#465: Jamie Foxx on Workout Routines, Success Habits, and Untold Hollywood Stories (Repost)

Optimal minimal. At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking. Can I ask you a personal question? No, it is. A cybernetic organism, living tissue over metal empty scale. S

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Check it out. Hello, boys and girls, this is Tim Ferris, and welcome to a very exciting episode of the Tim Ferris Show. At least I hope it will be because it was for me. Of course, every episode it is my job to deconstruct world class performers, whether they're in entertainment, military, chess, Sports or otherwise. How do they do what they do? What are their routines? What were their influences? Favorite books? What did they do for exercise? What is their favorite cereal if it comes down to that? Et cetera, et cetera. And this particular episode features Jamie Fox. Jamie Fox is the most consummate performer in and entertainer I have ever met. And I've met a lot of people. He blew my mind. Uh we spent two and a half hours together in his studio at his home. He is an Academy Award winning actor, Grammy Award winning musician, and of course he cut his teeth as a famous stand up and improv comedian. He can do it all. And In our conversation which goes all over the place.

We do cover it all. And that includes him playing live music. Just to off the cuff, it includes impersonations, Oprah, Mike Tyson, Kermit the Frog, Bill Cosby, Clinton Reagan, Sammy Davis Jr., Ray Charles, and dozens more. Morgan Freeman, it goes on and on. But he also talks about his origin stories. So how did he, for instance, match a one million dollar party thrown by Puff Daddy with four hundred dollars in LA. How did he go about doing that? How did he build up his fan base? What was it like to bomb in the beginning? That's B O M B not B A L M, even though I said it that way. The Connections initially. How did he connect with Kanye? How did he connect with Jay-Z, Pharrell, et cetera? And uh we get into a lot of nitty gritty. We talk about hard times, we talk about what he learned from his grandmother, the skills he developed as a kid, what he uh uses

We go really deep and all over the place. Uh I I was so excited and nervous at the same time in this interview. It was one of those times, and for those of you who have done interviews, you'll know the feeling where the stuff that's coming out is so good. You compulsively check the audio equipment to make sure that you're getting it. So Uh I hope to provide some bonus material on top of this, and we've had that before, for instance, where Arnold Schwarzenegger has answered some of your questions after the interview.

And uh to get any of that you will need to sign up for the newsletter. So just go to four hour workweek dot com forward slash Friday. That is a four hour work week. dot com all spelled out forward slash Friday and that'll get you the five bullet Fridays, which is just a short bullet list of all the cool things that I've managed to find in a given week and I send those out on Fridays. So sign up for that and you might get some goodies related to this episode. So check out Jamie on Twitter At IM Jamie Fox, F O X X. And for all of the notes. all of the links, the resources and so on from this episode. As always, you can find it at fourhour workweek dot com forward slash podcast with all the other episodes. And

That all having been said. Holy shit. And please enjoy the incredible.

Jimmy Fox. Jamie, welcome to the show. Man, thanks, baby. I'm so excited to be here. I'm I'm uh admiring your setup here. This is where the magic happens. To be honest with you, a lot of magic happens here.

Oh, we are actually in my studio. Uh my home studio. Now We're talking about tech world? Studios because of the tech world.

Uh a lot of'em dissipl dissipated in closed doors. Because um If you think about when L M F AO came around. They didn't need studios. They did all of their music on a laptop, right. Flying from here to Germany or whatever like that and just dumped it on to uh and and just pressed up the C C D or the iTunes. So studios are but almost becoming obsolete. But there's something very interesting about This studio. First just

For people that are listening. This Studio and I'll describe it. It's you know, it's sort of plush. There's the carpet is great. We can sit next to a grand piano. Uh he had a grand piano, which a lot of places So we keep a grand piano around just to make sure that we don't lose, you know, we won't get too techie, but what's interesting about it is it's actually electric. But it's an electric grand piano so we still have the wood to give you that warm sound.

Uh, which, you know, we I think it makes a lot of sense because as music starts to progress Uh because of the way we record now, sometimes you lose a little bit of the heart of it. So I think within the next twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years it'll be, you know This type of music, the real sound will You know, remain.

Now the the studio When I first got the house looked like a a old porn set. It had a it had like a old basement carpet and a couch and like a metallic uh metallica uh poster And I was like what would I do with this because I needed a place to to work and and do music. What's interesting now, I I got a guy to change the whole place over and as you can see, we'll take pictures and show it f for you.

for you guys that are listening, but They did a very good job in it. But if you look over here, this is where we do the recording. There's a there's a booth, which is normal, but also the recording on both sides were able to do animation. We're able to do uh if we want to do ADR for movies. Um what is ADR? ADR is like when you um like when we're doing a movie but we're recording the the the movie outside, there's a lot of noise. Oh you doing pickup audio? So we'll do pickup audio. Uh so uh and so and and most

Any actor or actress will tell you A DR is the worst thing in the world to do. So to be able to have here have it here, I could do my A D R here, I could do my animation here and things like that. And so Just the Now the the studio itself The actual brains of the studio, it's a old hard drive.

And the reason I kept that old hard drive, I used to have a smaller studio in a smaller house. But when I had that small studio I wasn't in music. I built the studio of my smaller house because I wanted to get a music, but I was from comedy and from acting and things like that. But what I would do is I would throw parties and I would invite musical people over Uh at the party, like s but and when they would come over like if I had Puff or or Snoop or back at that time John B. or or Brian McKnight, I would say, Hey man, you know I'm trying to get the music. Would you leave me some music in my studio? So people leave me like sixteen bars, twenty four bars,'cause I mean they would they would record

Something while they're in the studio. They were record we'd have the party going, I say man's go in the back. You know, while we're drinking and whatever like that and go and I said, Hey man, just leave me a little something'cause I was trying to get into uh to music. And then I met this kid uh uh named Breon Prescott. Basketball we play basketball and all this kinda stuff, pick up basketball games. And he said, Hey man, why don't you ever do music? I said, Man, I'm trying to get into that shit man. I just you know how to get into it. And then one day he I throw this big party.

And uh it was a um Uh the party was was crazy because as I di digress a little bit. I would follow Puffy combs around back in the day when it was just like Puff and J Lo and I and back at that time no one could get into his parties, but the reason he would let me in because I would carry a camera with me everywhere I go. But it was back in the day day, like you know, the big canon cameras. Wait, he would let you in because you carry a canon camera. Yeah, because at that time I wasn't Jamie Fox, I was just Jamie Fox. And uh uh so I couldn't get into all the parties because Puff was so big, like he come to LA, we couldn't even get in our own clubs. Right. But I popped I I I took a town car everywhere he went.

Jumped out of the town car one day and said, Yo Puff can I record. No, at that point he didn't know you at all. He knew me. He knew me the the kid that was on the Living Color or whatever like that, but it wasn't elevated. Right. And plus he was having parties that were like huge, like nobody's getting it. And so they was he saw me with the camera, he's like, Yo let him through. And it was back in the day, was it like the big Canon camera with the light and I had to change the battery. It wasn't like how today you just got your pocket. No, I had I had production. But uh I would follow him around and then one day we had this this party in Philly that I I recorded for him and he said, Yo your money, you know how much this party costs? What? So it costs a million dollars for this party. I said, You paid a million dollars for a party? He's like, Yeah, that's how we I told Puff, I challenged him, I said, I'll throw you a party At my house in LA.

Which is way smaller than this situation. But I'll spend maybe four hundred dollars and it will rival this party, not in the scale of it, but in the type of people that are there. And he was he was a little upset. You know, Puff is a you know, he he always likes to win. He's a competitive guy. You better understand the essence of this part. I was like, All right, I I get it. And uh he actually came to uh LA a few weeks. Later.

And it was a Saturday said, Yo Playboy, make that shit happen. So he calls me like nine in the morning, right? For that night. For n in the morning. For the sake of the day. For the day. I said no problem. So I go into my cellphones. Call I I have a I have a list of people. Oh that since I

First came to LA. The way I got into uh um Um knowing everybody. I was the first I was the first social media guy without social media.

Mm-hmm. I would go do a stand up comedy routine at a club. If they like the routine, I had cue card back in the day and would have people sign cue cards, sign the name, did you like the set, give me your page or number, I will text you and let you know where I would be. You have time. Yeah, with they were like index cards. Index cards. So a box and I had these fly, man. Stop it for a second.

Uh, so we're picking back up. I just have to we took a fly break. Yes, so it was a salty. I just have to admire this.'Cause the studio is What would you say? Maybe like thirty thirty by fifteen feet. on the floor and then another fifteen feet tall. And you said I'm gonna stop and get this fly. Yeah, I saw the fly. This is a lot of space. And it took you about seven seconds to drop this fly down and kill it. I was very impressed.

So the cue cards. So so what so I would get cue cards and and and like I said, I would send it you know, I I had a list of about eight hundred people. Had six hundred women because women at that time, this is like around ninety, ninety one, women at that time love to go to comedy clubs. So it was all the pretty girls, because pretty girls like to laugh, you know, and and eight, nine girls together. Jamie you're so crazy. Whatever. And so uh I had eight hundred signatures, two hundred guys because they wanted to be where the girls were. So I would take that list and also say, okay, well now I'm having a party here, here, here, whatever, whatever if you want to come by. So that same list along with the other people that I met as I As I started to grow in the business I text and said, I'm throwing a party for Puff and this one Puff had

Uh bun. Uh we ain't going nowhere with that. And it was bl it was popping. I mean, even the LA dudes was like, man, we don't wanna fuck with this New York dude, but the shit is so the song is so hot. So I text I said, Listen, I'm um Puff is coming. And the people that I text were only cool people.

Like no guys are to be hating. You know, uh the girls are pretty. Uh uh not sluddy, but not Not too tight. Right. You know I mean it was just it was just really it was it was mm it was mm mm.

And so I hit him at twelve noon. I said, Yo, where you at? We're at a fevered pitch. It's going off over here in my little house. And when he gets there.

His mind is blown. And you know, he shows up with the entourage that you know, he Puff Puff he was like Gatsby. And he walked in and he says, Oh, that's the girl from that show And that's the girl on the side and I I said, Yeah, Puff, we We all live out here. You know, so all the people you see in Hollywood, I I know they're my friend. And so he's like, Oh shit, so the party's incredible. We're playing his music through my little sound speakers. Everybody's really toasting him. And I said, Puff, the people that are here.

What the fuck? Almost there, I think. Good night.

Two for two. Two for two. Yeah. So so t so so he's he's admiring the the it's it's crazy. And um and and everybody's in tune with him and I explained to him. I said, Puff, let me explain to you who you are. I said, These are the people who not only live in LA but I think I've found the right

set of people who appreciate the art as well. Because what you do musically and what you doin' on the artistic side is blowing our minds as well. And I said Therefore, look at the table. I only spent four hundred dollars on the table there's Kentucky fried chicken. I just put it in a nice bowl. Uh there's cola. I just put'em in pitchers. I said, so no more than four hundred dollars, but people are here. I said, because here's the thing. A fitted baseball cap, New York. Fit it. It's fifty eight dollars maybe retail. I said, but Puff on your hat on your head is priceless. We just want to be around this fly shit, right? So we partying, Puff is partying, and then it's the dude standing uh next uh uh like on the wall. No one's talking to he got a little green jump jacket on. Guess who it was? Jay Z.

Nobody knew who he was. I said, Yeah, I know that too. Uh Missy Ellot has one room, Puff has the other room. Then I go to my garage. to grab some other drinks. And I see this tall dude and this little dude and they're like the little guy goes, Yo B It's like this all the time. I say, yeah, what you mean? You know, the girls and karaoke. I said, Yeah, yeah, man, who are you? Oh, we're the Neptunes. My name is Pharrell. I said, Yeah, man, I heard of you. Yeah, man, I like your shit. So that's how long ago this was. Amazing. So here's how I make the music play though. So as Puff is there. I get people to leave me different bits of music or whatever,'cause I'm trying to get into the music thing.

So I turned that into a show in a sense to where I would just have different people I would toast. And try to, you know, get my music on. So one day My boy Breon brings in this kid, he has a backpack on. His jaw's a little busted. His name is Kanye West.

Mm-hmm. And I say Yo, yo, who's who's that? They said, yo, that's a new kid, Kanye. Where's he coming on? I said, really? What he do? Say he rap. I said, Well shit, he gotta perform that shit, because everybody that comes to this to my house, they gotta perform. So I said, yo, man, they say you the shit. And he was really quiet. You know.

I said, man, let me hear you rap. You need your beats or whatever? He said, I don't need no beat. Freestyle. The through every I mean. Chopped everybody's heads. Just amazing. I said, dude, I don't know where you come from. But you are going to be one of the biggest stars.

Ever. And he says, I actually have a song for you. I said, Mwah? Me? Like, what you mean? He said, I got the song. He says, I want to record it. I said, Well you happen to be in luck because I got a studio in the back. So we go on the back. And my studio at that time I call it the Porsche. It was l uh lot smaller than this. It was really like nipping. It was like a uh It was like a layer jet. It was compact. It was compact. The sound was toasty. I had uh engineers from all over the the the city

dial it in so that when real artists come, they don't think that oh this is just comedian fucking around. Some real shit. So we go in and and and and uh Kanye, you know Quiet. But but at the same time. He knew what he wanted. He says okay, the song goes like this. She says she wants some Marvin Gaye, some Luther Van Jose, a little I said, I got it. And I started going, She says she wants some Mar. And he said, What the fuck are you doing? I said Well see, young man, you don't know nothing about R and B.

See, I'm an R and B motherfucker. See, I I got to give him the shit, you know, I gotta put the shit on it. And he goes really politely, he says Hits the the button, he says, Uh, don't do that. I said, but you don't know what you're talking about, but uh that ain't how the song go. You gotta sing it this way. So in my mind I'm thinking You know what, I'm a single shit. The song is whack.

It's not gonna make it. 'Cause I'm thinking Old school R B. But he was teaching me the simplicity of hip hop. Which I didn't know.

Yeah. Cool guy. Great rapper. I don't think it's gonna happen for him. So I'll go off and do a bad movie and when I come back

My boy says, Remember that song you said was whack? I said, Yeah, it's number one. In the country. You, Kanye and Twister, Kanye's first record. And it was actually Twister's record. I said, oh shit. So I'm at a club, he said, You don't believe me? I said, No, I'm we're Miami. He they played it, everybody ran to the dance floor.

