You do it to challenge yourself. You do it because, naturally, in the profession of acting, you want to show growth. You want to say that you take the craft seriously.
Whatever is on the page is what I’m married to. I’m very prepared. I’m a thespian. I don’t like to improv. I don’t like to go off course ’cause I think that’s where stuff happens. When you stick to the material ’cause it’s written so well, that’s where the magic happens.
On ‘Think Like a Man,’ they got the best out of me because they allowed me to bring my own cadences and opinions to the character that I was playing. I think we got the best of that particular character.
So many doors can be opened up from stand-up comedy, and the first one that was opened up for me was acting. But you can go from acting to being a TV personality to being a radio personality to being a writer to being a producer, to just being a visionary, to voiceover work.
I’ve done a great job at being universal in my stand-up, which is why, for ‘Let Me Explain,’ I toured all over the world. These movies I have coming out – ‘Ride Along,’ ‘Grudge Match,’ ‘About Last Night,’ ‘Think Like a Man Too’ – are putting me in a position to become universal on an even bigger scale.
I don’t see how people are comfortable with seeing other people be great. You can be happy for anybody, but what is your excuse to not want to be great?
