Kel Mitchell With Special Performance By Tye Tribbett Part 1

Kel Mitchell is joined by the soul-stirring musical talents of Tye Tribbett for a first-of-its kind episode of Club Shay Shay. The show kicks off with a nostalgic sip of orange soda, setting the tone for a journey through Kel's life and career. Then, Tye Tribbett delivers the very first live performance on Club Shay Shay, sharing his journey from not being able to play the keys until speaking in tongues to collaborating with music legends like Stevie Wonder and Whitney Houston after his work on The Prince of Egypt.

After the music, Kel Mitchell shares heartfelt stories, starting from his humble beginnings working at his grandma’s candy store to his breakthrough on Nickelodeon. He opens up about the tragic loss of his best friend at a young age and the challenges he faced balancing high school and his burgeoning acting career. From All That to the iconic Kenan and Kel show, Kel reminisces about the camaraderie with Kenan Thompson and memorable moments like encounters with Usher and LL Cool J. He delves into the origins of his character's famous love for orange soda and reflects on the creative energy of Chicago. As a multi-talented artist, Kel recalls his comedic parodies and ventures into musical theater, including his role in Freaknik The Musical alongside T-Pain. He shares insights into his family life and friendships in Hollywood, including his bond with Nick Cannon. 

Kel's journey is also one of self-discovery and perseverance. He discusses the challenges of being a child star, seeking mentorship, and navigating creative ownership in the entertainment industry. Kel candidly opens up about his mental health struggles and finding light in the darkest times. From voicing beloved characters to finding fulfillment in his faith, Kel Mitchell's story is one of resilience and authenticity, leaving listeners inspired and uplifted.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I told the makeup artists, I said, yeah, just do
full makeup, you know, just cover, cover up.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
And she did the full So but you.

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Gotta be careful about you tell Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah,
makeup artists.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
You say it to full and you went to a
similar product.

Speaker 3 (00:11):
Yeah, yeah, you remember that. I told him I want
to be cast, get clean. They took me living there.

Speaker 4 (00:17):
Yeah right, all my life, grinding all my life, sacrifice, hustle,
Paed Price, one slice, got the Brother disat all my life.
I've been grinding all my life, all my life, grinning
all my life, sacrifice, Hustle, Paed, the Pricing, one Slice,
the Brother diswatch all my life.

Speaker 5 (00:38):
I've been grinding all my life.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Hello, Welcome to another episode of Club Sha Shay. I
am your host. Shannon Sharp, also the propriet of Club
Shasha and the guy that's stopping by for conversation on
the drink today, is one of Hollywood's Brady Stars. A
multi talented, well rounded performer, actor, comedian, artist, dancer, rapper, musicians, greenwriter,
executive producer, director, author, hosts, pastor, a song after voice actor.

(01:03):
He's been nominated twice for an Emmy. A fan favorite
household name for kids of the nineties, a husband or father,
a Nickelodeon alum who loves orange soda. Kell loves orange soda,
kel Mitchell. Oh, make it about the club.

Speaker 6 (01:19):
You know what you got lords, we do we got
it yeah orange so that.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
Yeah, oh man, I appreciate it. Man, I'm happy.

Speaker 3 (01:37):
Man. We're happy to have you.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
Bro.

Speaker 3 (01:40):
Thanks for stopping by the club. All the best, no doubt. Okay,
A man that fruit too. Yeah, Shae loves orange. So
to kill your pastor. You're a musician, so for you.
For the very first time, we have a live performance
coming to the stage today for the first time on Club.

(02:02):
Shay Shade is three time Grammy winning gospel artists Ty
Trippert and he's gonna sing a song be all right.

Speaker 7 (02:13):
Yeah yeah, he's gonnnna make everything all right.

Speaker 8 (02:21):
Whoo yeah yeah yeah, check it.

Speaker 7 (02:26):
It gets so hard, just trying to figure it out,
find out.

Speaker 8 (02:31):
Trying to believe God, trying to want the words in
my mouth to say out.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Trouble will come and go, even on.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
The mountain high on the Bounty Loop. But never let
your faith go. Yeah, never let your leave boo. I've
been there before.

Speaker 5 (02:45):
So confused, don't know which way, stressed out.

Speaker 7 (02:49):
The world's so crazy repossible, stay in the house, been
trying to rise up.

Speaker 9 (02:54):
We got terrorists disguise.

Speaker 3 (02:55):
They look like us, but we know who we trust.
Just want to say that we gonna feel all right.

Speaker 7 (03:01):
Tell him, tell him, tell him we won't be all right.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Let them tell him we won't be all right.

Speaker 7 (03:09):
Yeah, yeah, feel real good in here, all right?

Speaker 3 (03:12):
All right, can't hear you real long, sir? See, we
won't be all right.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
Let's go. We gon'ta be all right.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
No matter what your God won't be all right.