I grabbed the mic, said that's me, that's that's that's my song, I'm I'm on that, you know. And so the music that's how I got into the music. Now the reason the story is significant is because the same brains that we use that same hard drive That we use, I brought it to this studio. Oh no. So that hard drive is is magical because we also did just to give you a history on the on the music, Brian found that song Slow Jams, it went number one. And then as we started getting into music

There was a song that Breon brought in. And he will play these Brian would call me, like he said, You want to be in the music business. It's like, you know, two or three in the morning. He call me, says, You want to be in the music business. I said, Yeah. He said, Then wake your ass up. I said, What? He said, I got this song you gotta hear. So I drove all the way from my house in the valley to this to this uh to this to this little studio.

He says, You ready, motherfucker? Are you ready? And Breon always says everything three times. Are you ready, motherfucker? Are you ready? Are you ready? I said, Yeah, yeah, man, play the shit. So he plays it. And the song was Blame It on the Goose, Gotch Feeling Loose, Blame It On the Ah. I stopped it. I said, listen. First of all, please tell me that's my song. He said, Yeah, it's your song, but you gotta record it right now because a lot of people are listening to this song and they don't know if it's a hit or not. He said, But I know it's a hit. We did blaming on the alcohol.

That night I sung it exactly like the record, which goes way in contrast to my R and B roots,'cause it was out of tune and everything like that, but if we wanted to sing it exactly like the demo So we wouldn't lose the essence of it. I don't wanna be like blame it on the alcohol, you know, some corny shit. So we did that. And then we went from every the way we broke that record is that we went from every club. We went to the strip clubs first. Went to the strip club. Strip club. We went on we w we did a East Coast run. So we we're gonna break the record in the East Coast. So we went to the strip. We went to New York.

Oh. My man Pecus took us around. Uh and I will go into the club and use my comedic you know, vernacular to get the song off. I said fellas, you ever been Uh at the club, you meet a girl, you've been drinking, you think she look like Hallie Barry, you get her back home, she looks like Hallie Scary, you know what you gotta do. Blame it on the goose, got feeling loose, blame it on the Stop the record.

Ladies, you ever meet a guy, you get back to the house with him and you've been drinking too much and you say I usually don't do this, but you do it anyway, you gotta blame it on the So we took that and we went all the way down from New York all the way down to Miami. This is like two thousand eight. And then the song took off. And so Long story longer. Blame it on the alcohol was done here, slow jams was done here. So this studio has

But That essence to it that you just You don't throw that away. And just the building itself? Natasha Bettingfield's been here, she's cut, Kelly Rowland's been here, she's cut, the game has been here, he's cut.

Right here on this floor. And I'm sure on the st uh for you guys listening. I'm pointing to the floor, to the carpet. A young man by the name of Ed Shering. Slept on this carpet for like six weeks.

uh trying to get his music career going. Uh he came from over from London. He heard about a a live show that I do in LA. So really wanna uh do your live show if it's possible. Uh you know because I have some music that look like this kid with this red hair. I'm like, Yeah, you do my live show and it's all b it's mostly black, you know what I'm saying? But it's really like music people, like really hardcore music people. The very finicky. You know, people that have played for Stevie W wonder, people will come there to I mean, I had Miranda Lambert one night, I had Stevie Wonder on stage, I had baby face, I said, So this is the real shit you talking about You know, you can come here, I don't care about the London and the accent.

You gotta really come with it. Alright. So I'm taking on my live night. Eight hundred people there. People's plan.

Black folks sweating and just getting it, you know what I'm saying? I mean people singing and you know, they would they would tear American Idol up, you know, so and these people don't necess hasn' haven't necessarily made it. So all of a sudden the Sharon gets up with a ukulele. Walks but out onto the stage. And the brother that was next to me was like, Yo Foxman, who the fuck is this dude right here, man, with the red hair and shit in the fucking Ugulele?

I said, man, his name is Ed Sharon, let's see what he does. Within twelve minutes he got a standing ovation. Wow. From that crowd. And I said, Bro. You're on your way. So This studio has a uh

Like I said, a lot of history. And it has that magic. Yeah. Now you uh You mentioned getting into music.

But it seems like from what I've read of you That Music in some ways came first. Music did Music did my when I was a kid, my grandmother Uh make sure that took

Piano lessons. And you know that's tough for a little boy in Texas. You know. Playing Furry Lease and Chopin and Mozart. We're not talking about Houston or No, we're talking Terrell, Texas.

And I love my city. My city was dope because it was only twelve thousand people. So it was like literally like twelve or fifteen families. So we all knew each other. But you know, for a little boy playing at that time, you know, the kids didn't understand, yo, man, why you doing that? Man, my grandma want me to do this, you know. And so I would sometimes I would be belligerent and be like, Why you want me to do this? She says, the reason I want you to learn Classical piano. is because I want you to be able to go across the tracks and play your music. for people listening across the tracks or on the other side of the tracks for a southern city. was the tracks in a southern city.

Separates the city. One side is black. The other side is white. So in our city, the south side, the south side of town was where all the black folk live. The north side of town.

where the white folks live. So she says, I want you to be able to go on the white side of town and play cat classical music. So she taught me how to play classical piano Um a lady by the name of Lanita Hodge taught me how to play classical piano. And I literally would go on the other side of the tracks and You know. and and start playing for like wine and cheese parties and things like that. But my grandmother too,'cause she was able to see the future.

Uh here's a lady with a eighth grade education. She had her own business for thirty years. She had her own uh nursery school business. She says, When I say across the tracks, I don't just mean And Terrell and Those people over there. I mean the metaphoric. Like across the track like meaning everywhere in the world. So you be but she's because c music connects you to the to to the whole world. So

And doing That's I would connect with people on the other side of tracks who You know, in a southern city, Intel, you know, we were a little we were a little behind the curve when it came to race relations. Let's just say it that way without, you know

I don't want to demonize my my my home town, but there was there was that Who's a little black kid? And my grandmother would be like don't you know. play. Do you think I would play, you know, a lot of that broke up broke o you know, broke up. I remember even Like

being armed with just my music in sort of that racial setting and some t sometimes. Like there was a uh a time when there was a Christmas party. Were these paid gigs? Yeah, I make like me, I get like ten, fifteen dollars. You know what I'm saying? At that time was Lama and I played for the church. So playing for the church, I would make like uh seventy five dollars a week. So if you count that up, that's like three hundred a month, you know.

That's real money at thirteen fourteen. My grandmother would take the money though, said put it yeah, give me this money. So great on what you do doing my money. Shit, you ain't gonna you ain't paying no rent, you ain't gonna give me this money. So but I remember at that time being armed with just my music and uh there was a Christmas party that I was supposed to play for. Myself and my best friend who was seventeen. I was sixteen at the time And so here's a little bit of the the racial misunderstandings, shall we say.

I went to play for the guys Christmas time. Maybe it's like December 17th. And we show up as two little black kids on the white side of town. And uh when he opens his door and he sees these two little black kids on He says, What's going on here? I said, Well I'm I'm here to play uh for your Christmas part show, then why are two of you here at the same time?

I said well I don't have a license. He you know he drove me. Uh is there a problem. Yeah, it's a problem. I can't have two niggers in my house at the same time. And I was like, Oh, well, you know, I've been sort of used to the racial misunderstandings. And I said, Well, is there any way he could wait outside or wait and he can't wait on the street. Starts at six thirty. Now you gotta make your make your mind up, man.

So uh I said I told my boy, I said, Let's just come get me at eight thirty, which was pretty late. You know, for kids at that time, you know. Uh so I go in. He says, Where's your tuxedo? I said, Well, he didn't tell me to have a tuxedo.

So we go into this room which looks like a bedroom and I'm looking like why the fuck does he have clothes hanging up in his bedroom. But it was a walk in closet. I never seen no shit like that. I was like, Oh man, we can make a split level condo out of this shit. So He gives me a Brooks Brothers jacket that had the

Patches on the elbows. I'm like, oh shit, half a little So now I'm really playing. You know, but as I'm playing Uh they were doing uh the grown ups there were doing uh Racially misunderstanding jokes. I'll say it like that. And my grandmother.

At that time she said, uh when you're in a setting like that. Uh there's a word I want you to remember, it's called furniture. I said, What's that? She said, You're part of the furniture. So you don't comment on what's being said. play. That's what you're there for. You let these people enjoy their And the lady of the house felt bad. She said, I just want to apologize to you for

What they're saying. Oh no problem. She said, Can you sing something for us? And I was like, Sure. I can sing some four. And this was the song that I sang.

Just not trusting no An open fire. Uh Jack Frost nipping that y'all know. Mm.

You take care. Speaking song. Bye up. Um Oh

Stress the Bye. Everybody.

Anyway. So as I'm seeing it. I remember watching those White guys. Old man.

Some of them faculty at my school. I don't think it was that they meant harm harm, but it was they'd have to resign today. Yeah. And they look and they go, they they immediately change. So wow, man, that's good. You know any other songs? And I sat and I did about Maybe like a six song set.

And I saw what my grandmother talked about, that music cracked them in half. They saw a different me. And then afterwards, he gave me a hundred bucks. And I'm like shit, call me nigga every day. I got a hundred dollars.

I'm rich. And what was interesting was I went to give him the jacket back. He's like, no, I don't I I can't wear the jacket. So it's still a little bit of residue left over. But I saw what the music did and I remember when my

When my boys show back up, I say, Listen It was cool gig. We got paid. I said, but I gotta get out of here. I said because I'm too smart for this. Yeah. I need to go elsewhere.

And I did. I changed my major well, I changed the college that I was gonna go to. I was gonna go to another college in Texas and study music instead. I came to California, San Diego. To study music. uh international university. And what was interesting about that was is that Being in Texas it was black, whites, and Mexicans.

When I got to international university, it was eighty-one different countries represented at that school, all connected by music and other things. Music of sports. Uh In the music The music. arena at that time was

high end strict child prodigies from Japan, child prodigies from China. I had a Russian uh uh music teacher and it has a Yugoslavian music theory teacher. So it was It was really across the tracks. But uh because of that and because of Estel Tally and Mark Tally, you know.

Picking me up every uh weekend to go play music. Um Man, I w it set me on a like I said, a a crazy wonderful journey. And uh uh So the music was first.

You know, and Um my college was interesting. I didn't know anything about Jewish Palestinian I had no idea. Uh I was at the student center and there was this argument going on, yeah.

So what are you talking about? Oh my brother, my brother, my friend. You're talking about the Gaza Strip. The fuck is that? And they said no, the Jewish The occupation, the this, the that and I I had a I l I got a quick

I got a quick uh history lesson on on that. I got a quick history lesson on people from Argentina. Uh or I would see a person who looked black and I'd be like, Hey what's up, brother? Oh shit where you from, yeah. Oh, I'm from Paris. I was like, What the fuck? They got black beard. So That music gave me not only an opportunity to share, but opportunity to be educated by other people because we study Texas history. And studying Texas history is interesting. Like if You study Texas history. If it didn't happen in Texas It didn't happen. So when you look at like like this is just a sidebar.

But when you think about politics and what people know and don't know in politics and what they know about across the sea or what they know about even on the next block or what they know about what's different in Texas from New York. The reason that politics is so interesting is because the people don't necessarily have educations. Which is why I think that once we start Opening up.

A little more and traveling a little more because what is it, less than how many percent Less than less than five percent of Americans have passports and things. So anyway, that music, like I said, took me What other your your grandmother seems like a very wise woman and uh I've heard you describe her and I might be par I'm sure I'm par paraphrasing this, but that she

She was the bow or had the o and you were the arrow. And she pointed you in different directions. I'm wondering what other Like you are the furniture, right? I mean when to speak, when not to speak. What other lessons did you learn from your grandmother? My grandmother taught me confidence as well. My grandmother was a very confident person and uh very smart. Just

How would you say just Naturally intelligent. She was a a a a Taurus. You're saying natural. It's like it wasn't something that was super educated or anything like that. But you just had a na wh I I'll give you I'll give you I'll give you a uh a hint of my grandmother. I'm ten years old, maybe.

I think I'm in the fifth grade, seventy six, uh President Carter. The preacher started preaching about Homosexuality. I don't know what it is. Ten or eight or whatever.

So he's saying God made Adam and Eve. God didn't make Adam and Steve. So people like, you know, it's southern. It's Texas. Amen. My grandmother and said, You stop that. And the whole church thought. What's that, Miss Taylor? You stopped it. Now her words

What she said next was very interesting. Let me tell you something. I've had this nursery school for thirty years. And I wanna let all y'all know. The God makes sissies too.

And the whole place went what? She said these little boys I've watched Since they could walk. They they play by d they play by different music.

And you stop that because you're making it hard for them. To navigate. Sits down. He goes to another subject. Eventually he leaves the church. But I found that very interesting. At that time I didn't know what that meant.

Until I got to be about a w you know, what was you talking about? She says Yeah, it's true. She says, you know, I I've had this nursery school. I I see the difference in the kids. And so therefore I would have these kids come to me. after they graduated from high school, gone to college or tried to have a family Although they had they were living with this. So she was a type of woman who had natural intelligence. I said, Well, Granny

Well what does it say about religion? Doesn't it say that it's that it's wrong? Yeah, being a You know, care for Texas is Natural question. She says you know when I think about it?

She said you have to open up the umbrella of religion. I said, What do you mean? She said, if you only open up the umbrella halfway, only a few people can stand under it. She said you have to open the umbrella all the way through. So God's children can stand on it. Because no one here did not get made by anybody else or anything else, but God.

So that was my grandmother. You know. It seems very uh the the move in church, but it's a very bold move, very courageous. Very bold very bold but my grandmother raised those people in church. See, I was adopted. you know, at seven months, so she was much older. So all of the kids that were there were the and it was only like I said, it was only a few families that lived in terror.

So all of the kids that grew up Or all of the grown ups that were there, she She was the matriarch. Because during the during the year it was a s it was a uh it was a uh It was a school. You know what I'm saying? But then during the summer

you drop your kids off of my and my grandmother's house and just let them keep'em. So she was very uh powerful in that sense. And then When I did finally make it. It was wonderful to tell my grandmother to come live with me. So my grandmother was living with me. So we go to the clubs. You know, my grandma was like

She had to be eighty three at the time. She we go to clubs, we hang out. You know what I'm saying? This is in L This is in LA. Uh I had a little apartment, split level condo. Remember when that was hype? The split level condo. So I had a loft. Oh yeah, Ricardo, he's only nineteen, he don't know what I'm talking about. But I had a loft. And we were living in that loft and then we eventually rented a house and Me and my grand I and I didn't know I was a mama's boy.

