White People Need to Discover Tyler Perry

A couple years ago I was in Hartsfield Airport buying Madea's Uninhibited Commentaries, subtitled Don't make a Black Woman Take Off Her Earrings. An odd title for a funny book about a funny character played by a funny man with a message. the African American woman behind the counter was a bit surprised that I, a middle aged, pudgy white guy, knew all of Perry's movies and felt the need to Madea's pearls of wi-dom. She said Tyler isn't very popular with the mainstream. Meaning, white people.

Tyler Perry, 40, had a troubled childhood, and began writing as a way of getting some of the pain and anger out of himself. The result has been a long string of highly successful plays, some moneymaking films, and now two successful sit coms on cable. Here the trailer for his latest flick:



Tyler Perry is a different sort of writer/director/actor/producer/playright than the sort of sunglass wearing La denizens that pack the business. For one, he focuses on an African American audience, though he also has millions of fans as Clorox white as me. He has a different kind of message -- one that portrays a positive message about faith and family, and deals with real world problems like drug use and adandonment, while never letting you go too many minutes with out a deep in the gut laugh.

I've bought DVDs of a lot of his plays -- I've never heard one playing in the Bay Area, though perhaps I just read the wrong papers. For me his Medea character, a giant oldish woman (Madea is a positive slang term for a wise grandmother or older woman, I think) who is brusk, has a foul mouth, and will resort to violence as a first resort to protect her own rights or the people in her life. Here are some choice Madea clips:







Tell me Madea isn't someone to listen to after you watch that third clip!

The company produces a lot more than Madea movies.

Check out this other bit of interesting, from the website:

In the fall of 2008, Perry also opened his 200,000 square foot studios in Atlanta situated on the former Delta Airlines campus on more than 30 acres. Employing hundreds of local Atlantans, his new studio consists of 5 sound stages, a post production facility, a pond, a back lot, a 400 seat screening room and designated areas for entertaining and holding events.

A massive media company. In Atlanta rather than Hwood.

I've never seen a Tyler Perry anything that didn't raise improtant issues, have phenemenally complex characters, or make me laugh a lot. And think. One can ask for no more from entertainment.

There's a tendency in the US for people of a color to watch entertainment performed by people of their color. And that's OK except there is great entertainment in all colors, and if you miss out on this African American focused entertainment, you're missing out.

So, my fellow white people, wake up to the magic of Tyler Perry's plays, movies, and TV. It really is quite a set of shows.

Get yourself to the website, buy a movie, and enter the wonderful world.