomber impression. Like in other words, I know when you're showing off and doing the short shot you go, yeah, yeah, by your aristocrats trick.

00:59:04
Speaker 2: I think it depends on the group is not doing that. I think that's always the key, especially in a group of improvisers. It's a conglomeration of everyone's efforts, But how.

00:59:13
Speaker 3: Do you know when it's time to shine and bring the show to another level?

00:59:16
Speaker 2: Honestly, I think with our group it's repetition and doing it over and over again. It's like a great basketball team or a great soccer team. Like in a good basketball team, the reason an alley oop works is because the guy knows what the other guy's going to be, so he throws the ball to where he knows it's going to be. It's the same thing with us. I feel like, you like, if you know Lin's coming up to do something, you'll lob him align and it'll work whatever, and you'll leave him somewhere that makes it funnier, and everything just sort of gets like on top of each other, on top of the other, and top each other until it's like ready to explode. And that I mean sometimes it's luck. It feels like sometimes it's having a great night, and honestly, sometimes you have a shit night. I mean we've done hundreds of shows where it's just like wow, we can't even buy a laugh.

00:59:53
Speaker 3: You know. That's kind of the thing about improv, which I find to be so interesting.

00:59:56
Speaker 2: It's like even bombed, like bombed and like in like front many thousands of people, and it's just like, so.

01:00:02
Speaker 3: It teaches you to fail. Yeah, absolutely kind and you have.

01:00:05
Speaker 5: To know what that feels like. And I think the worst thing that can happen to you, and this happened to me is with the success of Who's Line. Before Who's Line, I was not the funny person in the houseful of Honkeys.

01:00:16
Speaker 3: I had my role.

01:00:18
Speaker 5: I was like, I do the song stuff, and I can do characters and physical things. But because improv isn't really my thing, I'm doing the group hahha. But my thing is I'm gonna get cast in a sitcom or and another thing or like so, so I don't consider myself funny.

01:00:35
Speaker 3: You can use me.

01:00:37
Speaker 5: But after I got Who's Line and then I was one of four, They're like, oh no, we hired you because we expect you to be able to come up with something. Now it was the first time that I was called upon to be funny on the dime. And the training that Whose Line gave us is it's kind of the antithesis to what you just said. The four of us that you know, the regulars, we've come to know each other's strengths and we can give each other lobs all day. But because of the nature of the games and what it is, it's always it's a team sport. But it's also we know that Wayne can do this, we know and can do that. We know the Ryan's gonna do this. We needed a so you're always you can lob for somebody else, but they expect you to be able to step forward.

01:01:19
Speaker 3: And take it. Is there ever free practice or like, are you given slide sides? No?

01:01:26
Speaker 5: The only practice that we have is a camera blocking and so we know the games, but we don't know and any suggestions. And the camera blocking isn't even for us, it's for the actual camera guys to know. Because whose Line was so innovative and people have tried to shoot improv shows before. But the reason that whose Line works is and I learned this as a producer from Dan Patterson, the guy that created it. He's not doing Who's Line for the people that are in that audience. The people in the audience are a tool. He's doing it for the home viewer. So the reason that we would have that camera blocking is he wanted to know is if we were doing a game like talk show, Wait, I'm gonna put you in the audience, and if we're following the conventions of a talk show, maybe I might get up and be angry and run down the stage and tackle him, or I might run out of the bin. We want the cameraman to know if we're doing X game and they have to follow, but we would never get a prompt. And that's what was so amazing about it, and our hit to miss ratio got to be so good, like it was scary. I was like, we really don't have They're like, oh, there must be so much who's lying that you left on the floor. No, because they're so cheap in a good way that if we take for four hours everything we has made it onto air at some point in some time. So I got lulled into a false sense of oh, well, I'm bad in everything until the first time that I did say something on stage this is shit.

01:02:46
Speaker 3: Didn't work in a comedy club. I was like, oh, pardon me. Wow. So learning to accept that failure and go, oh great, well that didn't work. Cool. I suck, but I won't suck now.

01:03:03
Speaker 4: Is it true that you guys have to have a certain level of synergy with each other for it to truly work? Yes, Like say, if like I'm passive aggressive with you and will kirk that stage, like, and we have a disagreement or an argument, whatever, is it easy to turn back on and.