Like we go to the parties, come back, we have an after party at the crib and then one of my homies came and said, Yo, uh Yeah, Fox, uh So older lady out here, uh In the in the front room, I said, Yeah, that's my grandmother. What's that? Oh yeah, yeah, and then you use a a bottle of champagne pop.

What we doing? We getting it or what? You know, so uh she was uh she was amazing, man. So, you know, my grandmother, you know, we party, hang, have a good time. She was eighty three years old. And then the the big thing was as I granted, you know, it's Christmas time. Why don't we do something we ain't never done? You know, you you you saw making a little money. Why don't we go to Hawaii for Christmas?'Cause I got some friends from Hawaii.

Well what yeah, well let's get it going. Gas up the plane, right? So we uh fly to Hawaii one year. And I it was just amazing to be able to show my grandmother Another side of the world. It even made the papers in Terrell, Texas. Estel Talley.

Uh on our way to Hawaii, you know. And I remember And you know, just a fun Just a fun time. I remember um We're having a good time, we're going everywhere. And she had a boyfriend at the same time, who's eighty three too. And he was on the you know, he was on the land side. And so

So it was like December twenty third and we uh we called her boyfriend just so they could talk. So she's on the phone. Yeah, having a good time. Mm oh yeah, yeah, weather's nice. Mm funny. Oh food is good.

I got my own seasonings though. Uh-huh. Well I tell you what. Look, I'm gonna go, but let me tell you something. No let me come back there and uh catch you with no young girls. You understand?'Cause I don't play that. Let me catch up with no young girls. You hear me?

So she hangs up, you know. It's like three or four families there. We're having like a little Christmas party and we all go, Granny, what When you said the young girls, what you talking about, you know sixty, sixty five. I don't wanna mess with them sixty five. She said shit, I'm eighty three. No, so I can't handle sixty five year old woman all in my shit. So she was just a Great person.

Tough girl. Uh I remember there was some situations where I did make it and some people in my family felt like I should give them all the all of my money. This lady walks in and We're in my apartment, she comes and says my rich cousin. I didn't even recognize'cause I you know, I hadn't I only seen it maybe once or twice growing up. So anyway

It gets around to it, she says, I need ten thousand dollars for a kidney. I like it. Who's kidding it? Well, I need kidney surgery or something like that. So if you give me the cash, I could take it and get the

I said, Well why don't you if it's a situation of medical I I know some doctors maybe they can help you. Oh I would prefer the ten thousand dollars. I said, Well yeah, okay, I'll hit you. I didn't call back. I was like So that became a problem for her.

She called me one day and left on the answer machine. Young fella. The last time you seen an answer machine. So I'm checking my answer machine and she leaves a scathing Message. Well, you know what? I didn't get the money from you.

And that's fine, because you're not part of this family anyway. You was adopted. Nobody wanted you anyway. This is what this lady is saying to me. Brutal. I was like, what the hell? So I let my grandmother here. Let me run that back. Played it. Mm-hmm. What's that number? And she called. And I I remember listening. I'm grown. You know, I'm I'm twenty-two.

So I'm grown. And I hear how she stuck up for me. She let me explain something to you, boy. And I could hear I got the boy when he was seven months old. I said and everybody wanted him. I wanted him. Uh everybody.

Yeah. He may not be blood. But he's our fam that it just it was just incredible. Yeah. My grandmother was absolutely amazing. I think you need people like that. And when you talk about that bow, that's what that's my reference to to raising kids. And I got my own kids now. Is that

when you raise your kids, you are the bow and arrow. You're the bow. They're the arrow and you just try to aim them in the best direction that you can and hopefully uh Your aim isn't too off. And uh that's what she did for me and then uh You know, she watched my whole career. Uh all the way up until

getting nominated for an Oscar. Where all of the things that she taught me came into play. When we did uh Uh Ray Charles that was an opportunity.

To play the piano. To be funny. to do an impersonation and all these things is what my grandmother championed. So when we when we embarked upon that film I was like, Oh man. Granny was right.

This is taking me on the other side of the tracks. When we got in Even when I got a chance to meet Ray Charles, which you know That's my grandmother's heir, you know? Uh and she didn't get a chance to meet him because at the time she was, you know, she couldn't move b bedridden a little bit.

But uh Being around older people. You know, I understood that muscle too,'cause I was always the young kid with the old parents. So Meeting Ray Charles was like seeing my grandfather or seeing one of my uncles and When I met Ray and we were trying to do Ray Charles the movie.

And Taylor Hackford, who was a director, and he said, You know, I've I've been wanting to do this movie for twenty five years. I'm glad you came along because it's the right time. And I remember meeting Ray Charles, walking down his studio. You know. Clean, you know. Look like almost like you can see, you know. And I said, Mr Charles, you know, I'm just trying to do the best I can to

Yeah, to do uh To do your m m move your bio. He said, You know what? Uh look, it i if you could play the blues, man, shit, you could do anything, man. I said, What you mean? He said, Can you play the blues? Shit, that's what I'm asking you. I said, I guess so. Then come on. And we go and we sit down. And all of the hard work that my grandmother All of the days my grandfather drove me to Piano lessons here I am sitting

With A legend. And we were like And I was like Playing the blues.

With Ray Charles. And as we're playing I'm like I'm on cloud nine. Then he moved into the some intricate stuff like the Lonious Monk. And I was like, oh shit, I gotta catch up. And I hit a wrong note. And he stopped because his ears are very sensitive. I said what's that? Why you hit the note like that? That's a wrong note, man. Shit. I said well I I I I'm sorry, m Mr. Charles, I just said he said

Uh the notes are right underneath your fingers, baby. You just gotta take the time out to play the right notes. That's life. So that was a list. That the notes are right underneath your fingers. So metaphorically. So now you gotta cross the tracks. that someone like Estelle Talley teaches you, then you got Ray Charles explaining now that you're across the tracks.

What notes are you gonna play? And so now we go on and we we we we do that movie. Which we didn't know what we were doing. We didn't know that it was gonna be like that. It wasn't a studio film. Uh it was independent. And uh

You know during the during the process of the movie was interesting. of my b you know background being from Terror h knowing how to mimic. But I needed to know how to do Rach do Rach Hall's like The young Rachel. So I got in touch with uh Quincy Jones. And for all of you young ones out there.

Uh listening. make sure you Google Chris Quincy Jones and Ray Charles. And the reason why you should do that is because they were the building blocks of our music today, which started in Seattle, Washington, which was interesting. Seattle at that time was a was a big hub for jazz music, jazz musicians, and that's where Ray Charles migrated to running into a young Quincy Jones. Ray Charles actually taught Quincy Jones everything he knows about music. Who is Quincy Jones for the you young ones listening. Quincy Jones was the one who Did I mean he played he was a band director for Frank Sinatra.

All of those guys, the rat pack, all of those guys, he was the band leader. Uh if you and then when I met Quincy Jones He talks about that, yeah, man, shit, man, music, man. These young cats don't know music anymore, man. Shit, they wouldn't they play in the key of Q if they would, man. Shit. Man, when I played baby Frankie, baby, I said, Mr. Jones, who's Frankie? Man, shit. Frank Sinatra, man. Shit, I was young, man, the band we were playing in Monaco, man. We didn't even have time to rehearse, baby. We're just there playing waiting on

Fucking Frank for come in. I said, What do you mean? He says we we had to play this show in Monaco. Frank had never met me. Knew that I was this young kid. who was great with the music. I become the band leader. We don't get a chance to p rehearse. Monaco, where is billionaires and millionaires in the audience waiting on this incredible show. And he says, we're just vamping, man. Shit and Frank doesn't even come out on the stage. He comes through the audience, man. Shit, talking and shit. I'm like, man, I'm nervous as hell.

And then Frank got up. He said he sang. The bail was tight. And Frank Sinatra knighted him, like gave him a ring that was like, you know, pretty significant, if you know what I mean. And if you guys uh Google Frank Sinatra, you'll understand what I mean about the Lucoso Nostra And the uh

So Here I am now talking to Quincy John. And he's telling me about Ray Charles. He says yeah, man, Ray taught me everything, man. Shit, man. He taught me how to dress. We were wearing suit suits, zoot suits and shit, man. He had nice suits, Taylor Maiden. I said, Why did he have nice suits? Shit, man, he was always around women, man, and women would tell him, man, those zoot suits are ugly.'Cause he couldn't see, so the women was telling how to how to dress. And I said, Well, Mr. Jones, I'm trying to figure out how to do Ray Charles

But I need the young Ray Charles, right? And he says, Well man shit, let me look. And he w gives me a cassette tape. To you young ones out there, a cassette tape back in the day was a way for us to I'm just messing with it. To uh to share music.

And I said, Okay, I got it the cassette tape. I had to go rent a truck from rent a from a Hertz rent a car because there was no cassette players in the cars. So I popped the cassette tape in. And uh uh on the tape was Hi, this is Donna Shore from the Donna Shore Show. We have two very wonderful musicians here today, and Mr Kenny Rogers. Mr. Ray Charles. And you hear the young Ray. You know what, Van, I'm just so happy to be here. Uh so happy to uh that you know my music. I mean this is just great. And it was the young Ray, like, you know.

Uh, because when I was talking to the older Ray, I didn't want to grab those bad old habits I want to play in young. So I hear Ray talking young on the tape. And then all of a sudden He's in charge of the gr o of the interview and this is you know, he was just doing his thing and then all of a sudden she says Talk about the drugs, Ray. And then he started to stutter.

Well you know what I So I use that as DNA. To play. the iconic character Ray Charles that when he's talking about his music, he's fully in control. When he's confronted with real life things, why are you doing drugs? Why don't you take care of your family? Why are you cheating on your wife? He would

Student. And I say this long story to say this. After the success of Ray Charles. After being nominated for Uh an Oscar.

Uh my grandmother got a chance to witness all of that. She got a chance to see The bearing of the fruits. Of you know, of of her labor.

Coming from that. Racially misunderstood town, which I love. And wouldn't change anything in the world. When it comes to tarot taxes. Her saying.

Get across the tracks. We've now gone across the tracks. We've gone all over the world and then here we are. And think about think about What's the what's the odds? Of a kid.

Who lives in a town, population twelve thousand two hundred and forty people. From tarot. To go all the way to Los Angeles, California. Meet Puff, meet all these different people, and then actually have an opportunity to win an Oscar and your grandmother gets a chance to see that. Now, October twenty third Two thousand four, she passed away.

Which if you know The actual awards Listen. Uh two thousand five. Uh in February. But she got a chance to hang in there and and you know, and feel it.

You know, so uh it's uh uh It y you know, my grandmother was just like you know The the blueprint. How do you think of Teaching confidence with your own kids because you're you're clearly a very confident guy.

Uh, grandmother was very bold, very strong woman. How do you try to teach that to your kids? Well what you do with your kids is like w w with my daughter is I there's a the phrase that when you see Annalise, I my my my daughter, my oldest daughter, Corinne I would always ask them. What's on the other side of fear?

And it'd be like Huh? I said, What's on the other side of it? Meaning like if I stood in the middle of this floor right there and just yelled What's on the other side of that? Or if I stood on the in the middle of the floor and went, Uh, what's on the other side of? Meaning like Either you do or you don't, but there's no

Pillow leaf? There's No reward. It's just You just be yourself. So I taught them what's on the other side of fear. Nothing. People are nervous for no reason.

Because there's nothing no one's gonna come out and slap you or beat you up and then you're just nervous. So why even have that? And so That's a building block that they can use. not just about the entertainment business, because that's the other thing. You don't have to be an entertainer, but whatever you go into, whether you be a lawyer or school teacher or tech

Guy or whatever, or girl, whatever it is. There's nothing on the other side of it. What's on the other side of your own. I like it. So it's like so why are you why when people say Oh I'm so nervous, what are you nervous about?

sort of r recite to myself and I'm gonna paraphrase it because I have it written down, but it's from Mark Twain. It says I'm an old man who's known a great many troubles, most of which never happened. Yeah. Exactly. Because all of it is in our head. When we talk about Fear or Lack of uh being aggressive or it's just it's it's it's it's in your head. So not everybody's gonna be super aggressive, but the one thing that you can deal with is a a person's fears. So if you start early

If they are a shy person. They just won't be as shy if you keep instilling those things. So The mimicry, the impersonation. Yeah. How early did that start because I read and and maybe you can Tell me if this is off.

Or not because you never know with the internet. Uh that your second grade teacher used to reward the class if they behave by letting you tell jokes? Yeah, they will let they will let me tell jokes'cause I would get in trouble. Miss Reed's my I think it was my third grade teacher, Miss Reeves. 'Cause I would like talk, but I was very smart. My grandmother had a school. I sh I lived in a school. So I I'd already knew the the the the from like first to eighth grade, I already knew all of the lesson plan. So, you know, a kid like me sitting there with nothing to do, I'm gonna get in trouble. So she would uh Let me do stand up comedy on Fridays.

for the kids and all I would do is my grandmother would watch Johnny Carson and the only room that had the television was my room. So I had to watch Johnny Carson too as a kid. So nine years old, seven, eight, nine years old. I would just take the jokes that were being told by Uh David Brenner and Steve Allen.

A young uh David Letterman. Uh uh who else would be on there? Franklin the J. Uh you guys when you when you're hearing this, you go Google these guys. Uh a young J Leno. Uh uh these were like sort of like uh

You know, Richard Pryor. What so I would take those jokes. and tell them to school'cause those kids wouldn't want to please tell me you use Richard Pryor on Friday's. Richard Prior on Primetime you couldn't you couldn't he couldn't really say anything on Prime to he was clean. But like uh uh Uh uh Rich Little. And Google Rich Little, because Rich Little was the first person that I saw do impersonations.

So there was a there was this was this had to be This had to be like seventy six, nineteen seventy six. So it's like fifth grade for me. The joke was uh Jimmy Carter. Which was the president.

At the time. Singing You Light Up My Life. And at that time his brother Or was getting caught drunk all the time. Like b uh Billy.

Uh so it was uh Jimmy Cardigan. Uh Solman and Nets. Oh, me and my brother Billy. Oh what's it by the window? Waiting for somebody to bring some peanuts and beer. And so that was my first attempt at an an impersonation.

And then it went on from there to do a retroduction I am not a crook. So you know Uh who else would I do? Reagan. Uh that came later. But but here's the thing, Reagan came later, but Reagan came like in the eighties when I was actually like twenty one And I was the first black guy Uh

doing the Reagan impersonation, probably the only one. So I would be uh on stage doing my impersonations and go into Ronald Reagan, people are like, No, it ain't no way. Well Well, as a matter of fact, I uh Oh no, there you go again. Yeah.