Speaker 7 (03:26):
Tell us, yeah, check it out.

Speaker 3 (03:34):
In these last days, evil times will come in it's.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
Head and day.

Speaker 5 (03:38):
Look at all the hate since this crime is murdered, day,
human trafficking, racist, some police brutality, bullying, rape, caramelist.

Speaker 7 (03:49):
Shut your ordeal, let your feedom come and let you
and will be done in here.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Let your glory rise.

Speaker 5 (03:57):
Let's your sun.

Speaker 4 (03:58):
Shine, head.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
Cloud, a little summon ray.

Speaker 7 (04:03):
We will show because we go after the ninth side, we.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
Come be up. Hey, both this grace.

Speaker 3 (04:09):
You'll kill the girl.

Speaker 7 (04:11):
He ain't come all hey, tell me, tell me kid,
he probably out. I know he would, he called me out.
Hold right, So don't you worry aboudy, No, don't probably
about that. No, just believe in receiving me. Worn't that
he promised you.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
We ain't gonna be out.

Speaker 3 (04:26):
Oh jeez, speak of be your son.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
We believe he come the all day.

Speaker 3 (04:33):
I wanna never count you nor No, I'm until I
ever cout you.

Speaker 1 (04:37):
Ho.

Speaker 7 (04:38):
I'm gonna live near me, sive anywhere that your promise
me be on again.

Speaker 3 (04:42):
Yeah, let's show him.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
He must.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
This damn speak. We all right, don't worry about no,
don't go sleep over it. No, no, they got everything.
I never control the roe on that.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
We gonna be out right.

Speaker 7 (05:00):
Go on to Marster said we are yeah, yeah, brather not.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
You'll say battles mid a shot up there.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
Still fight will that we.

Speaker 7 (05:14):
Gonna be all It's gonna be all right. It's gonna
be all right now, Yeah, it's gonna be alright. Here,
he's gonna be all right.

Speaker 1 (05:23):
Now that's done.

Speaker 3 (05:24):
It's gonna be all right. It's gonna be all right.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
He's gonna be all right. Tell him say we gonna
be all yeah, yeah, yeah, we.

Speaker 3 (05:45):
Gotta go y'all.

Speaker 7 (05:46):
Last time said we're gonna be we gonna be on
we're a man doing borrow night. Yeah, only one night though,
climbing last Morrow night. Yeah, only one night though, let
the tears fall down from the hide. Yeah, only one
night though, only one night though, don't get.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
The devil no more.

Speaker 7 (06:05):
Yeah, we've been laying doing pa night. Help me out saying,
only one night climbing last fir night.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
Only one night though.

Speaker 3 (06:13):
If you hurt, make sure that you hurt. Yeah, only
one night, God, be all right, only one nice girl,
be all right?

Speaker 1 (06:20):
Only one night.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
Hey, Joey comes in the morning. Yeah, whoa, I feel good, y'all.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
Joy comes in the morning. Get time.

Speaker 3 (06:30):
Joy comes in the morning. Can y'all see it? Yeah,
Joey comes in the morning.

Speaker 1 (06:36):
Check it out.

Speaker 3 (06:37):
I can see your broth good.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
Days, hoday.

Speaker 3 (06:41):
I can see your priens hood day. See hoday.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
Looking like a brand good day?

Speaker 3 (06:47):
Like a pain, hoday? Hey, I can feel a brand
hood day.

Speaker 1 (06:51):
Hell a pain? Honday.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
I gotta go, so we gonna be out right?

Speaker 1 (06:56):
Yeah, rage.

Speaker 3 (07:08):
And leaning up with the stool three times winnings. Hi,
you did that?

Speaker 1 (07:22):
Be all right?

Speaker 3 (07:23):
I'm listening to the words of the song and thinking
about everything that's transpired over the last five years. How
do we convince people to lean on the word of
God and this spirituality and the religion that everything's gonna
be all right. Well we just stay consistent.

Speaker 8 (07:36):
I believe if we just stay consistent, keep encouraging people,
keep speaking a word, they're going to hit a point in.

Speaker 1 (07:42):
Their life where all they have is that hope and
all they have is that faith.

Speaker 8 (07:45):
They could keep fighting and trying other things and other
remedies that they want. But if we just remain consistent,
God is the way, Jesus is the way he can
help you, and our testimonies help people.

Speaker 1 (07:54):
Yo. He did it for me.

Speaker 8 (07:56):
It's not even about convincing people. It's about being a
witness like ya. I ain't even trying to convert nobody
in here. God is good to me.

Speaker 1 (08:02):
His way works for me.

Speaker 3 (08:04):
And when they hear your consistency on that Christ content.