01:03:19
Speaker 5: Just it's possible or maybe it's possible. I also think it depends on how well you know each other. Like a group like Freestyle Love Supreme. They came up together and they have a chemistry that have been lucky enough to jump in and out and sample like my friend Jonathan and I who hosts Let's make a Deal? I mean to who co hosts it, and he's also and let's make a deal. We've known each other since we were nineteen, so we have a shorthand. It's easy when you have a shorthand. If you're mad at somebody. To do a successful improv show, it would be hard because you have to be so open to what the other.

01:03:51
Speaker 3: Person is doing. It's trust.

01:03:53
Speaker 5: And so if I don't trust you, I'm not gonna mess with you, because then I'm gonna take it on my back.

01:03:58
Speaker 3: I'm gonna go, you know what, No, I got.

01:03:59
Speaker 4: This, Okay, I'm gonna wind down five questions left and I'll try to make it brieffish. What one thing did you leave behind in twenty twenty h and what new thing did you gain in twenty twenty.

01:04:15
Speaker 5: I left behind in twenty twenty. I think I left behind a bit of that fear that I talked talked about, and I gained a brand new sense of I'm going to live my life because life is too short. I literally tried to live my life knowing that there's a clock.

01:04:37
Speaker 3: And not a bad clock. But there's just a clock, okay, and I want to be happy? All right? What movie are you ashamed to admit that you've never seen?

01:04:48
Speaker 5: There are so many movies I feel that that are in the zeitgeist that we've heard, We've seen bits that you feel like you've seen.

01:04:52
Speaker 1: That you're supposed to feel like I've seen that, Like I don't even I'm nowhere near.

01:04:56
Speaker 3: It, or better yet, like a movie that you're supposed to have seen. Oh, Star Wars Brady Brother. Now, granted, I can give the entire Star Wars with him, I can.

01:05:11
Speaker 5: Give you the entire plot of Star Wars and because over the years, but I never Star Wars fell in the gap of I didn't see a movie and a movie theater until I was sixteen years old and I went on a date that I could afford to pay for. We never went but as but my grandma went, well, you can't see the movie, but we got you these and McDonald's had the commemorative Star Wars glasses, remember totally, so so she got me those and we collected the set of four. It's like, there's your Star Wars. So it's like, okay, so never seen it.

01:05:45
Speaker 3: Still what you are Wars?

01:05:48
Speaker 8: Wow?

01:05:49
Speaker 3: What's you you never see?

01:05:50
Speaker 8: I never Star Wars to this day, to this day, anything was just like magical white people and l's and ship.

01:05:56
Speaker 3: I ain't fucking with that ship. So so magical white people. But a Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones.

01:06:06
Speaker 4: I've watched Thrones, but I've not watched Lord of the Rings. Harry Potter, I've never seen like I'm.

01:06:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I in the pandemic.

01:06:15
Speaker 4: I finally watched Star Wars and it was a struggle, like I've watched them five times or on the you know, the tour bus, you start, I start the Godfather on the tour bus.

01:06:26
Speaker 8: Is like all the I mean, the first three are like them, the ones, but then all the ones they made, Yeah I heard them.

01:06:32
Speaker 3: I heard one of them. Are good.

01:06:34
Speaker 4: Yeah, so it's I've still not watched Return of the Jedi, but I think I confiiciently say that I've watched Star Wars to the point where I remember it Empire strikes Back. I know I've seen it twice, but I don't remember shit like and I still can't tell you what Star Wars is about.

01:06:50
Speaker 3: Like good versus Evil.

01:06:52
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, it's the hero's journey. But but yeah, like now, I don't know if it holds up to to the the stuff that's invisible invincible invincible invincible.

01:07:07
Speaker 3: Okay, are you five minutes early or twenty minutes late? Five minutes early, so now you can't be friends?

01:07:16
Speaker 5: This sucks, no, but I can give you a well well that comes with a in parentheses. So five minutes early, because if left to my own devices, I will be twenty minutes late because I get caught up in that thing I forget what they call it, the time blindness, or I will get I'll stand stand in my closet distracted red shirt the sweater can't wear that, and then I play the scenarios. If now that won't look good if I do, if I don't it, okay, I got no, But I have to, and I'll be rooted in one spot until whatever the thing is that I have to solve solves. So I have to leave extra early to allow time for me getting stuck.

01:07:57
Speaker 8: When you officially die and those with ADHD, when was that, and like, what's that process been like?

01:08:02
Speaker 3: Kind of managing it?

01:08:04
Speaker 5: It's been great because using the medication when I need it it does help me focus. And as a creative, you know, we all have ideas. Oh I'm gonna it helps me get things done. It's no problem getting an idea. It's doing something with the fourteen that you have and then writing shit down or or even using getting focused enough to I'm up. Now, I have to get out of bed and I'm gonna make my bed. I'm not gonna lay in my bed. I'm not gonna using it that way. And also understanding certain patterns and behaviors that I have, some that are superpowers and some that aren't.