That being being young and and and that teacher Miss Reeves and Miss Miss Dalf it and all those. Teachers allow Miss Cole allow me to be myself. Oh you know, help me hone in on what I was gonna be doing.

for the rest of my life. Like like literally my friends from Terra go like How the fuck did you do that? This is the shit you used to do. You turned to thirty. It was literally the same shit. I'd be like, wow. M millions of people are watching this shit. It's the same It's the same thing. And then You know

uh came up, you know, the the impersonation, you know, I Now Cosby is back in. To do the Cosby impersonation is back in. Don't know how I'm gonna do it, but There's definitely a Cosby joke somewhere. I don't know where it but I I I used to do Cos because of the people and the jello pudding and the and the filth and the fly and the farm, which Eddie Murphy did, but people didn't know like Cosby's real speaking voice is not like that. What's the speaking voice like? His speaking voice was different, because I remember I got in trouble with Mr. Cosby.

Because uh He felt that the the the the movie Booty Call was Not cool. And he said some things in the press about us and I was like a young comedian, like, damn man I

I'm just trying to work, you know? But but his speaking voice when he was on the phone. Well, see the thing is Is that when you do something like Bulldog. What is a booty call?

See you. Why are you calling the bo you know, whatever but it was so It wasn't the it was because and then you find out that that was your stick. Yeah. Because it Kid and the child and people and

Far buttons. So I I know that that will That will come up. I I I'll find the joke for for Cosby that uh of course it's gonna be a little uh People gonna be like, uh, but it's gonna be funny as shit.

Uh and now who who's now uh Doc Rivers from uh the Clippers. Hey you know. We're gonna try! You know it's it's not Blake's fault.

You know, next year we're gonna we gotta do better. You know, it's so I'm working on like the new impersonations now. Uh and so that's And the way you do an impersonation is usually about it's it's it's musical. Like um say Kermit the Frog, right? So Kermit the Frog is

So it's sort of like the way you do your You know what I mean? Mm. Mm, mm, mm.

So the actual voice tone is in the key of G for Kerr Mra. Uh uh Cody. So that and then once you get the voice tone, it's how you make

Is how you manipulate your your your mouth to get the sound. So it's it's sort of constricting. And then and then and then it's and then it's asking the character to come sit with you. Kermit the Frog here. Here with the uh three little p So, you know, it's but the key is this. And at the same time, Kermit the Frog, who else sounds like that? Sammy Davis Jr. a little bit. Because you know, man. So now Kermit the Frog is

is one way, but if you just twist your voice or twist your mouth to the right And grab some swag now you're Sammy Davis Jr. Because man, you know it's the same voice. You know? So that's That's sort of like the mechanical way of of getting to the impression. So you would start with not the visual, because obviously f those people who are listening can't see this, but The uh mannerisms are also very much on point. Oh

Like I I I do an a LeBron James impersonation, which is really not uh uh uh a uh A voice. It's more of his mannerism. It's the jaw. No, it's the look. Let's go, Row. You know, just go ro you know the game of basketball, you know, we just try to you know you know, it's that. You know. No, it's right it's right after it's right after playing. You know, when it comes off the off the the court, they catch me still tired. You know, uh you know, the game of basketball we just try to you know, do the best you know, so it's the the mannerisms so people will appreciate the mannerisms for the physicality of of someone like uh

Uh uh LeBron or you know Different. You know, like I said, different different personalities bring route bring about different things. When you look back on what uh what Ray said to you If you can play the blues, you can do anything. If you

had to Translate that for your own kids, let's just say. If you can do X, fill in the blank, you can do anything. What would you put in that blank? I I would say this. It's a it's a couple of things when you have kids who grow Up around Hollywood.

If you can stay Motivated. And if you can Not do some things. Not be jaded.

Not be entitled. Not be spoiled. Not do drugs. not get into all the bad stuff because it's the you know, our kids live in a elevated space. So what I try to do and and Ricardo sees this all t Ricardo sees this all the time, so does Justine.

We don't play around when it comes to discipline as well. Like when the kids are here and all of our friends The Size of the house means nothing. to if you don't do the right thing.

you're gonna get in major trouble and you're gonna get in Texas trouble. You know what I'm saying? Like how my grandmother disciplined. So it's a it's a it's a it's a different thing when it comes to kids that are live in a privileged situation. Luckily my daughters are very, very Uh especially my oldest daughter.

My oldest daughter never even asked me for money. Never asked for the new car. Never asked for a plane to ride coach. I mean, you know, so I think she really, really has Uh a great head on our shoulders. I remember I got this Rolls Royce.

And I went to go pick my daughter up in the Rose Royce, thinking that's gonna be you know Pick her up in the Rolls Royce, drop the top. Try it! What up, da. So I'm riding, go to pick her up at school, she won't get in the car.

I said baby, what were you doing? Look at the top, it comes up. She says dad, I'm not getting a car, calls her mind and said, could you come pick me pick me up? So what you doing? I'm not getting you you goofy. You made me you make me look stupid in front of my friends. I was like, Oh Yeah, she's really And that's something she has on the inside. My youngest daughter is a little different.

She wants to ride in the rain in the Rolls Royce all the time. Daddy, let's take this car. We riding down Sunset Boulevard. She playing Rihanna. You know what I'm saying? With her shades on. So she's a little different in in in in that sense. And I remember telling her, I said, Well well well Annalise, we can't ride around in LA in the in the limo with in the in the Rose Royce with the top down. You know, we're on our way to the Soho House and it's sort of finicky up there. So I gotta at least put the top up. She's like

Why? Just I said listen, let me ride until I get to Soho House and then I'll put the top up. As we get there. Okay. So we ride up in the Soho House. We're in the valet and all these, you know, celebs and people are coming out.

And she yells out, Jamie Fox in the house. And I'm like, Hell no. So I'm trying Pull the top down all the other celebrities. Look at this motherfucker being arrogant and shit. He's so gaudy. And he's got the kid. Announcing them. So so you know, it's a lot of things you can tell your kids, man, and then and then you just have to hope for the best and and and be there. What uh

What is your birthday? Eric Marlin Bishop. And how did Eric Marlin Bishop become Jamie Fox. Man

I was Eric Marlin Bishop. Graduated high school, eighty six. I get out to California and I start doing You know I'm I'm in college in in in a um Doing the music.

But I will go up. On these Open mic nights for comedy. So I go I do really well, did I g get like standing ovation. And then I I came to LA got a stand in ovation.

And then when I came back every week I wouldn't get called up. I was like yeah what Why can't What's going on?

But what I noticed. How does the open mic work? What you do is you put your name on a list. Put your name on a list and they pick from the list and they say, Okay, these are people that are going up. So I went up and had a great set then for the next three, four weeks I didn't they never called my name. I said, Yo money, did you see my name? Yeah, yeah, you weren't on the list. You were on the list, but we we we got other people. But I found out that the comedians were actually running the list. So the comedians that had been here for a while was like we we don't want him on here'cause he's showing us up. So I was like fuck.

So I ended up going to this Even in at the improv. The improv like in Santa Monica. And so I had never been there, so

I wouldn't notice that a hundred guys would show up. Five girls would show up. The five girls will always get on the on the show because they needed to break up the monotony. So I said, hmm. I got some.

So I wrote down on the list all of these unisex names. Stacey Green, Tracy Brown, Jamie Fox. And now the guy chooses from the list. He says, uh is uh Jamie Fox, is she here? She'll be first. I was like, No money, that that's that's me.

Uh. Oh okay. All right. Well you you're gonna you're the fresh meat. So what's that? They were shooting evening at the improv, this old sh old comedy show back in the day. Say you'll be the guy that will just throw up to see if you get a laugh or two. You know, it's gonna be a tough crowd. Fresh meat. Fresh meat. I said, Cool.

So I go up in between two of the guys get a standing ovation. People like Who's the kid? Is he on the show? Fresh music. Amateur. So then they started yelling my name, Yo, Jamie. Yo, Jamie.

Hey Jamie, but I'm not used to the age. So now they think I'm arrogant. This motherfucker thinks she's not even listening to us. So I I I took that name. In a stock?

And then I started building everything out off of it. I uh back in the day people used to wear jackets and put names on the jacket. So I had Sly as a dot dot dot. Uh coming to the foxhole, foxhole, you know, things like that. I'm gonna grab a little something to eat. Yeah, sure thing. Okay. We are back after a little food break. And uh

We talked about Some of your comedy starting third grade, maybe earlier. We talked about Uh grandmother. And What I'd like to talk about a little bit more is fear. So you mentioned on the other side of fear.

By the time you got to Doing the open mics. Getting up on stage. Were you nervous? Were you afraid or were you over it?

I went to open mic night and saw the guys, I was like, Man, these dudes are terrible. And uh so when you go on stage And your whole life is not I wanna be a comedian. I went on stage like yo, I'm gonna just

Fuck around. So if I hit, cool. If I miss, I wasn't trying to be anyway. You know, I wanted to do more music, but But when I went on stage it was just like it was it was just natural. It was uh uh I you know, I I belong here. So I think that's the thing too, when it comes to entertainment Uh there's a certain like oh I belong here. This is what I'm supposed to do. How successful I

that's something out of my hands, but I do know that this is where I belong. And that's with anything and anybody. Like when you can When you can sort of listen to that voice in your head, or what's in your heart. and you get a chance to do something that you really feel like you're supposed to do. That alleviates

A lot of the fear. surgeon or lawyer or something you know, something like you know, if something that I'm not you know, versed in or something like that, then maybe there will be more fear. But with this You don't have w I don't have those types of fears. And and uh as I've gotten older in the business I sort of simplify things.

Like No. I just Execute. I have to ask people like

Ricardo, Justin Justin. What should I ask execute? So the fear of a celebrity or or or an artist now is how do I get my art off? In a world where it's

Uh uh the the s the social media driven Sort of uh Um ridicule and critic criticism. Like I always say like this, like a person like Prince or person like Michael Jackson could have never survived in today's world.

Because in the in the day of the internet and where everybody has a voice. Most of the voices are hateful voices. Or not understanding like like if you saw Prince with Uh um

A guitar and a bandana and the way he dressed. You know, people would meme the shit out of it. You know. So Now it's a uh it's it's not a fear, but it's just a

A question that I have to always ask them like Yo, is this is this the cool shit to do or not the cool shit to do? And so what I learned is when it's just executing something when it's either executing a song or executing a joke or executing

Things within the Within uh entertainment. It's cool. But then you have to wonder like How do you get it off? Like how do you Like even now when you talk about the Bill Cosby joke, back in the day we just tell the joke. Now you gotta be like okay, I gotta tell the joke in a way

that it's still funny, it still keeps the bite on it, but you know so those are the Different like For Me as a uh entertainer. Where there's not fear. It's just like, you know.

Questions. Does that make sense? Make sense. No, it does make sense. The considerations. When you when you uh Have you bombed on stage before? Oh yeah. Okay. When you are bombing, what is your internal dialogue or response and then secondly is boy you stay

Yeah. Well you bombing. I bomb and it it wasn't a lot. I only bomb like Twice. Do you remember your first? Yeah, yeah. I I did this this show.

For this guy named Lattimore. Old Blue Singer. I'm twenty one. What was his name? Lattimore. Lattimore. Sounds like Voldemort. Yeah, Lattimore. Lattimore. So

This guy saw me at this other club and said, Hey man, you know Lattermore's performing round the corner, man, what'd you come and open him up? Whatever. I said, How much you pay? He said, pay fifty dollars. I said, I'm there. Fifty bucks, I need it. So this is like N eighty nine, ninety. So

I get there. And I don't know who Lattimore is, I just know it's a lot of older people. Like I mean like oh I'm like oh shit Where the people at these other people. So I'll go up.

And the setting was different. It was like the chairs and stuff were way in the it was like a book banquet setting. And it's in the middle of the hood, you know, Crenshaw. And like the tables are like from here to where like twenty feet away. thirty feet away from me. So I don't have that And I Oh you didn't have that proximity. And I hadn't been doing stand up comedy that long. I've only been doing it for like a year.

So I had If I'm funny, I got an hour. If I'm not funny, it's about ten minutes worth of shit,'cause I would just take a joke and just keep Spinning it, spinning it. So My first joke they didn't get, second joke they didn't get. I said shit, I'm damn now the jokes.

So I said, Well let me do this before I do anything. Let me just talk about people in the audience. So I looked and I saw this guy with this sort of suit on with a butterfly collar. Like, oh shit, I'm gonna talk about him with the butterfly cotta, but before I could say that, I looked around Everybody has a butterfly collar. This is what they really want to look like. And so uh

I just said, Hey man, I you know, I don't know what else y'all want. And uh Pretty soon Lattimore's gonna come up. You guys ready for Lattermore and I just so do not say I'm gonna take a break. So I get off stage.

And a dude that was Washing the dishes. Takes his apron off and goes, Man, I got it. As a mic. How feel?

And he started doing these old stock jokes. Kills. And so I said, Okay. Now I know what it is. You gotta have jokes that are appropriate for your audience. So I learned on how to tell jokes for everybody because at first my jokes was geared towards women, it was singing and so what I started doing from that from that day on, I would go to like Des Moines Iowa. Davenport, Iowa.

Boys of Idaho. Where it's all white, Gunners in Colorado. All right. And I would go do like forty minutes of all black material. To see what they

understood what they didn't understand. So if I go to these all white places, if they understood fifteen minutes I log that fifteen minutes. I can go to any place where it's just all white. Uh and so I would tell the joke. If fifteen minutes they understood it, I can go to any place in the world.

Oh Florida. Oh political highbrow. Stuff and see what the see w see what the black folks understood. Man, what the fuck you talking about, dog? Now they understood fifteen minutes. Now I got fifteen

to thirty minutes to forty five minutes that wherever I go. No matter what age. They'll understand no matter what gender, no matter what race, they'll understand this forty five minutes. So I had to learn how to Use the formule. In order for you to be

Funny. And then once you got your comedy license, once you've been seen by enough people. In the highest way. Like in the like if you look at uh Like if you look at the arc of a Kevin Hart. Like Kevin Hart.

Takes that art. Takes the same formula. I'm not for sure how he put it in his in his in his mind, but he's doing the same thing to where he's going to all of these places. All over the world. Implementing his comedy. And if they get it.