Speaker 8 (08:08):
When they hit rock bottom, they're gonna remember what you
said and they're gonna try God too.

Speaker 3 (08:12):
But He also wants you to remember that when you're
doing good, just don't call him. Everybody want to call
him Lord. But when things are going well, we see
were doing it on our own.

Speaker 8 (08:24):
That's the thing about That's the thing about God. He's
so good to all of us. The Bible says he
reigns on the just as well as the unjust. It's
the matter of the heart. Do you think it's you
or do you know as God? I think the wise
person knows it is God. Remember when Jesus was born
a little boy, the wise men brought their gifts to Jesus.
Wise men bring their gifts, their success, their everything to him.

Speaker 1 (08:46):
If you're wise, you'll lean on him more.

Speaker 3 (08:49):
I read. I don't know if it's true or not.

Speaker 10 (08:52):
Hold on, hold on, shame, don't turn that cart off,
the shad that you could not play the key until
you spoke in other tongues, other brother, not your typical tongue.

Speaker 3 (09:07):
Not the typical talk. Not.

Speaker 1 (09:09):
No.

Speaker 8 (09:09):
Yeah, I grew up very Pentecosta, very legalistic. They ain't
play no games, no ear rings, no movies. Everything is
a sin and everybody going to hell. But us so
with that, but us as an elitism of mindset, legalistic.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
So I couldn't.

Speaker 4 (09:24):
I was.

Speaker 8 (09:24):
I felt like now I'm not gonna I felt like
I was the most talented person in the church. That okay,
But I was sitting there every Sunday like man, let
me hurry up and speaking, so I wasn't worrying about
going to heaven. I wanted to speaking tongue so I
could play in the church.

Speaker 3 (09:40):
I worried about heaven.

Speaker 1 (09:41):
Later I got to fix their service tonight.

Speaker 8 (09:43):
So twelve years old, it happened for me and I started,
you know, taking over and playing at that time.

Speaker 11 (09:47):
Wow, yeah, man, it was crazy back then. Man, y'all
did those cheer Revival with all the what are you
talking about? With the hot and be hot, and they
got them new mosquitoes that ain't come out yet.

Speaker 3 (10:00):
Bucks everywhere.

Speaker 8 (10:01):
Man, we had all that in that tempt me by
we was kicking it out through praising God.

Speaker 1 (10:05):
I love that because it took us outside.

Speaker 3 (10:06):
Of the four walls of the church.

Speaker 8 (10:08):
So that was always exciting for me because I always
saw that small context. So to see God bigger than
that in the streets was amazing to me.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
Introduce you to your group. I want I want to
know more about you.

Speaker 1 (10:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (10:17):
All you want to know about the ess is this
is This is Brandon right here.

Speaker 3 (10:21):
Brandon man. This is Jalisa Fay right here, Lisa.

Speaker 8 (10:25):
This is Jocelyn right here, soprano alto tenor.

Speaker 3 (10:29):
This is Joe right here. Okay, that's my main man, Joe.

Speaker 8 (10:32):
But there he holds it down to my producer, all
that stuff. We can do all this stuff together.

Speaker 3 (10:36):
This is Jr.

Speaker 1 (10:36):
On the drums right here. It's a little nephew.

Speaker 8 (10:39):
And I got one brother in the whole entire world.
I got one brother and that's him. That's status right here.
That's my brother, base player, friend, all that good stuff.
So we want to be happy family here time.

Speaker 3 (10:50):
Looking at some of your music, Collapse Music, Soul Child,
Jill Scott, The Ruth, Jessica Simpson, Floora Try Common Erkabad,
Luther vandros Stevie. Wonder what were those experiences like you.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
I didn't do any of that.

Speaker 3 (11:01):
I'm just like.

Speaker 1 (11:07):
We are. We did a movie called The Prince of
Vigia that was.

Speaker 8 (11:12):
An animated story about the life of Moses.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
We won this gospel choir competition.

Speaker 8 (11:16):
They say, let's get that choir on this movie soundtrack,
so we started doing music for that soundtrack. There we
met Faith here, Whitney Houston, all these people. So for
the movie premieres, we were the only choir, so we
would say background for like all the artists, and some
of them just took to us and loved this. So
we went on tour with Faith Hill, Tim McGraw, We
went on tour with Don Henley, We did stuff.

Speaker 1 (11:38):
With Gloria Stepan and all this stuff.

Speaker 8 (11:41):
All these Once you got in the funnel, it just
kind of like, let's get that choir.

Speaker 1 (11:46):
Let's get the choir.

Speaker 8 (11:46):
And then I'm from the Philly, Jersey area. So we
did our first album in the Root Studio. I was
very cool with them.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
I knew them all. We all knew each other.