01:08:36
Speaker 3: So so it's a good process.

01:08:38
Speaker 8: How old were you when you like finally realize I guess, oh we're diagnosed five years ago?

01:08:43
Speaker 3: Oh wow?

01:08:43
Speaker 5: Okay, oh yeah. I've come to many things late in life, but better late than never. Listen, that's part of that trying to be be be happy thing.

01:08:51
Speaker 3: This is part of the pandemic pivot. M H.

01:08:55
Speaker 5: Like I'm home now, and yeah, why am I like this? Why does this thing happened? Why am I not happy? Blah blah blah.

01:09:02
Speaker 3: Okay, soe, you mentioned someone on the tonight show which I kind of.

01:09:06
Speaker 4: Want to ask, which was because the thing was Twenty twenty was the year in which, as I predicted, half of my friends made life transitions as far as their partnership was concerned, including my own relationship imploded in twenty twenty one at the time. To the person I was dating before the pandemic, you made a decision to quarantine with your blended family. Yeah, with your ex wife who's now still your partner, and whatnot your daughter you I don't know your current situation now, but first of all, whose idea was it?

01:09:51
Speaker 3: And would you recommend that? Like I would only recommend it to someone if you've.

01:09:59
Speaker 5: The family became known because of TikTok when everybody got on TikTok at that point, and then we started doing dance videos and we would post, oh, this is our family story, and then news outlet's pick that up and it was so weird.

01:10:11
Speaker 3: Folk.

01:10:11
Speaker 5: Wait a minute, you're quarantining with your ex wife. You're living in the same but if we don't understand, so, the only way that we could get to that is I wouldn't recommend that unless you've had before twenty twenty. Mandy and I met in ninety five. We were together for years and then we got divorced, and we had our baby before that, and then we made a decision to stay friends and to work on ours and we genuinely love each other like we are family, Like we couldn't be together romantically, but that is my heart, that is my family. She would kill for me and I'd kill for her, you know, And so being able to it's a fluke for some people. And to then do it with her boyfriend, who her boyfriend, Jason, and it's not even boyfriend her her life partner used to be my backup dancer when I'd had my Vegas residency. So add another layer on top of that and it sounds what a whacky sitcom. But we we love each other enough, and I'd like to think that with enough therapy we needed to do therapy. I needed so much therapy to be okay with myself that I could be okay with Jason and I try to be on some toxic man shit have like.

01:11:23
Speaker 3: Well that was my but you can't be bitbbitda.

01:11:26
Speaker 5: No, this is another man who stepped in, who my daughter feels safe around, and who I've never gotten a call from my ex wife saying this guy's hurting me or he's stealing money or he has treated us another way, so I love him. So I would not recommend it unless you have a history of therapy with your family, because even knowing everything I know now, that's not for the week. You must know each other well to be quarantined together.

01:11:53
Speaker 3: That's no joke.

01:11:54
Speaker 4: Okay, what will you have meitt is one of your worst habits. Commitment, okay, and not that I was cheating or doing anything. I'd get into.

01:12:04
Speaker 5: Something and then hoop, I can't do it because I would be because I commit so fast because.

01:12:11
Speaker 3: I want, oh, like I would love that relationship, or I would love to do this job.

01:12:16
Speaker 5: Because they think that I'm talented, or she thinks I'm good, or they think that I mean and then you jump into something you're like, ooh, this was not the right move.

01:12:24
Speaker 3: I shouldn't have done it.

01:12:25
Speaker 5: Okay, I gotta quit, I gotta quit, I gotta quit, I gotta quit, and so you get.

01:12:29
Speaker 3: Out of it. Yeah, I see, I'm gonna complete this. I fucked up.

01:12:34
Speaker 4: I said yes to everything, and I'm not regretting it because they're passions. But I wish I could just be like dog just.

01:12:43
Speaker 5: So you can you can help me, because Mandy lives by If you say yes, you have to rock it all all the way through, and I agree with that in theory, but there are some things that you say yes to that are not good for you, like somebody may not be good for you, so I don't want to. My habit was I would try to see it through to some kind of conclusion instead of just chopping it off and then even accepting a job that you're like, Okay, this is gonna suck.

01:13:07
Speaker 3: Why am I doing this. It's not gonna be good for me. I'm gonna look bad. Look I'm out. Yeah.