He's he's gathering all that so that now When people see Kevin Hart no matter where in the world They're gonna laugh. You know, so it's the th th the you know, the p becoming a great comedian is also having a formula going on in your head because if you

If you paint yourself into a corner like you're only the black comedian or you're only the Hispanic comedian whatever that is, then It's hard for you to become universal. I mean, Eddie was Eddie Murphy was great. He had an opportunity through Saturday Night Live to get it to everybody. But uh uh it's definitely a a formula to not bomb it.

So What would you say to yourself so that's the first bomb. You mentioned two. Yeah. Was the second? Second one. And if it if it's too if it's hard to recall the the The follow up question is gonna be

What is the post game analysis when you step off the stage after bombing So the second time. But I don't like to work out jokes. And tell people I'm working out.

I like to actually do a show. Come and do the show. Right. No. I think I think that's cheating and I think you you get bad habits.

So I I do a show in Irvine, California. First show I killed. It was just ready for him. I'm like, oh man, everything works. Second show. Because I didn't take time to dig out the jokes and that so but when you bomb you go like okay, all right, let's go, let's check it out. So I got a team of my my guys, I said, Let's go. Okay, that didn't work. No, you gotta put this in front of that.

You gotta put that behind this'cause that's gonna kick this off. People didn't know what that was, so maybe we don't say that. So you know, you have to You when you take the bomb when you take the L It's not like you're not funny. What's the L? Like you take the loss. Oh, okay. When you take the loss, it's not like you're not funny. It's just like, okay, you just didn't put the shit together. So that's the other thing too. When you do become funny,

It's gonna be harder now. To make people laugh. Because you set the bar. So watch this. The hardest part

For Chris Rock. Was after He had done something great. And stand up. Because now

You gotta top that. The hardest part for Eddie Murphy 'Cause he wants to come out and do stand up is how do I top That In your head.

The hardest part is coming. for Kevin Hart in the fact that You sm you smashed'em. Now You gotta you gotta

You know what I'm saying? You gotta know how to you you gotta know how to refresh. Because When you do something like like I I would look at my stuff and go like I gotta quit doing that. Because that shtick that I'm doing, people are catching on. And they're like, Okay, motherfucker, we've not already seen that shit. So that that's the other thing. You gotta have great material

And you gotta have you gotta know You gotta know how to move.'Cause like right now is the perfect time for Eddie Murphy to come out and do stand up. Because it's been so long. It's nostalgic. It was thirty years ago. So now you can catch a new young Uh, you can still excite the older, you know saying so being a stand up comedian is tough. And you've seen a lot of Funny guys not be funny anymore. Why? Because you can't top what you did.

You look at the Jim Carrey, you go like okay, man, where you at? Where you at? You know what I'm saying? You know, d don't give up the funny. Uh Oh, you look at Chris, I always look at Chris Tuck and be like, motherfucker, where you at? Don't don't leave don't leave us. Because Being a stand-up comedian is an interesting thing. Most stand-up comedians want to look good. In what way?

We just wanna look good. Think about this, when Eddie Murphy started doing stand up He was funny. But then he started doing, you know, wear the leather suits and it was the fly shit and the rings and they want to look good. Joe Piscopo. Started working out.

But the muscles. You know what I'm saying? So As a stand up comedian, we gotta be careful. Not to look too good. Because people start going, What the fuck are you doing?

You ain't cute, nigga. We just wanna laugh. You know what I'm saying? But when we started, you know We start getting into our shit, that's when we look'cause I did that. Like Like I got to uh my thing was uh After and living color. The show called the Live Color that it did.

I I felt like I had made it. So I wasn't necessarily on the good looking ship, but I was on the I've made it jokes. I went on stage and was doing rich jokes. Just got that range, Rover.

Anybody else? It's crazy out here. You know, they're so finicky, right? Motherfuckers look at me like what the fuck is you talking about? And then uh uh I was talking about you know the square footage of the house, man, when they get a certain square feet, man, that shit is crazy and maintaining, you know? Motherfuckers is like Motherfucker if you don't get off the goddamn stage I'd lost it. Right I lost it. And I walked off stage and all of a sudden The I I walk up stage. They'll give it up for Jamie Fox and I'm thinking they're going crazy. Yeah, yeah. Oh thank you. Thank you so much. And I'm standing outside the club and I hear the crowd going crazy. I'm like, What the fuck they doing? I just went on stage. What the fuck are they laughing at?

And I opened the door and there was a kid. Skinny. Little tank top on, barely fit. His name was Chris Tucker. He was m smashing. He was

No one has been that funny within fifteen minutes. I've never seen I've never seen and I watch'em all. I've never seen a stand up. where people were laughing so hard, like I said, he's gonna kill somebody. Like when he says last night, how was you? Oh, I killed. It's gonna be true. Somebody gonna have a fucking heart attack. And I sat down and said and I went, I can't do that.

I lost that. So I left, went to another club at night, bomb. Like it wasn't just you know So finally I went over to Okinawa where the troops were. I started doing stand up over there for the troops to sort of get back. It was my rocky moment, like you know, I started running up the steps chasing chickens and shit. Trying to get back. And uh uh for a stand up comedian, that's the one thing you can never let go. You can never stop being

Excuse me. A certain goofiness to you. And so and like when you talk about fear or when you talk about bombing It's uh uh It's a different when you when you when you've done it for a long time. You know, and when you do bomb

You just gotta get right back up in it. And you gotta acknowledge it. Okay, I stunk, nigga. Like today's world, it ain't you can't do nothing in today's world without somebody letting you know Oh nigga, you fucked that up. Yeah. What are the sources or where do most of your best bits come from? When you look back at the stuff that just Killed. Is it It must be shower, the the thing that bugs you three times. So you write it down. I mean w how do you develop your materials? Observation. And like you know, I do jokes with them, you know, it's just sort of like observation.

Uh You know, early on it was the black and white thing, you know, black folks do it this way, white folks do it, which was the way we were doing comedy in in in the eight late eighties and nineties. Oh, the average white man's heart. It has it no, it has to do with the heart. The average white man's heart beats like this. Well, the average black man's heart beats like this. Ha

You know, lady, that's why you have a choice. Would you rather make love to somebody like this? Would you rather make love to someone like this?

I mean that was the jokes, you know, at the time. So it was observational. And then it was personal. Like you do your observation first and then it was personal. My grandmother Who was uh um You know, we live together, you know. And when she first heard like Uh on television, what age was.

being old, she didn't know what it ac exactly meant. She just knew that it was bad, but she thought that since she's always on me anyway, that I'm gonna catch AIDS. But it was for the wrong reason. Like she would say, Boy, you gonna It's six in the morning. You gonna wake up, shit, half the day done gone.

I said granted. What you mean it's a six. Shit, I'm not sleeping. Anybody sleep that long got to have AIDS. It's a great I don't think that's how No, I saw it on T V. You sleeping too long, you got A. I said, Man, I don't think that's how they exactly And then like I would use her towels like you know you know you know old southern women had them there was a towel used and it was a nice tile. So I used the nice tile. Yeah.

Well, I know you ain't used my tiles. You're gonna put the A's on the tiles. You can't use everybody's tiles. Anybody use a towel like that? Got to have A's. I said, Granny, I don't You know, so it was opposite and then this is what she was actually saying. So when I did that joke on stage people was just, you know Would die. So it's observational, then it's personal. And then some of the comedians are great politically. I'm not necessarily a political guy. My thing was the impersonation of the politician, like Bill Clinton.

Uh You know uh I did not have sex with that woman. Things like that. But uh oh It's so many different ways and so many different guys out there that you that that you look at and go, Ooh Like when I would look at a young Chris Robb.

The way he was a technician, just me. Or you look at Jay Leno, or you look at Uh even Arsenio Hall when he would work out, or you see Eddie working out a joke. Uh you know, it's they are or or watching George Lopez, who knows how to And just really bring you into his world and stuff. So it's some

It's some uh Some guys at Sarah Silverman. Uh Just I mean a technician. Amy Schumer.

Watching her on a just a Saturday night live when she's, you know, working her shit out. Uh a young Whoopi Goldberg at the Met. There's so many people that you can watch and see how To How to

You know Tap into your own skill set. You know, but uh I try to look at all of them and try to just, you know, not steal from it, but just get inspired by it all. Who are some of the most underrated. comedians who come to mind or people who you think d haven't had their do, haven't been appreciated. But I I I think they were just they were just like warriors that never got that shine. Oh, there was a guy named Kirkland.

Who was a warrior. But he never got to shine it. T K had a colorful past, you know. And and he'll let you know, he said, you know, he was a he was a crazy motherfucker, but TK had jokes like And Juan Dunn's Curtman the Frog always say Hi ho, hi ho. Is he a pimp? And what And why do fat people wear leather pants do they think that shit is cute? And why do people in wheelchairs tie their motherfucking shoes? Do they think they gonna trip? Oh man, it was just

He was just amazing. And and his delivery, you know what I'm saying? He say uh Uh he says. 'Cause I'm T to the motherfucking K. That's the type of motherfucker I am.

Don't play me, play Lotto. You got a better chance. And he's he he played he He made he made he made himself a character on stage. Yeah. That was just You know, you guys are too young f to to to know this joke, but Bugle Boy Jeans

Uh Bugle Boy Juniors used to have a commercial where a girl would Pull up in the car and says. Excuse me. Oh those bugle boys she would say this to a guy, like he's walking on the street with his jeans, he says

Excuse me, are those Beagle Boy jeans you're wearing? Why yes they are. And she get in the car, man. TK had a joke, man, that was so funny. He said, Man, let man let that motherfucker be a motherfucking black girl in the motherfucking car. Excuse me. Oh those Vigo Boy Yeah. Get in a car, motherfu I mean people would just go The dude has so many like levels. And uh

He just, you know, y y he's he's a underground guy. Uh Who else? There was a lot I mean a lot of people. Earthquake. Amazing.

Uh uh Earthquake is amazing. Uh what's my other dude's name? Uh Tony Roberts. Amazing. Tony Robers, man, I've never laughed. So He says uh he said uh

Oh man, I I had to dig out some of these jokes. But he talks about uh It's very physical, but he talks about being on a plane and the plane is going down. And he says he said he was doing a plane and he thought the plane was going down. So he says, So I wanted to fuck everybody before you know, I wanted to fuck before he says, So while the plane's going down, he's fucking everybody, you know, he fucked the he fucked the uh he fucked the nun, he was fucking everybody and then the plane leveled off. Oh I'm sorry, y'all. My bad. Just hilarious, man.

And there's a there is there's so many, man. So many. Not a lot of new comedians now that are actually Uh, it's funny, right? That are actually dangerous now. We don't have dangerous comedians. We don't know. The dangerous comedian that we have right now is Amy Schumer. She's dangerous. In what way? Like like she'll she'll say it. Like It'll be hot button, you know what I mean? Have you uh have you ever heard uh I saw this guy on a I actually heard of him through uh a guy named Evan Goldberg, who's Seth Rogan's writing partner. And uh and so Gerard Exactly, that was good. So Gerard Carmichael

Oh yeah, yeah. His special. Oh my God. It's like I would never make a rape joke. This is more of a rape question. Well he's dang and it's not a lot of that anymore. It's not a lot of dangerous comedians. And I think that's where we sort of go like You know, where's that danger? Like you when you when you when you see Amy Schumer, you see like I saw her in a room Talking about catching a dick. In front of the Robert De Niro. Like we're at the American

Uh Film awards would have like that. And she's just I mean Hardcore dance, which is what Cyrus Silverman started out as, you know. So but Amy looks like she's rounded the corner and is now, you know Really making it.

You know. Making a dope for herself. W if you look back at uh in Living Color and I I watched the show and it just if in retrospect it seems like Such uh Such a magical combination of people.

So how did that group Get assembled. And Uh I mean what made that

Team. So special because I mean you look at the list, right? I mean you've got Chris Rock, you've got Jim Carrey, you've got the Wayne, you've got it just goes uh Jennifer Lopez, you've got like you go down the line. It's just it's an all star roster. Well at that time Keenan Ivy Wayne's he he put it all together. And he was able to grab all of these incredibly talented people. Mm. And make them get along.

And figure out how to squeeze all of this talent. into twenty two minutes of programming. Sure.'Cause it was only it was a thirty minute show, so it's twenty two minutes. But he was very

disciplined in how we make jokes. You were not allowed. To come in and be half assed. He pull you to the side and say As a black comedian.

You cannot be half assed. You're either great Or you don't exist. So And he says, Don't take the racial part of that. Any kinda way, that's just the way it is. He wrote for Eddie Murphy.

He was around the greatest. He says, I'm around the greatest all the time, so that's what we gonna do. So when you see Damon Wayne come in. And I just got hired, like they had already been doing the show for like a year or two years. So when I saw Damon walk in and Jim walk in, it was like It was like fucking Jurassic Park.

It was like fucking T Rex and fucking You know what I'm saying? And the way I got on the show was was crazy too because it went From the auditioning process, it was a hundred comedians. Down to fifty. Down to twenty five.

Down to ten. Down to five. I was part of the five, but I was losing. I wasn't doing well within the uh improv of it. Because I just wasn't catching Catching the right shit.

And then Keenan says something incredible. He says, Well, I dig this, but I want to see y'all on stage doing stand up because I wanna have stand up comedians. I was like, Oh shit, that's my shit, that's my shit. And the other four people Didn't do stand up. It was only one other girl that did stand up. God bless her, Evette Wilson. But the other three didn't do stand up. So I was like, Oh man. So that night. Everybody's going to the laugh actor, which was just starting.'Cause at the at that time the comedy store was dominating. Laugh actor was just and and they begged can we please have the audition in the Laugh Act. So I show up late on purpose.

Because I wanted to be last. So I show up late and tomorrow while Oh, who was the producer on that What are you doing? You're late. Oh my God. Why aren't you here? We're supposed to go on up early. You're supposed to be first, Jamie. Oh my God, you're gonna kill me. I said, Oh damn, well we're gonna can I can I just go up last yes, you have to. What. So go there. Now this was interesting for me because I was in White World. I was like on the mainstream. I did all my jokes in the hood at that time. You know what I'm saying? I was the hood guy. So

I was like, oh shit, you know. Uptown, you know what I'm saying? It's like everything's clean and shit, you know, ain't no weed in the air or nothing, you know what I'm saying? Ain't nobody s snuck no drinks in and shit. And it's an audition thing. So I'm watching the the guys and you know, God bless them, they they just had never done stand up before. So I had my cassette tape and I knew what I was coming up to. I'm coming up to heavy decent effect with more bounce to the ounce. So I give the dude my tape. He's like, What's this? That's my tape. Uh you know going with music. You know, up there they didn't go on with music. They just went over hand clap. I said no man, I gotta I gotta come in with heavy decent effect. With more bounce to the bumps I need the crowd going.