Speaker 8 (11:53):
So just being around the Root studio, they be like, yo,
get on this. LL's coming in town. Do you know
justin Tim Blake is coming dude. That's why we got
Crimey and the River and all that.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
Yeah, I was to get that.

Speaker 3 (12:04):
You don't gonna go there. You know I'm gonna do
the joke. Yeah, I was. Listen, listen, we gotta prove it.

Speaker 1 (12:12):
You gotta prove it. Get on, no team. I don't
remember how to what kid is that? What key was that?
What kids?

Speaker 3 (12:22):
They got me proven that? I didn't played that since then?
Oh there is hey something like that, something like that.

Speaker 1 (12:41):
That was a hit song.

Speaker 8 (12:42):
I know you.

Speaker 3 (12:42):
They broke bread with you with that one. Didn't it. Yeah,
we had dinner on hold On that was one of
that's one of his biggest songs. Everybody, I didn't know
the business then.

Speaker 8 (12:51):
I was working with Timberland and Timberland is still my
dude to this day.

Speaker 3 (12:55):
So he cut me a check.

Speaker 1 (12:57):
I took that two thousand dollars.

Speaker 3 (12:58):
I split it up between everybody. I didn't no points.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
Yeah, yeah, I talked.

Speaker 8 (13:11):
I don't know the business stand and you know, I'm
not upset about any of that.

Speaker 1 (13:14):
It's it's it's all good.

Speaker 3 (13:15):
It's what it is. Thank man. Appreciate you, thank you,
Thank you guys so much. Time's going to be on
tour May sixteenth through June thirteenth, coming to a city
near you. Don't walk run check him out. He's unbelievable.

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Speaker 3 (14:46):
All right, Keil, Yeah, before we get you got started
with Nickelodeon back in nineteen ninety four. Yeah, ninety four,
ninety four. So was that your first gig? I mean,
did you do you're from Chicago to Southside. Yeah. Did
you have a job before, Nick, Yeah, Man.

Speaker 1 (15:01):
I definitely had a job. I did different things, you
know what I mean. When I got on there, I
was a junior in high school, like sophomore going over
to junior and uh, yeah, man, I worked at my
grandma's candy store, you know what I mean. She was entrepreneurs.
She had the beauty. So yeah, I ain't some of
the supply. Yeah, definitely, definitely yeah man, but definitely there. Yeah.

(15:25):
And I did some construction work with my uncle and
stuff like that. But I was still you know, still
a team. Yeah. And that was like my first like
big gig, my first one though. I was a model first.
So I tell a lot of people that, Yeah, I
was on the back of the Captain crunch box, Like, yeah,
he was back of crunch berries. I had a little
you know, hot top fate holding crunch berries on the
back of that. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (15:46):
Early on, you had some something tragic happened in your life.
Your best friend, Yeah, was murdered at a very young age.
What impact did that have on you?

Speaker 1 (15:56):
Km oh Man a very big impact, you know what
I mean. This was someone that was I was very
close to, went to my church you know, growing up.
Shout out to my family, and I remember when it happened.
I was on All That. Actually I was on All
That at the time, and yeah, he was murdered. He
was shot in their head in alley in Chicago. And

(16:19):
around the time, it was like I was still doing
the show. I was shooting the show and I really
didn't have time to grieve because it was, yeah, because
you know, you got to go right back on to
being on the show. So that was a very hard
time for me. But this was someone who actually saved
my life as well. I remember it was a situation
where something went down in the neighborhood. Some guys you know,

(16:41):
did something on his side of the neighborhood. We were
separated through a vadac the two neighborhoods, right, and they
were looking for the guys on my side of town
that did it. Just so happens that I was just
you know, playing, you know, in the school parking lot,
and those guys happened to be there. I had no
idea that they were doing that. They were coming to
do a drive by at that point, and when they

(17:04):
were driving by, Sam was like, no, no, noah, nah,
you know what I mean, that can't go to my
church when we don't do it. And he told me
the next day while we were at boy Scouts, you
know what I mean, literally told me. He was just like, man,
don't hang with them no more. You know, this is
what happened. This is the situation. You know, we were homies, right,
you know what I mean. So, yeah, definitely had an impact.

Speaker 3 (17:23):
How did the Nickelodeon How did the Nickelodeon give come about?
Did you audition for that? Where they're like were there
people like, hey, we think you'd be great for this,
and how did this come about?

Speaker 11 (17:31):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (17:32):
Man, Well, you know I was a bit of a
class clown, you know. Coming up. I enjoyed, you know,
making people laugh, you know, that was my thing within
my family, all of us we love doing that. And
I started out in theater, you know what I mean.
So I started on theater first. And it wasn't a
thing of like getting on television or anything like that.
That was never the thing. It was for my parents.