01:13:13
Speaker 4: I did shit to the detriment of like the casualty of my was basically my relationship, which was again, as soon as we got out in the world, the first thing I thought about was all the work I'm gonna do now that we're out in the world instead of like the progress that I was on, Like hey, and.

01:13:36
Speaker 3: Then it's like, all right, well you'll you'll.

01:13:37
Speaker 4: Have time for this relationship in twenty thirty something, so, you know which, I was like, all right, so I guess this is over. Even though it was quasi amicable, the breakup much to the detriment of my relationship at the time, Like, even when I'm sacrificed amicable, what did you say, Even when it's amicable, it's not amicable because somebody's got kick the other person and that just sucks. Yeah, I'm in trust me. I'm definitely the bad guy in this scenario. And I feel horrible that I made so much progress and improving and slowing down and sleeping more and all that stuff, and the second life was open. I was like, oh, back to work, you know, funny stones, and now realize I fucked up.

01:14:24
Speaker 3: So but I'm gonna see this stuff through. And then.

01:14:29
Speaker 4: I promise I'm really going to commit to just like one thing at a time and not stack a whole back pile of things, like it's not human to direct four movies at once and make a record and no, it's not human.

01:14:46
Speaker 3: So I don't recommend that, but you did it, so good job.

01:14:51
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, it's it's it's going to be good. So hopefully not hopefully I'm training myself to not.

01:14:57
Speaker 3: I don't talk going to be good?

01:14:59
Speaker 4: Yes, I talking to the affirmative, the affirmative. All right, last question. You have thirty seconds to talk to your twelve year old self.

01:15:11
Speaker 5: Oh wow, well this is easy because I've talked to him many times. So what do you want me to talk to him about? Well?

01:15:17
Speaker 3: What would you mixing cereals?

01:15:21
Speaker 4: What would you want to tell him if you were allowed to have a butterfly wing effect to a certain belief. This's part of me that actually wishes that I give an opportunity. I'm almost thinking I'm sick enough to actually say, you know what, everything the way happened, let it happen.

01:15:41
Speaker 3: But I think I would be open.

01:15:44
Speaker 4: To some sort of improvement, Like if I could have the confidence and the insight that I have now at fifty three, right, maybe like thirty three, even forty three, Like you're the same person.

01:15:57
Speaker 3: I hate you?

01:15:58
Speaker 4: Right, no, no, no, you know I'm just one of my regrets was like wow, at forty nine, my eyes finally opened and now I'm just thinking, like, damn man, like forty nine now and that would be sixty and shit, no, but you can't think I could have made magic. You want everyone's ass like thirty, Like, no, thirty, you don't get it. Then it's you want to do hood at shit with your brain?

01:16:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, like you ain't so.

01:16:27
Speaker 5: Weird that it can't even work, like because that's around the same. Yeah, like I would have had that epiphany. I'm fifty one now, so it wasn't until you know, like being forty six forty seven, that you start doing that work. And of course you would wish for that confidence, but I would challenge you and say, if the confidence that you could even have at forty or thirty whatnot, who knows where you would be. So so the only thing that I could tell to my twelve year old self is I can't regret anything, because I guess things have turned out okay. There are things that I hate all the time, like career moves that I went. I wish I wouldn't have done that shit, but but life isn't horrible. So the only thing I can tell him is I wish that what I want for him is maybe not to change anything. But I want for twelve twelve year old Wayne to know when this sounds like a hackneyed life thing, to just know that you're enough in that sense and just and just know that you're gonna be and like you're dope, Like, trust me, you're you don't even understand how dope you are, because I don't even know how dope I am. Because I get excited if somebody that I recognize, like you even saying hi to me, or anybody that I respect and says, oh Wayne, I saw Alicia Keys the other day and Swizz and.

01:17:41
Speaker 3: They're like, oh Wayne, it's like you know who I am?

01:17:43
Speaker 5: Oh my god, that whole thing that's still that twelve year old kid who is like, but so yo, you are so good, You are so great. Don't worry about being cocky, don't about pleasing people, don't about being black enough, don't be that you're gonna be good. So do what you want to do instead of living your life and having it affect your choices and then without telling him to change anything. Maybe if he just did that, then then then we'd see what would happen. Butterfly wise, all right.

01:18:09
Speaker 4: Before I close this show man, it's just hitting me right now. How apropos this moment is because I've had a relationship with one particular date that for me was always doom and gloom and always I felt like defined the darkest period of my existence. Like for me, the idea of questlove was invented, the idea of this, the idea of everything was invented on all the ironic dates. To remember fucking June second, Like, in my mind, June second, eighty nine was the worst day of my life in which you you know, you always had that moment. I don't know if it happens for you guys, whatever, but you know I'm certain you've had it where you just like that never again.