Okay, sure. So he's standing there with the tape. And then Sean Wayans gave me a great tip. He he walked up, he said, Yo, Jamie, just go up and do your act, man. Just stop worrying about don't don't worry about the characters. Just do your act. Yo, Marlin, Marlin, come here, tell Jamie, just do your act. I was like, Oh, really? Just do my act? Do my act like I do in the hood? Yeah, do your act like you're doing in the hood. I said straight. Cool. So I go up. They don't play the music. I'm waiting on them. Oh, you got my music to do is over there like that.

I said, Well I'm supposed to have some music. And I said, If s if this shit goes wrong, you will actually see me working across the street at the gas station and I went into a character. Man, I was in there with Keenan and all them dog. And it just it so I did this little character and then I went into my act. And uh I gotta stay on that.

And I remember seeing Jim Carrey. K Fly girls like on their feet. I said, Oh man, this is great. And that's how I got on the show. And during that show, I did this character called Wanda where I said all the good looking ladies clap your hands.

I said now all the ugly ladies, let me see you can make some noise. It's quiet. I say ain't that a bitch and all the ugly days I thought Hey, for real though, he ain't talking about me. So we did this character. Keenan was like, I want you to do that character on the show'cause I think that's where you

You'll uh you'll really b uh flourish. And when we did that sh when I did that character, that's when everything sort of changed because I was trying to find my bearings on the show because we got on the show. But we were there for a trial basis. But when I did that character, it was like it was like it was like playing football and I was like the punt returner and I was the rookie and I ran it all the way back the first day. Uh so nobody really knew who I was, but they knew that this character was was was was slamming. And so that sort of gave me like my stripes because

Uh these guys were jugging us. I watched I watched Keenan. I said Keenan, these jokes ain't funny that the writes that the the writers wrote. He says get on your feet. Everybody get up. Let's do this. So he was like, There's never a joke that's not funny. You just gotta work and find it. So he taught us the formula of finding the jokes, and he was right every single time.

And so uh Like I said, to be there watching Jim Carrey. Like Create pet detective on set. He's writing pet detective as it were. So what's that you're writing on? Hey man, just uh you know

Working on some stuff. You know, just got some stuff I'm working on. So what is that? Pet detective. I said, Sound funny. And was he developing it for the show at that time or for development for for much later? Well shit. I gotta make one phone call. No problem.

Alright, so we're we're back. We took a little took a little breather. But uh Catch us up. What were we just talking about? We're talking about how nowadays is that you don't get a chance to control your own narrative. Like we were talking about is there's two different people. Some people think that the tech world and the and social media and things on the internet has taken us to a great place. And then there's people who think that it's a horrible place. I had I spoke with a um

A young lady who had been burned bad. Bad by the press. Bad to where she lost her job. And what was interesting about her job was that what they were scolding her about was Like me knowing her, I was like

You're not like that at all. She says I can't. Nanak do Everybody thinks so. And they took Something like they went through emails and

Through our personal emails and all of something else. But it was just like You're not like that at all. So when I was on the phone talking about it, she was like, They're saying this and ah don't worry about it. You're you're cool. You're not like that. I don't give a fuck. But I hadn't I'm bowling. I'm like, I don't I don't even I don't even need to read it. What could they possibly say? And when I look, it was a national story. I went What the fuck?

She lost her job. Yeah. And so like even Like y you'll do something where you think that it's Either you're making fun or you're having fun. Yeah. But they'll take whatever it is that you say. And make it what they want it to say. Yeah.

Or craft it where like if you do a joke, it's not about being a joke anymore. Jamie Fox slams Caitlin Jenner Jamie Fox trounces like No, I'm a comedian. We Do do but everything is something that they control.

Uh and it It's tough because When I say Justin Bieber, what do you think? What's the first thing that comes to mind? Be honest.

Yeah. But what do you think? But what do you think? Something about a kid who's can't get it together. When I say Chris Brown, what do you think? It's something negative. When I say Jennifer Anderson, what do you think? What do you think of cover of Rolling Stone photograph black and white? You think what? Cover of Rolling Stone magazine, black and white naked, laying on a bed. That's hilarious. What the average person would think of not what they do. Right. But the impression at the subliminal image that got at the checkout counter. Yeah. If I say if I say Jennifer Anderson, you automatically because Nowadays they control we don't control our own narrative to where it's like

with uh Quentin Tarantino. Which I thought was sad. Because Usually When you see a a a a a story about black lives matter or anything black, it's usually the the same black folks with the koofy who's trying to be heard. And they're absolutely right.

They absolutely It's so much wrong going in black world. There's black on black crime, then there's the the the divide that is because of social media. uh that is going on between the police officers and black folk. Police officers are

On the whole A great folk. I know'em. I got I should I know a gang of police officers. But the one or two that have been caught on social media makes it look Paint the picture. That it's all of Now granted, we've known for a long time.

That Blacks and police officers have always had a divide. We've done mus we've done movies about it. We've done books about it. It just is the way it is. Now my take on it

Is because I call it Residue. It's slave residue. Meaning that slavery for three hundred years, you saw a person of of color a certain way for three hundred years. You've always saw him as a slave or the criminal or what something that you didn't value. So therefore coming out of that

Of course, there's gonna be a divide when it comes to police. And when it comes to blacks and when it comes to that's always been that way. So Take that off the table. But in today's world of how do we Bridge that gap.

I've gone to Quantico in Virginia, saw what it what a police officer sees, I've talked to police officers that how can we bridge the gap? I've suggested that you go get a white police officer who you think might not like black folk. You know what I'm saying? Get that person to go into the hood and throw a picnic. for a kid that's eight, nine, ten y years old who's African American, so that he can see another Another side. Another side. of the police officers because right now social media.

Or immediate period. the stories that are the most salacious where it's the the the black person the the black cop being k the bla being killed by a cop. It's hard to erase those images. I'm a black man. When I see that, I have to react to that. Because I'm like wow. You know, I d that that troubles me, but then I have to sit down and think.

Okay. Let me not think of the worst thing to say. But let me think because I know how media s tries to Make things Or heighten it.

Right. How do I bring The headline. What people don't understand is that when you keep showing the images Of the black guy being killed by the

But a cop That does something to you. Oh yeah. That's like whatever you believe in, if if if it was a Jewish person, if it was a gay person, you cannot sit and not be bothered by that. At the same time, that cop when he sees The other side of it.

When they're saying All of you guys ain't shit. Which that's not what's really being said. Most of the time it's with the individual cop.

Now the cop sees the sword. In his mind now, well fuck it well, it's a problem now. So now imagine that cop who's watching the story. Driving on the street. That young black kid. Who's watching a story, walking on the street.

What happens? Dynamite. Because we can't get it we can't we can't get anybody responsible. On the media side. To say

Let's stop. interviewing people and putting labels on them. Let's interview this man and this woman, but don't say that they're Democrat. Don't say that they're Republican, don't say that they're a cop. Just have'em talk.

Because when you see it When you're watching TV and you see something that you agree with, you agree with them only, and you can't hear the other person. That's the first thing. Two Like when I look at Quentin Tarantino. To demonize this guy. Can and just because people might be listening to this for years, could you catch people up on the confusion.

Who Is a Purist. When it comes to

Even if Even if You could go I could go to Quentin Tarantino and say something, man, I think you know, as a black person and so and so and so and so. He say, Well c stop doing that. Stop hanging it just on black. Hanging on things that are substance.

First, And then let it be h I mean so I've I've heard this guy speak When there's no cameras, I said, Wow, you know what? You make a lot of sense. So Quentin Tarantino Uh Sees the Black Lives Matter campaign.

sees the individual stories. Fourty different people of individual stories where a police officer Head. Killed the person who was unarmed. It touched it. The reason I thought that was in impactful because you seldom see

The White superstar. Go and stand. With the black folk. who just trying to be heard.

Even high end black guys. Don't go stand with the black folks that's trying to be heard. when it comes to like especially Hollywood,'cause you know, the people in Hollywood are so scared oh they won't see my movie or they won't go see my song if I stand if I stand up for anything of substance. They're so fucking scared. So when I saw this dude do that, I was like, wow, that's great. But then

the misinterpretation of his words where he says, I'm standing here with the murdered Quentin Tarantino speaks that way. He speaks. If you've read any of his bo uh movie or saw any of his movies, he speaks in those terms. He says, I stand with the murder. When I see someone being murdered, I call it what it is. It's a murder. Though that's a murderer that killed this

This person. However the story got spun was that Quentin Tarantino is a cop hater. He hates all cops, and all cops are murderers. And I was just like, oh, here we go again, man.

Here's a person who's willing And I'm gonna speak like willing to put aside his white cushy Hollywoodness. He could live on in his m on his mountain. And never give a shit about anything. He came and I said, Man, I felt something.

And now They paint it so bad. And now you got the you got the New York cop. So we got so for his ass. Now it's a beef. Now it's That's not what we we trying to do, but you can't Do anything right now.

Because The media story if it's Not salacious. We don't want to report it. We we have it. No, I do. And it's it's it I mean they've if it bleeds it leads, right? So they put the salacious the the visually viscerally impactful stuff up front because it gets the clicks or the purchases that exceed the advertising.

The only, I suppose, flip side to that And I have a very specific question for you that uh uh from a fan I'd love to ask related to um some some of these race questions. But The good news is If you can look at it in these terms, is that The necessity for new is so high.

That if you starve a story of oxygen. It'll often die on its own. Yeah. Because they can't regurgitate the same thing if there's no response. Exactly. And so you you can let it kinda die on the vine. Uh but Um we were talking about this before, but I mean I've had instances and I won't bitch him on too long because I think the question is more interesting than my bitching, but I've had instances where these these formerly I would say

Outlets of record, you know, very prestigious outlets. Uh magazines, I'm not gonna mention them by name because it's but I was interviewed and profiled by a magazine at one point, very, very highbrow magazine. Uh there were six or seven misquotes or uh erroneous facts in the piece. And I corrected those with the fact checker, went to press with no corrections. What do you do in that situation when those things then end up in Wikipedia. So you have to develop a sort of um strategy and I mean this will get even more interesting. Once we have you know smart stadiums, once we have uh facial recognition like you see on Facebook, once that's implemented across the board, it'll get very interesting. But I'm gonna go down that rabbit hole and instead

I'm going to uh bring up a question that I'd love to get. Yes. Back in the day. If there was a misquote. And you went to that entity and said, Hey, you you quoted me wrong. Oh.

We'll release a statement. Saying that we misquoted you. And it erases. The problem with today's world Once it's out there, you can't get it back. Yeah. You cannot change. Yeah.

Because it's gonna stay there. When you when I punch up your name. That's the first thing that's gonna come up. Or the second thing that's coming up. You can't get rid of it. Yeah. And when you talk about the regurgitating or the uh uh or the uh uh or or Just letting it die. You could let it die, but the problem is You have to at least

Once it starts give another hopefully that you can give another side of it that people may see a little bit. Sure. They don't wanna see it what's crazy about our society right now, no one wants to see anybody reconcile. No one wants to see anybody C come together or say that Like when I when I think about Quentin Tarantino, I spoke and said

I back you as a friend and skeep keep speaking the truth and don't worry about the haters. Meaning Speak the truth from you. Not whatever the comment was. But whatever you're saying in your truth, you say that because you ain't out there You could be promoting your movie.

Mm-hmm. You could be trying to make money. You actually trying to see how you could get how you could go. I know the way he thinks. I'm gonna go talk to them. If they are wrong in what they're saying, I'm gonna tell them. But if they all right, he says I I'll be the one that can go to the cops and say that and now Look look at how it is. It it's so quite go ahead.

I think you're right. People want gladiatorial games. And we don't have gladiatorial games, so they use the front page of gladiatorial games. But But speaking of sort of conflict resolution, so this is this is a question from uh fan TJ, my wife is pregnant and we're moving to a very non diverse neighborhood. We are kind of worried on how it will go. She is black and I am white. What is some advice he can give to a young couple raising a child of color in today's world? I'll say this. I'll say the I I'll I'll say this about America. Let's use America as an example.

To me America is the most incredible civilization. that has ever been created. Hundreds of years from now, people will look on this look at this place. And marvel.

There's the bitch and the complain. I'll Where everybody bitches complains about every single thing. But the one thing about America that is incredible is The evolution of freedom.

The change. When I talk about slavery that happened, it was three hundred years of it, look at the evolution. We come out of it. We have a black president. People.

Or more welcoming now. Oh We used to live in a world not too long ago where It was frowned upon, it was tough, it was this.

What I would say to people like that, just live your life. Like I live my life in places where at p at times it was definitely racial misunderstanding. But I would talk to that person. I would make sure that person understood who I was as a person. I'm not gonna compromise who I am as far as a black man.

But I'm also gonna give you another Another version of it. Not the version that you necessarily see on television, the version that you see on the internet. I'm gonna give you me. And most of the time We are alike in so many different in so many uh instances. So when he's saying moving to that non diverse place It's different, man. Look at the look at the i I hate to say this, but listen to the kids, bro. But when you talk about the kids, the kids today

I I I'm I'm at the gym last night, twenty four hour fitness. Kid is playing future. Why it? Why your ass is that when I white kid. When I first moved into my neighborhood years ago

And I felt like I made him I'm in the white neighborhood now. I'm here. Oh I'm so I've made it. And I hear NWA blasting. Look out there with these kids, it was sixteen years old. So times are changing, man.

And You have to start giving people the benefit of the doubt that they'll get it right. And for all those people that were here back in the old days and that are now fifty and sixty and seventy years old, that's dying out. The way of thinking is dying out. You may be looking at a uh situation where you may have the first female president. It's the evolution of uh of it's the evolution of freedom. Think about how we treated women at one point. No voice, no rights, no nothing. I've heard people say, I'd rather have a black person tell me something to do than a woman anything. But now it's

So we are On the right path, man. Love who you wanna love, be where you wanna be, because we are evolving. Man, that that was that's huge when you when you talking about people in the Bible belt and the you know how they felt. So if If those things are now Like my my daughter taught me like when she was thirteen. She's twenty one now. She was thirteen and it was this was this was nine years ago and it was talking about gay rights and things like that and

And And I asked her friends, I said, What do you think about it? She don't think about it. I said that's that's you guys. That's a good answer. She said, That's you guys. She said that's old people. She said, That's why we're turned off from religion sometimes. That's why we're turned off from all of these different things, cause old people argue about where you from, what you do, what you look like. We don't give a shit.