(17:54):
It was having a positive outlet, you know what I mean.
So think about it is they put me in everything
because they didn't want me to go into the wrong crowd.
So they were like, hey, try everything and karate, you know,
science camp, everything. And what stuck was literally this theater
ETA Creative Arts Foundation. Shout out to them in Chicago.
They're still going. And I went there to this theater

(18:16):
and I was like, this is where I belonged, you
know what I mean. I did it as a summer thing,
and yeah, I started going on auditions. I went from
ETA to Victory Gardens Theater out in Chicago, Goodman Theater,
started making my rounds in the theater game and yeah,
it went good Man.

Speaker 3 (18:33):
When you auditioned, did you know you had got the role?
Did you think you had knocked that out of the park.

Speaker 1 (18:38):
No, So yeah, when I went to the audition, I
remember I was at my high school CVS shout out
to CVS Cavaliers, and I remember I had a test
that day, you know, I had my finals that day,
and so usually I don't forget my monologue, but I
remember when I went into the audition, I went blank
because I just had finals on the brand, you know

(18:59):
what I mean. And I went in there and they
were like, you want to go out in the hallway
practice it. I was like cool knocked over some camera
cords when I was walking out. I did it in
a funny way. Though they started laughing. I'm thinking I
ruined the whole audition, but they were cracking up the
way I did it. Came back in and they said, wait,
before you do the monologue, I want you to just
do some impersonations. So I did some impersonations. I did
editing there, you know what I mean it It was

(19:20):
one of the characters that I did. I also did
coach creeding in there that was based on a coach
at my high school. Did all the characters that you
saw and all that I did it in the room.
Weeks went by, you know what I mean. I also
killed the monologue, but we went by and I'm thinking, like, no,
I didn't get it. And I remember it was a
phone call late at night and my mom was like
what what? No, Hey, thank you Jesus. Then we went

(19:41):
to LA and when we went to La, it was
like the avengers of every funny kid that you could
possibly think of from all over every city went up
against it and definitely got in there.

Speaker 3 (19:54):
Yeah, so you get all of that, so you froze
the very first chance. Now you've got all the the
people worked around, like, Okay, this is my big moment.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
Yeah man, yeah, it was deep, Like I would say, froze.
I just I have finals on the brand and my
parents are big on education, you know what I mean,
They're very big on that, and so I have finals
and we were like we went, we were like the
last audition. I was the last audition in Chicago and
and made it through. But I had been doing theater
and everything, you know, prior to that for years.

Speaker 3 (20:24):
So how did you learn to develop your character? Because
you said they asked you to be impress impersonations and
impressions of some of these characters that were in the
script and just like on Q, because did you rehearse that?
Did you think they might? Well, they might ask me
to do this, so let me be prepared. And they don't,
I'm cool, but if they do, I'll be ready.

Speaker 1 (20:43):
No, check it out. So it wasn't scripted. This was
literally like what impersonations do you have? So most kids
would probably do stuff that they've seen on television.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
I did stuff that I saw on the L train,
seeing people, my uncles, you know.

Speaker 1 (20:58):
I coached people that I knew, okay, and I just
gave them all original characters right there on a spy
and that was the thing. They were like, Yo, this
kid came in and he did original voices, original characters,
and they wrote literally to the characters that I did,
you know, And that's how a lot of the characters
that I had was so original on all that.

Speaker 3 (21:18):
Well, But how do you learn as a child to
like play to the cameras, play to the crowd. That's
because you said you were class cloud, But so when
you're in a class, everybody's watching you anyway, so you don't.
It's not like you have to play the thay, you
just be yourself. How did you learn how the stage presence?

Speaker 1 (21:36):
Theater? Okay, that's really what helped me do it, you know,
shout out to naku JAHI that was my first theater,
you know, drama teacher. And in summer, I remember my
first time being on stage. We did a play and
he was amazing, like he would write his own plays.
He did this thing. It was kind of like The
Wiz mixed with you know, Beach Street aff like that.

(21:58):
And it was called Casino in the Coconut And I
got to play this character named Rattles where I was
a narrator, and he taught us how to really become
the character, you know, really become the character. Where does
the paracter come from?

Speaker 8 (22:09):
Is?

Speaker 1 (22:09):
What is he like? What did he like to eat?
So I was trained and knowing how to do that,
and then I started. I went from doing the plays
with the teens to also doing plays at night too
as well with a lot of different adults, you know
what I mean. And so I started to really understand
the craft and really understand theater and didn't act up
at school as.

Speaker 2 (22:28):
Much because now I was having a job.

Speaker 1 (22:29):
You know, I had a job and I found, you know,
what my talent was, and I really enjoyed it and
I wanted to learn every aspect of it. You know.

Speaker 3 (22:38):
Did you feel like you did you feel like it
was acting or you were being killed?

Speaker 1 (22:43):
Hmm?

