It took me a long time to get to where I’m at, in my career and as a man. I was going through my trials and tribulations in life, and it gave me the strength to tackle things that have come my way.
I came up in the community center. I used to be physical director of the South Central Community Center in Chicago on 83rd. It’s still there. It used to be around there when I was a kid.
I hate to compare anything, especially while I’m promoting. I feel that’s another disrespect, but ‘Ocean’s 13’ is the best movie I’ve ever done in my life. No question.
I learned hard lessons in life; I had to because I had so much happen: My mother died my sophomore year in high school. The next year, same day, my brother dropped dead. Two years after that, I got married because my girlfriend got pregnant. The year after my wedding, my father – who I had only recently met – died.
I was born October 5, 1957, on the South Side of Chicago, in the Woodlawn area, a neighborhood that hasn’t changed much in forty-five years. Our house was on 66th and Blackstone, but the city tore it down when the rats took over.
Every time you see a black romance it’s over-the-top. There always has to be extreme hostility between the sexes. He has to cheat. She has to show him how independently strong she is, not just as a woman but as a black woman.
As I got older, I got into all kinds of things in the streets – but for some reason, I never got caught up with the gangs growing up. Everybody dug me, man. I never had problems.
I’m an entertainer and I really enjoy entertaining. I think if you’re going to really be what you say you are, you have to really live it, work it, practice it, and think it.