And so Thank God for the youth. Thank God for that couple because what they're doing is they're showing the new world. And she said, Dad, if someone was doing something somewhere that was straight, gay, black, white, or brown somewhere else, does it affect you at all? Does your air change? Does anything around you change because the people are living the way they want to live, as long as they're not breaking the laws like you know what, you make great points. She went on to my radio show and talked about it. So

Oh We are in a new day. We gotta stop. I said like I was telling Justine, I said, we gotta make sure it's to say, let's put let's put media out of business. We gotta quit allowing them to control the narrative. Those people like with with with Quentin Tarantino or the Black Lives Matter or or people that speak up on something that is broken or that is wrong.

You don't give them a chance. by painting them in a in a bad situation. Are you gonna do another comedy tour? Yes, I'm gonna do another comedy tour, but my I'm gonna start it organically like uh Maybe a hundred people, two hundred people. Start it organically and just sort of grow it.

Uh, I got some great jokes. And that's the thing, like when when you're uh when you're when you're a comedian it's like you have to pray that the jokes will open up. So I got some great like jokes that people will get and understand. And then just the stuff that's been going on with me, you know. uh you know, getting older, you know uh not realizing you the OG, you know what I'm saying, like you know the young

Like the young hip hop guy. What's up, O G Yeah, that's right. You know? I mean just just Just It's just some funny stuff. It's it's some funny stuff that's uh and and that's what any comedian would tell you that it's hard to be funny when there's nothing funny happening. But there's been so much funny shit happening. Uh, for like my mom who, you know, adopted and who d who gave me up for adoption in seven months and she comes back to live with me and as she's living with me, she walks down the first day she's here, she walks down uh the steps and says, I want a phantom. I'm like, uh bitch of the opera? What are you talking about? She's talking about a phantom uh Rolls Royce, right? And it was just funny that j just certain things that

The fact that everybody lives in my house. The fact that my mom, my dad lives here, my two sisters, my dad still dates. You know, and my mom is going on his side of the house when she when he has a date. You know, just assessing, like just being in a way like Mm oh hey, hi, I didn't know you had company, George. I mean just and now they've turned they've turned in the kids. So you know my dad to come to my room, U uh uh uh uh uh could you tell her not to come on my side of the house when I got a date? And I'm like, Now parents So you know it's funny things are happening. Yeah, so it's organic now, so we got funny. When you think of the word successful, who is the first person who comes to mind?

And why? On the bigger picture. Because I witnessed this in two thousand eight. To si President Obama. Become president to me.

Two thousand eight. Not talking about after he became president, because everyone will have their views on on that. I know what it meant to me. To see him. Stand up there. Put his hand on that Bible and say, you know.

become the president of the United States. That is success in so many different ways. And it also It jars you. For every person that says, Oh man, just'cause I'm black, I'm Maybe you can't use that all the time?

'Cause this man now Shows you. And what Every side you end up on,'cause it's not a political thing. To see that.

And the reason that it means so much to me to see an African American man like do that, like and literally when uh when when when he was this was interesting and this is how we connect it. When he was thirty points down for the nomination. Thirty points down. No one knew who he was. I get a call from Oprah Winfrey. Hi, Jamie Fox. It's Oprah. Hi, Jimmy. I was like, what's going on? There's this guy named Senator Obama. I think he's gonna be the next president. Then I got a call from Norman Lear. Jamie, it's Norman Lynn. Sure.

The Senate's on fire. So who is he? Senator Obama, but he's thirty points down, so no one knows. The reason they're calling me is because we have a radio show that was reaching everybody, especially the the huge urban market. So I go on my show and I say, uh I'm voting for this guy named Senator Obama because he's black and I go to commercial. When I go to commercial, my phone lines light up.

We're all black people saying that we will not vote for this guy just because he's black. Don't treat us that way. So we ended up educating everybody about him. He gets the nomination and he goes on and he wins. And to me it was all odds against him. And I thought That that That type of success.

regardless of where you come from, like I said, whatever side you stand on, to me, that was something monumental. When we talk about where this country has come from, when you talk about the greatness of America evolving And evolving to that type of freedom and him taking advantage of being in America and becoming um Uh a president to me that's just success to That uh he redefined what it is.

What historical figure do you most identify with? Who do I g Five with historically. Uh when it comes to entertainment, Sammy Davis Junior. is a person that I look at all the time who I go on the internet and watch him play the drums, or watch him sing, or watch him dance, or watch him uh do jokes, or watch him do a movie, or watch him spin guns, to me he was just the ultimate uh

In a in a Yeah, full stack entertainer, as one engineer said. That's what they that's what he called you. Oh man, that's great. And then there's there's other s sides of me too. So like the the sports side Like I was a Magic Johnson. Like you know, the person who was who loved being competitive but also want to get everybody else involved and you know, the way he played.

Basketball. When it comes to social consciousness. May I interject for a second? Yeah. So This might seem like a funny question, but do you feel like you identify more with Magic Johnson than Karim Abdul Jabbar?

Yeah. The reason I feel m more than Kareem Abdujabar is because Magic smiled and it was fun, he was happy, you know. Not to say that Kareem wasn't, but Kareem was more serious guy, you know. If you ever met him, he's Completely seriously. You know, when it comes to social consciousness and social issues, that's where I I I draw from a lot of different people. I think going I I think watching Martin Luther King

And going to Atlanta and seeing What he did and how he did it, when he did it. When I look at The bravery Of him.

It's beyond'cause I I look at social issues today, how We're so afraid to step out on anything, like oh my My wealth and my money, I And and not to say that I've thought this way all my life. Like literally, like it just happened not too long ago where I was like

We gotta sp sp we gotta s step up more more socially. We gotta be on social kind. Even if it even if some of the people say, Oh fuck it, I ain't gonna your to your movie. Okay, fine, you weren't gonna go anyway. But we had to step up a little bit more social social wise and when I went to see where Martin Luther King came from and what he did and how his house was he actually came from middle class, big nice house, but it's right across the street from poor from poverty and it's sort of taught him how to deal with other cultures. Taught him how to deal with other uh uh financial groups. He says I don't want to see people hurting. He says I want everybody. You know so I I I think like that. I've always thought like Uh even when we talked about earlier the Jews and the Palestinians in the uh in the student center, you know, the rest of the story was I befriended both of them.

And we all became friends because I call myself sp Spackle, which is the stuff that goes in between the bricks. Yeah. I'm I'm Spackle. I get along with all religions, get along with all people and try to bring'em all together. And so that was the so when I think about it socially, it is the Martin Luther King thing because I think sometimes we overlook that the world is big enough for all of us to live on it. It's big enough for all of us to to to get along. And uh Yeah.

Sometimes I I I question Why is it so tough to get along? You know, which is what Martin Luther King question says I just don't I don't get it. And I and I won't stand by, so A little and like I said, I've only thought about like that, you know, here in the past few years after watching Harry Belafonte go on stage before I was supposed to get a

lifetime achievement award and he goes on and says something so prolific, he says Uh They were talking about violence and he said the the violence that's happening in America is mostly black violence and you black entertainers. Sit here mute. And we laid all of this groundwork down for you guys and you guys are disrespecting and and not picking up so

You know, uh that's the one reason I said I think more socially. I mentioned Karino Dul Jabar because I saw just by chance a fantastic documentary uh called Minority of One. Ah and it's so good. And it detailed in particular and I'm not I'm not at all well versed with basketball, so it was also a glimpse into that world for me. But his relationship with Magic Johnson, which was fascinating. Do you have any particular favorite documentaries or movies that you just feel are

Must watches for human beings. That's a big question. That's that's why. I think documentaries On Cultures are important.

If you get a chance to see a di any documentary about Jews. What they went through. Watch it. Any document?

Documentary about Palestinians and what they've gone through. Watch it. blacks and what they've gone through, watch it. Women and what they've gone through, watch it. The reason that I say it is because If we're talking about the human aspect of it. Like I didn't get it.

Until I watched It was actually the pianist. Yeah. And I just went shit. Oh, I didn't know it was like that.

You know I didn't know that. And so you know And then when I listen to some of my friends who like, you know, live in the Middle East and they're going through those things, I said, Shit, I didn't know it was like that. So I think any time you get a watch Get a chance to watch people and where they come from or culture and what they went through.

Uh you could even look at it it uh uh whites breaking away from the I mean the thirteen colonies breaking away from from England. You go, Oh shit. I didn't know you went through that. So it's like when you do that, you you you come away with a sense of Okay, I get you now. Right, it helps build your compassion. Yeah, it it helps build your compassion because

You y you only live in your own world. You know what I'm saying? And unless you get a chance to see what it is. uh a lot of times your views will be will be narrow and just watching documentaries like that to to open up your views are just amazing. When you look at When you look at the story of

of uh like I said, the story of slavery. There was a book that I just showed these young guys called Without Sanctuary. Without Sanctuary. Where It's a book where A guy, a photographer, went around the South during the times of slavery and documenting lynchings. And he would document the lynching.

And make postcards because at that time, see we go oof, but at that time it was commonplace. Yeah. It was a party. So people get their food. This is where they got picnic from. They will get the food. drinks or whatever, and they'll go down and watch the lynching. And so there was a postcard that said, Here's the lynching of nigger Charlie Uh, hope you like it, hope everything is well. So that was something that was mind blowing because

It was commonplace. You know, so um when you get it like I said, when you get a chance to see cultures and history, you understand what what's going on Today. You get a chance, pull up the Harrison Act. The Harrison Act was

An act about taking drugs off the street. And making them illegal. Because it Uh at a at the time in our culture we were able to, you know, use whatever drugs that was out there was Available. But the government sort of didn't know how to get it off the streets, so they ran a story. Black man gets high on cocaine and fights cops.

And people's like so we gotta r get rid of drugs. People like fuck that. Get rid of our drugs. Get bigger guns. Give cops more jurisdiction. Finally they run a story, Black Man gets high on cocaine, rapes and kills Caucasian woman. That's when the Harrison Act.

'Cause well, we don't want that. But because of that Harrison Act with the jurisdiction of a cop. That plays into a little bit of what we're dealing with today. Because it was sort of set that way in a time where it was commonplace to see slaves. It was commonplace to see blacks as second or third class citizens. So and it's not to incite anything, it's not to

make you feel anything angry. It's just a It's just a peering into someone's Genesis to see where we are. today so that you can understand to Or try to have the compassion for

Um All of us who live here in this country because like I said, it's It's the best in the world. And beyond. I remember a friend mentioned to me I was watching Planet Earth and he said there's a companion of some type which uh I really want to see called I think it's humans of Earth and it actually profiles different civilizations, different cultures around the world, and it shows you how humans have adapted. You know, Mongolians using falcons for hunting and all this and whatnot. But the um Yeah, I totally agree with you. I think that

Yeah, cul if a culture is a set of beliefs and behaviors, you have to in a way be taken on that sensory experience to develop the compassion. You don't get it through text alone, necessarily. Uh If you could have a billboard. Anywhere.

Oh. What would it say? Uh Man. It will constantly change.

It would be those new boys. Sneaky answer. I like it. It would ha it would be the bo Bill Wood saying. Ball out, dog. Have a great time. Go to church. Love somebody. Teach somebody.

Get angry a little bit. It would just change, you know, because you know, these guys know me. I'm all about Heaven. And at the end of the last one will be have as much fun as you can. Because

In a blink of an eye. All be gone. A hundred years compared to infinity is Nothing. I talk to my sister all the time. Why you'd be like? I said, girl, you better get you better start having some fun. We gonna be gone in a minute.

You can look back and say shit, I should have been laughing. And now I'm dead. So Yeah, my billboard would change constantly. Because I I think we all change. You should get angry a little bit. Many, many years ago. Uh asked him at an event. I was sitting in the crowd and I said, What do you do when you get writers block? And he said, I write about what makes me angry. And uh if you ta if you were teaching a Ninth grade class. Yeah. Mixed race, mixed gender.

What would you what would you teach that class about? Like what would what would you teach? Wh what do you think the most important things skills Or otherwise that you could teach. Ninth graders might be. Well, like I said, it would have to be different tiered. Yeah.

If it's the ninth grader of today. I would teach'em as much as you can interact with actual humans. Uh, you know, the toughest thing in the world is like looking at my daughter and We're in Paris and generation thumbs. Yeah, they're on their they're on their They're on their cell phones. So I said as much as you can interact with people.

'Cause people It's the best interaction because there's all types. And there's discretion when it comes to people. Like there's no discretion when it comes to thumbs and what you can say on the internet and that's why you get drugged down by it. Because it doesn't take anything If they're if it's an anonymous person and they say you're ugly and you're this and you're that and you're this

There's no discretion there. So they can sort of get the venom off. if we're if we're in a surrounding I may feel something about something, but I won't say it'cause I I don't wanna hurt somebody's feelings. I I don't wanna have to hurt my feelings. So That's the one thing, interact with people. The second thing is

Interact with people from all over the world. Because you become narrow when you're just all about my block. And just being about your block. In today's world is going to hurt us.

because people don't understand global. We don't understand global market. We don't understand global things that how does something in the Middle East affect me in North Dakota. Mm-hmm. Because of the way we're set up.

Like this. So it's like you have to Get the education. I would bypass Well, uh no, I wouldn't bypass it. Get the education of people all the world. And then the last well last couple of things would be history. No history. No why we're why we're here, why this especially when it comes to to to rules and legislation and things like that, know why Mm.

Uh While we vote, why we don't vote. Uh if you think about it. This wonderful country runs on Just like a human brain. We only use a little bit of it when it comes to the voting market. You gotta vote. Get out there and be active in that. A lot of times we just hey man, whoever's the president is the president, whoever's this way. So so that and then uh um

The last part that I would teach is Last two things. Hustle. Teach your hustle. Your hustle muscle is the but Hustle muscle is the most important thing.

Oh When you hustle and and and you go get it. A lot of times that alleviates your problems. When you don't hustle or you leave it to chance. When you leave things to chance.

And you didn't give it all that day? Now you start to argue or wonder about things, Bills, fuck, I gotta get that done. Oh, my relationship is how did that but if you hustle For one, it's gonna take up a lot of m more of your time. So you don't have time to s To concentrate on just The worrying. The worrying.