Speaker 2 (22:45):
I was being killed, you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (22:47):
Because there's a thing, you know, what God annoying you
with and the talent that he gives you, you know
what I mean. So I was just doing that. But
it was beautiful to find it, you know what I mean.
It was beautiful to find like, oh I can do
this on and this could actually be a career. And
I remember one of the actors when I was doing
one of the plays, I think it was Dirt. It
was this this play called Dirt, and I remember one

(23:09):
of the adult actors came up to me and he
was just like, you got to enjoy this stuff. He said,
if you're gonna do this for life, you gotta know,
you gotta enjoy it because it's a lot of ups
and downs and things that go on with this. He
told me that at a very young age, and at
the time, I know what he meant. You know what
I mean, because I'm living with my parents right, stuff
like that. But becoming an adel, I understood what he

(23:30):
meant and I thank him for giving me that advice.

Speaker 3 (23:32):
Yeah, how did you you and Keenan Thompson. How do
you guys hit it off so quickly?

Speaker 1 (23:38):
Hmmm?

Speaker 6 (23:39):
Uh?

Speaker 1 (23:40):
You know what you know, being both black, that helps,
that helps. You know, we had the same type of background.
I'm from the South Side of Chicago, Atlanta, you know
what I mean. And it was just a thing like
I remember we introduced TLC, right, and when we introduced
TLC for the pilot episode, because you know, all that
was just a pilot. It wasn't supposed to be a

(24:02):
show thos a series, right, you know, so they were
trying it out. Nickelodeon had never tried anything like this
before with musical guests. People say it's like SNL for kids,
but it's really I felt like it was in living
color for kids, you know what I mean, just because
how diverse it was and the type of musical acts
we had on the show. But yeah, we tried to
did it. And I remember Keenan and I had a

(24:22):
sketch called Mavis and Clavis, but we played two old
guys and we were doing this characters and I would
tell Joe Key knew exactly what I was gonna say.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
I knew exactly what he was gonna say, and it
just worked at that moment.

Speaker 1 (24:33):
And after that, everybody kind of saw like, oh, these
two worked very well together, and so did we. And yeah,
it was on screen, off screen, we did the same thing.

Speaker 3 (24:41):
What made them pair you guys? Besides being black? What
made them pay you? You think that was the only
reason they put you two guys?

Speaker 1 (24:47):
No, no, no, that it was that sketch. So it
was literally that mayvison Clavis's sketch that they saw these
kids are definitely funny together and they play off each
other very well, and they started putting us in different
sketches together and it just it worked. It just worked.
And we didn't know anything about like Abne Costello or
Martin Lewis or comedic duos. And Kim Field, who was

(25:08):
one of our directors, she actually introduced us to that.
She was like, I want you to see Martin Lewis
because you guys are similar to this. And we looked
and we're like, yo, it's just like, yeah, we're like
a comedic duo. This is dope.

Speaker 3 (25:22):
So when they told you guys, you're going to have
your own show, yeah, yeah, what went through your mind immediately?

Speaker 1 (25:28):
Well, we were doing on that for a few seasons, right, so,
and it had became popular after a while, and then
usually we would go home and go to school on hiatus. Right.
So they hit us up and was like, you guys
are going to stay here all right during the time.
You guys want to stay here while the other kids go,
and we want to do your own show because we
see you guys off stage two and you guys are hilarious.

Speaker 2 (25:50):
So we were funny off stage two. And they saw that,
and so.

Speaker 1 (25:54):
Then after that they said, you're gonna have your own show.
They didn't know the name of it. I remember we
had a list of names. It was like me and
a hommy in all this different stuff and you know,
stuff they probably wouldn't have work. And I remember somebody
at the dinner it was just like, yo, just call
it Keenan n Kell, you know what I mean, called
after their names. And it really worked because we loved
like Martin and Fresh, Prince of bel Air and all

(26:14):
these different shows, and this would be our show. So
then simultaneously had the sketch Show and then we also
had the sitcom at the same time. Yeah, it was dope.

Speaker 3 (26:24):
We's some of your fondest memories of that fondest members.

Speaker 1 (26:27):
Yeah, oh man, it's so many. I mean, like, you know,
I was also in the hip hop. I feel like
I tell people hip hop and church save my life,
you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (26:35):
So, uh, you know I was you have a bunch
of jobs.

Speaker 1 (26:38):
Yeah, but yeah, man, I was. I was a B
boy in the South Side of Chicago. So I break dance,
I did graffiti, I did the whole thing. So shout
out to the mortal Masters of cry Line. That's what
we recalled IMK so but yeah, man, I just I
loved that.

Speaker 3 (26:55):
Man.