01:19:13
Speaker 3: I'll show them. I'm going to oh yeah, and that moment was.

01:19:19
Speaker 4: June second, like I documented June second, nineteen eighty nine, worst I will you know letters you see Michael Jackson writing himself. No longer I will be the like I've written composition notebooks. I'm never cutting my hair. I'm growing this outrageous June second, nineteen eighty nine. It's so weird that what I deemed the worst day of my life now is someone that I in the beginning of talking like, oh yeah, it would be cool. Now I'm like, ah, fucking universe is sending me something. It was even to the point where I hate it all. Geminis. That's the when you Gemini, I get that now, dog, And that's the thing, like there's a Gemini. Kathy's like the people that are real close to me I hate. I used to hate Geminisa.

01:20:17
Speaker 3: So this whole, these whole two episodes. Thank you, Wayne Brady.

01:20:22
Speaker 4: You finally disarmed, disarmed my my ire and disdained for Geminis.

01:20:29
Speaker 3: Well, I'm glad I was able to bring some love. Dude.

01:20:32
Speaker 4: I appreciate you coming and doing that. Wait, I guess so that Amber is not totally angry with me. How's your experience been with the Wiz? We have about to know you as a person and not your profession, but no, the Wiz come on, Like, what can I say in just a few seconds? You know, the Wiz to be able to bring this seminal piece of black theater to stage again after almost fifty years of being not here, That's why I wanted to be a part of the show. I want to be part of this black moment. This is a moment and the talent on stage is it's it's impeccable. It's like when you talk about black excellence, and I.

01:21:13
Speaker 5: Know that some of us have a hang up now with to turn black excellence because it denotes that other people. I'm gonna say it, it is black excellence because everybody on that stage.

01:21:21
Speaker 3: It's real bad, right, right, not consumers and right, it's not that. Look at what I'm.

01:21:28
Speaker 5: It is watching people. Like when I watch the dancers dance, and I know a couple of them used to be a lea and they trained. You watch people that when when I watch them dance, I think of in the classical world, you know, black bodies in the ballet space and the modern space being being told your butt's too big, your hips are too wide, you can't do those things because of how you're built and being able to turn a eurocentric thing on its head and then come come up with your own form of it. Watching these dancers do that, I was like, that is excellent. Listening to these voices, these these these are amazing voices, like like our Dorothy and the tin Man. The I forget the characters, but but I know their names, Avery, Philip and Kyle. Their voices are anointed, the voices in the cast, the talent you can throw a rock, and any of those people you would pay to listen to a record from from them. And I look at that and I go, Wow, that's what it feels like to not be the only you. And I look at that and it's one of the only times that I've been in a cast like that, where I go, I'm so blessed. I'm humbled that you're in a community of youth, that I'm in a community, and it's amazing.

01:22:38
Speaker 3: So please come out and see the Wiz. That's all.

01:22:42
Speaker 5: And you don't have to be black to see the Wiz. I'm just saying so, Bill Sugar, I'll see you there. Thank you for the invite. Way we will be there.

01:22:51
Speaker 3: Yes, Now is this the machine talking or is this really want you to come out?

01:22:56
Speaker 9: I just want to know who to ask for when I get there, Wayne Proud, all.

01:23:00
Speaker 4: Right, brother, thank you for coming on the Showy.

01:23:07
Speaker 3: Shout out to a Liah you miss such love.

01:23:11
Speaker 5: Next time I come back, we have the freestyle. We have to set it up so we can do something.

01:23:16
Speaker 3: Hey, yes, you're definitely going to be a mainstay on the show Man. Thank you for for coming on.

01:23:21
Speaker 4: We have a new bill and Healthy Sugar and Fonteglo and Liyah uh this Quest Love and Wayne Brady.

01:23:31
Speaker 3: Thank you very much and we'll see you on the next Quest Love Supreme.

01:23:35
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Quest Love Supreme, hosted by a Mere Quest Love, Thomas, Are You Saying Clear, Fonte Coleman, Sugar, Steve Mantoe An unpaid executive producers are a Mere Quest Love, Thompson, Sean Ge and Brian Calton. Produced by Me Benjamin Cousin, Jake Liah Saint Clair, edited by Alex Conroy. Produced by iHeart by Noel Brown. Most Love Supreme is a production of ihearten Radio. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.