If I put the work in I got my check, I put it over there. And your check can be doesn't have to be monetary. It could be Anything. It could be I put the work in at the charity and this happened because of the charity. But whatever it is, put that hard work in. And now You could see things coming to fruition And that takes n

Seventy percent of you were in away. Because you did give it y you all. And then the uh The last part of it is W reflect.

Sit still for a minute. When you t work and work and work and working. I got it this, I got it, I did. that will strain you as well. So you gotta be able to decompress. You just gotta be able to chill. Whatever it is that you chill with, if it's your homies, your friends or like take time out to be like, you know what

I I If if If it's out of my hands, it's out of my hands. I'll get a better crack at it tomorrow. Colin Powell says something incredible. He said, I always feel like in the morning I got a brand new channel. And I'm paraphrasing, in the morning He said, I I I love getting in the mo to the morning because it's a new opportunity.

But really take that time for yourself, you know, relax, chill. Whatever it is that you believe in, if it's God, Buddha, Allah, Hindu, all of'em. Whatever it is to get you on on that on that okay. You know, uh I did what I was supposed to do. Let me relax now and then tomorrow or the next day get another What is uh what does the first sixty minutes of your day look like? Or what do you have any morning routines that are important to you? Morning routines

I I wake up I uh I text the people that I dig and love. What do you say? I just send them encouraging like, you know, there's a few you know

People that just, you know, really mean a lot to me. Wanna let them know I'm thinking about'em, hold on. And then uh uh It varies, man. Sometimes I'll be like okay. I I put some work in, so I put in eight days.

So maybe these two days I could chill. Uh Get a little I do the uh just on the physical part, I get my uh I get my fifty pull ups in, hundred sit-ups. You know, maybe a hundred uh maybe a hundred

Crunches and it's easy. I used to not be able to do it. How many sets for the fifty pull up. So I do fifteen first. Fifte pull ups. This is what it is. I do fifteen pull ups. Fifty push ups.

Hundred sit ups. Then I go back and I do Fifteen different Oh chin. Yeah.

So that'll get me to thirty. Another fifty push ups that give me the hundred push ups, I'm done with the push ups. And then I do Ten and ten. To the first grip.

And you don't have to do it every single day, you can do it every other day. Uh And then what you notice is the pull up bar. And Tyrant kept telling me this. Well we I got a home retirement, he played Kane in Minnesota Society and he

I kept wondering how is he always in shape. He says man, I'm trying to tell you the pull up bar is the everything. So uh So that and uh um And then just, you know, make the call what I need to get done and make sure I'm, you know, in the right You know, position and get the kid. I don't drink coffee. I don't drink coffee. Is have you have never stopped?

I had to stop having stimulants. That's there's some uh. Earlier in my career I was It was all about the stimulus. So at a certain point I had to Ix nay on the K. Yeah. I've been I've been cutting that out as well. It's not good for me. People are like, Oh, are you worried about depressants, alcohol? I'm like, No, no, no, no. Stimulants, that's what I need to work on. Yeah, because'cause when I tell people I'm trying to drink coffee after a while, you you you keep

You keep hitting that same muscle, you know, that in your in your brain to where you I g I know people right now who can drink four cups of coffee and go to sleep. Yeah, I used to do that for you. Uh what is the red ball? And then he won't understand why some days he'll just be like this. Yeah. So I had to stop and it was tough because I had to have coffee every day and I drank Like double expressos.

You know I was like I had to have the up. Yeah. But now I know how to go get it inside of my you know, I know how to go get it inside. Last last question here is um I'm gonna ask w advice you would give to yourself. Three different ages, twenty, thirty, and forty. Um, so what advice would you give to your twenty year old self? Man, put the condom on.

Shit. Stop playing around. Important advice. And not the fishnet one either, put the real one on.

Okay. Uh Anything else for twenty, or should we move to thirty? Twenty

Twinies. I had my daughter twenty six. So the advice I would give me was like Calm down. You know, it w it was like calm down and and just, you know.

Make sure you're paying attention. to your daughter and to the daughter's mom. Twenties was tough'cause I just got to LA. I was just You know, man, the whole world was opening up. So I'm like, Man, I'm you know, I'm trying to do All of it. And why I was like calm down and and and luckily

It was twenty six, so moving into thirty. I was uh On my way to calming. If that makes it. Does make sense.

So then you hit thirty. What advice would you give your thirty year old self? Uh it's gonna go fast. Yeah. In what way? It's gonna go fast. The time is gonna go fast.

So just make sure that you uh You start now planning For your future. And not only is gonna go fast, but Don't spend all your money.

Don't buy the f the the jacket that's Twelve thousand dollars. You know Relax. You know, just just you relax it because it it's good and and forty is gonna come so fast. And you don't think that it is, but it's gonna come so fast.

And would you say that because you would want your thirty year old self to Pay attention to the present moment or do long term thinking or both. When you're thirty You got a kid.

And you're in my business. And in any business. All businesses are gonna especially when you when you when you when you make my business is about me, though. So I have to be careful in my decisions socially. Uh And in plan for the future.

I remember uh Uh Doing my television show. And it went five years went fast. And I would tell the people on my television show, it's gonna go fast, man.

And if you finish at thirty five, but you live till seventy. You know, so you have to really think about The future. A long game. Yeah. And then forty.

Big four zero. Yeah. Forty. There are there are gonna be tough decisions that you have to make when it comes to business. 'Cause in your forty.

When you're forty. In my business. The window is closing. On certain things. So you have to be able to open those windows to other things. And some of the people that you've gone t w to to battle with till you're forty may not be the ones that you will battle

And do business with Toward fifty. And Take a little bit of your uh personal feelings out of it.

Because I'm very personal. Oh meaning like I would stay with someone even if I feel that they're Not up to part business wise, but you know, we have history. Take a little bit of the personal out of it. Still remain friends if you can with that person because now it's really pending. Like fifty about to be here.

You know what I'm saying? So it's like, you know. And Uh I would tell my forty year old self Grow up in your mind, but not in your body necessarily.

Mm. Meaning stay young in your body, but certain parts of your life you have to grow up. And B be grown about things because now you got another kid Your other child is

You know. Twenty w she's twenty one now. Which is just You know, this past year, so But she was you know.

Thirteen, fourteen, if if when I was forty. But now you gotta start living Um You would always live your life a hundred percent for you. But now that you have your kids and they're a certain age, it's gotta be

Thirty to forty percent you Sixty to seven percent. what you're gonna leave for them and how you're gonna leave them because like I said, it's It's flying. And that's it.

Jimmy. So much fun. I really appreciate taking the time. And uh where can people find what you're up to Find you online. Learn. On my periscope, am I right? Am I saying this right?

Yeah, I got these young cats telling me what And then I'm Jamie Fox on Twitter also. I'm Jamie Fox on Twitter. I'm doing better on Twitter. I'm trying to do better. And On Twitter you and uh the old fella trying to The latest album? The latest album's called Hollywood Story of a Dozen Roses. This out I don't care how you get it, you can download it, bootleg it, steal it from a friend.

I don't care. I just want you to I just want you to hear the music. The song that's out right now is uh I'm supposed to be in love by now. supposed to be in love by now. It's been so long for me, I don't know how. Been drowning in the sea of broken vast. I'm supposed to be in love alone.

I've been chasing my dream now, I'm chasing you Running hard but my legs feel weak. I done played every part, I done played a fool, write the movie of Beoli. I'm supposed to be in love. Girl you stole my heart take a bow In love but now

Make sure you get that. Uh by now's out it's a song that my daughter made me She sort of made me do. She's like, Listen, stop with the club stuff, stop with and that's my my older daughter's like funny. She's like, Stop with the club joint. Stop you're trying to be too young. Like even she'd even like I had on some shoes one day that she thought was just I had too young of a shoe. She's like, Dad, what is that on your feet? I said, they're the new style, baby.

You know, it's this new style. I had a zipper on and a buckle and my name and grade and She's like, Stop it. She said, Dad, you have old feet. I said what I mean. You have Oh, it like you have you have feet for marching, like a civil rights Yeah but Surprise.

Yeah. So uh but she said do a song that we know that is from you. And and it's true, says I'm supposed to be in love by now. And so uh so that and uh jumping out of the window Uh And uh we just shot the In Love by Now video with George Lopez.

Is the priest I guess stood up at the altar. George Lopez is the priest, Nicole Scherzinger. Uh, and we all know her from the Pussycat dolls, but also her solo career and and everything else. She plays my love ventures, which is great because she's a good friend and so we were able to like really get into some like uh You know, they don't do old school videos anymore. Like this actually has a bit of a story. My man Tank is in it and then all of my friends, my daughter's in it, my little daughter's in it. And uh my mom and dad is in it, and you know, so it's uh it's kinda cool.

I was um Jamming to babies in love. That's the type of music I listen to this to before I'm when I'm headed somewhere to to write, sit down, do some creative work. Solid. I think Justin Beaver's supposed to do that song first. And we were lucky enough to get it. But uh Babies and Love Kid Inc. is on there. So, you know, we got some good stuff going.

And then uh later on uh Sleepless Nights will be out at some point and then uh we'll start work on the uh Mike Tyson uh bio and uh and that's it. And then the the stand up comedy is coming'cause like I said, I got a lot of stuff that you know I gotta get off. I'll get off my chair, so since you brought up Mike. W what would Mike say if he were here right now? Well I'm gonna say it like this, because

Now that I'm about to do the the movie? To do the Mike Tyson impersonation. Would be a little disservice. What I would say is is that I met Mike when I was twenty one years old. I went on stage and I was doing my joke and I was getting my Mike Tyson joke and I went into it and no one laughed. Because Mike was in the audience. A guy was in the orders with Mike and said, Yo Mike is in here, motherfucker I was like, Oh man. The black girls in the front was like what you gonna do, Jamie? You gonna tell your jokes? You scared of Mike Tyson? This is where Mike Tyson was knocking people out for nothing.

I did and then the guy yells at Mike said do the joke. And that shit better be funny. So I do the joke, it's a standing ovation. I come on stage and Mike goes, There he is, I wanna talk to you, you're so funny, come come hang out with me, you're funny, motherfucker. Go after come and get in the car with me. And we take off. And I started hanging out with Mike Tyson at twenty one years old. It was the most incredible thing in the world. Mike was bigger than Michael Jackson at that time. He was just he was the biggest person biggest star in the world. Mike would be in a club, see a girl and say, Hi, how are you like BMWs? They're like, Huh? Do you like being you like cars? Yeah. He would go open up the BMW dealership. They would buy he'll buy a car for a girl. That's how dope he was And then all of his boys would go to all the different cities and pick up the cars that he bought for girls and say, Yo, come on, get the keys back. You know he's playing.

So it was great to see it was great to see him during the time and it was tough to see him when he went through what he went through and then when we finally decided to do this movie, this is the Mike Tyson and I think people really be able to grasp is that when we show Mike Tyson older and I call Mike and I said, Mike, how are you? Oh, praise this to Allah, my brother. I'm happy. How are you? So I'm good, Mike, you know what's up, what's going on? I'm just happy, I'm happy because I don't have any money anymore, so I'm happy. S.

What does that mean? No, it's just all the vultures that were around me the whole time. I don't have any money, so nobody wants anything from me, so I'm just so happy. And if you notice his speaking voice, like what I told you with Bill Cosby, is completely different from when he's on stage, when he's getting ready to fight. So he was like, I'm just so happy. And I could tell I said, Mike, that's the person we need to tell. That's the story. We always see the person who rises to the mountaintop, but we don't see the other side of the mountain and all the jagged edges and all the things and And and you're about to slip off of that mountain. So

Uh Terry Winter who wrote. you know, uh Wolf of Wall Street. Uh Boardwalk Empire and uh Martin Scorsese who's gonna direct it, who hasn't directed a film about boxing since Raging Bull. So fingers crossed if it all goes together we'll be able to see Mike. Tyson in a different way and we'll be able to transform

Uh to where I wanna be so good that is Mike Tyson that I look so much like him and when I walk into his house his kids would acknowledge me as a father. Um And then I want to be able to sit back and reflect. And here's what I'm trying to do with with a career.

Characters. In Living Color, it was Wanda. Hey, for real though. I rock your whirl. Then

It was Willie Beeman any given Sunday. My name is Willie. Willie Beeman, I keep the ladies. Scream. Hmm. It's Ray Char uh no, it's uh Bundini Brown from Ali. Muhammad Ali is a prophet. How you gonna be God's child as soon as you come out the garage and be number two. So Bandini Brown. And then it's Well I got a woman well that's good to me. Then it's Ray Charles.

And then it's a jingle, you know. Love you very Well, The Jango experience, you know, working with Quentin Tarantino. Which was

Mind blowing. uh to be able to go in and read for that and I didn't know about that part I thought Will Smith was gonna do it. I was like, ooh, Will Smith and Quentin Taylor's gonna be incredible, incredible. It didn't work out that way. I meet with uh Quentin Tarantino. I told him I understand the script and I said not only that, I have my own horse. And so I ended up riding my own horse.

In uh In Django. And I knew that there was gonna be another character that's gonna change The gay. And uh oh

So they'll look at that, so they'll say Django? And then Hopefully if everything goes right. Mike Tyson will sit with those characters. So that you'd be able to after a while look at a at a at a career where You transformed into a character.

People know it. And were moved by it and And hopefully uh um If it all works out it'll It'll be a great it'll be a great opportunity to look back and see like wow, man, look at the things that you were able to do.

Oh. In America. It's an incredible canon already. And um My brother gave me Mike Tyson's autobiography for Christmas last year. And I sat down and I read it because when I was a kid.

I would watch on the greeny VHS Mike Tyson's greatest hits over and over and over and you'd see his reception in Japan. He was the biggest star on the face of the planet. But you read the autobiography and there are layers upon layers. So I A guy who just wanted to be in love, just wanted to It was more simple than we thought it would. Yeah. And uh

I can't wait to see it. I hope it comes together. I hope so. Jamie, you are the consummate performer and entertainer. So please keep creating. This has been uh such a such a gift. Uh thank you for your time. Thank you, buddy. And uh for everybody listening, you can find all the show notes, links to everything at fourworkweek.com forward slash podcast. Uh you can search my name and Jamie's and probably pop right up. And as always, thank you so much for listening. Hey guys, this is Tim again. Just a few more things before you take off. Number one, this is Five Bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from me? Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday that provides a little morsel of fun before the weekend? And Five Bullet Friday is a very short email where I share

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