Speaker 1 (26:55):
And I remember I was into music, so I did
a lot of music first, and so I was doing
hip hop and we got on the show to have
tlc B, you know, our musical guest and do the
theme song. Wow. You know, we had Aliyah, we had
Brandy Usher, all of them like right when they were
getting started, so it was awesome. Those are the memories
I remember, you know, doing mama jokes with el el

(27:16):
Koja and you know what I mean, and getting to
chop it up with busting rhymes. And then because I rap,
they would allow me to freestyle like all the time
with a lot of different one of them, so you know,
freestyling with Coolio on stage and stuff. Those are cool memories.

Speaker 3 (27:29):
Yeah, where did this love or this infatuation with orange
soda come from?

Speaker 1 (27:34):
Okay, so the writer wrote you know who loves orange soda?
I don't know where his mind went with that. I actually,
now being older, I feel like it was a branding thing, like,
you know, to to promote soda or something like that
with Nickelodeon. But they wrote that in there, and I
just kind of t painted like I put like that,
I do I do I do to the you know,

(27:55):
to the point now where I go five star restaurant
wherever it may be. You know, people still go, yo,
you're gonna get hornge soda. You got to get to
the horng soda. So it's crazy.

Speaker 3 (28:06):
I mean you mentioned back some of these up and
coming TLC and Aliyah and Brandy and Usher and uh,
I think Britney Spears made an appearance. You're like, this
is pretty cool. Yeah, when you go back home, I mean,
what do you when you go back home? What are
your friends? What do they think of Kale?

Speaker 1 (28:25):
Now, well, here's the thing. It was funny because it's
not like today where like the show's come on right immediately,
you know what I mean. So it took a little
bit for it to happen. And I remember, h it
was Nickelodeon was more for the kids at first, and
so we were the ones that made it like cool
for the teens to watch and the tweens to watch,
right uh. And I was trying to stay low, you

(28:47):
know what I mean, because where I grew up at
when I go back to go, I ain't really want
anybody to know that I was on the show, you
know what I mean. I was just trying to skirt
it through. And I remember the freshman at my high school,
one of them just started screaming as I was walking
the whole like hey yo. And then one of my
teachers ended up playing one of the episodes for my class,
and after that it got kind of kind of wild,

(29:07):
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
If you could go back, we're gonna put you back
at that age. Okay, right in today? Okay, what three
musical guests would you like to have on the show
for today?

Speaker 1 (29:19):
Yeah, we actually did a reboot of all that and
we got to bring a lot of people on the
show back in twenty nineteen, so Her was on there,
which was amazing. We had a lot of great guests. Man,
that was just amazing, you know what I mean. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
the Jonas brothers, you know, everybody. Man, we had everybody.

Speaker 3 (29:38):
I'm looking at this. You and music videos, you with
Kanye West with all falls down down, heal, young and
dumb and bro. Bro.

Speaker 2 (29:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (29:48):
Your resume just as a child without even talking about
moving forward was so expansive.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, you know that's the man. That's
the god Man and a lot of that because it's funny.
Because okay, so let's break it down. So when you
mentioned that that's two different areas of my life. Yeah,
with Kanye, I was in a dell, you know. So
it's like a thing because me and Keenan look very young.
So a lot of times people were like, we're still.

Speaker 3 (30:14):
Kids, y'all.

Speaker 1 (30:16):
Yeah, and we grown, you know what I mean. So
even on the show it was like that too. You know,
we had to shave and you know, still look young
because you know, we got on the show when we
were like Sophomorre's juniors in high school. It went on
them for a few years. Yeah, man, But to be
on all those platforms and half Kanye called me up
and to be your backage carrier on the show and
work with Common again, and that's just that Chicago love, right,

(30:38):
you know Chicago. You know I knew Common already. Me
and Common had a freestyle battle at Metro Music my sister.
I'm gonna say I won on the knowledge playing yeah
Common one that I was doing chriscross stuff. I was like,
it's can get the kill on the Meginni making.

Speaker 3 (30:53):
You know, So, how did this come about. I understand that.
You say, you know obviously comments from Chicago Kanye, So
were you familiar with someone in his group? They were
familiar with you, So how did this come about?

Speaker 1 (31:05):
Yeah, here's the thing, man, A lot of the comedians,
like you know, d Ray and Common and you know,
the hip hop just Chicago in general, we all support
one another on the South Side. You gotta remember, I
got started in ninety four, right, so you know a
lot of people that were starting to get on around
ninety six, ninety sev ninety eight, they already knew about me.
So it's like Me, Jason Weaver, Lorenz Tate, all of

(31:27):
us are from Chicago, you know what I mean. And
we were already doing like they were doing in a
society and he was doing the Maca Jackson's story, So
all these different things, man, So shout out to the
city of Chicago. Man.

Speaker 2 (31:37):
We all know each other, seeing each other around.

Speaker 1 (31:39):
So it's been good. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (31:41):
Well, I don't think there's any better person to ask
about this than you, considering your background. You're in the
hip hop community, your musician.

Speaker 1 (31:48):
Yeah, what's up with you?

Speaker 3 (31:49):
Rap beef? Why everybody treat teaming up on Drake I
I didn't even know they had a beef. I didn't
know anybody had a problem.

Speaker 1 (31:56):
Yeah, man, it's wild, you know what I mean. Everybody
going at it. I mean, that's that's hip hop, you
know what I mean. And we're gonna see as long
as everybody keep it peaceful, it's all good.

Speaker 3 (32:06):
I mean, I didn't know. I didn't know Ross was
at Drake, Future in Booming was at Drake. I mean,
I'm like, what did what did I miss? I mean,
I know I ain't It's immersed in the cultures when
I was younger, but damn, I didn't know that this
was undercurrent.

Speaker 1 (32:23):
You know that. No, I didn't know. I didn't. I
don't have any insidy. I'm just enjoying the music, man,
and enjoying the music.

Speaker 3 (32:30):
Oh I forgot k So let me ask you a question.
So is this really? Is this really beef? I mean,
because you know they Chris Brown going at Quavo that's beef.
That's a disc. You know what I'm saying, You know, saying, hey,
Big three is big me?

Speaker 1 (32:45):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (32:46):
You know, Quebecca, you know, uh Nas and Home that's
a disc. Remy Ma, that's a disc. Is this what
what what Kendrick did the cole that.

Speaker 2 (32:59):
I mean, you know, I look at it.

Speaker 1 (33:00):
It's different generations and how they're doing this, how they're
doing it, you know, like I said, just keep it peaceful, yeah,
you know, and enjoy the music.

Speaker 3 (33:08):
No breeze, ain't keep it peaceful. Yeah, I.

Speaker 1 (33:12):
Pray.

Speaker 3 (33:13):
Yeah, Chris, Yeah, he got the flame he murdered out
of the city. Real man parody you get, uh, Prince fifty,
Michael Row. When doing research on you, yeah, you are
like talented, beyond talent. There's there's not anything that you

(33:35):
really can't do. You can sing, like I said, obviously
you're a musician, you can do impressions, you can do bro.

Speaker 1 (33:40):
I appreciate that. You know. Look, I really look at
Triple Threats and I think, you know, theater really helped
me out that. But I really like, uh like you know,
like Sammy Davis, Junior rat Pack, I'm from that, you
know what I'm saying. I love that type of style,
you know, of people just being in Triple Threats, singing, rapped,
you know, whatever it may be, and just enjoying his

(34:02):
journey whatever it is. I love to try everything, you
know what I mean, and try it and see you
know how good I could be at it? And yeah, man,
it's been good.

Speaker 3 (34:11):
What's your favorite parody?

Speaker 1 (34:13):
My favorite period that I'm done yet you done? I
got a bunch of them. I like original stuff too,
but I got a bunch of them. Oh no, I
can't pick it just one, man. I like doing fifty
fifty was fun. Fifty was fun. When I did fifty
cent that was pretty cool.

Speaker 3 (34:29):
Yeah, what was Freaknick the musical? Tell us about what.

Speaker 1 (34:33):
Was Freaknick the musical? That was?

Speaker 3 (34:35):
Did you ever did you come to Freaknick?

Speaker 1 (34:37):
No? I never, I never went to Freak Nick. We were, yeah,
we rolling all that at the time, doing that. But
but yeah, let me see Freedi's music with T Paint. Yeah,
so shout out to T Paint. That's the hommy uh
and I remember and Carl Jones the Boon Docks and
all them, and they were doing He's the Ghost of

(35:00):
Free Nick. So when Freaknick was around him and T
Pain became the ghost to Free Nick, it was me
Afion Krackhead Rick Crosses in there to l Wayne, you
know what I mean. I played a lot of different characters.
Me and a fian did a lot of original music
in it, so it was cool.

Speaker 3 (35:14):
Yeah, explain us the Lord of Squad. I mean, with
Tyler to create ro how many groups were you in?
You just jumping shout out to Tyler Man. Tyler is
hilarryous too.

Speaker 1 (35:24):
I just you know, I really enjoy working with different
artists and comedians as well. And you know, I'm never
just like the battling with the comedians and all this
stuff like that. It's all love, you know, and and
enjoying every moment. And so I remember, Lord Squad just was.
They're fans of all that, and you know they reached
out to me and shout out to Tyler. He did

(35:44):
great Coachella just the other night.

Speaker 3 (35:46):
A lot of what's happened to you early you were
in high school. So once you got on, how different
did the kids treat you? How different was your life
for when all this started transpiring.

Speaker 1 (35:58):
You know, shout out to my parents. Man, They kept
me pretty grounded, you know what I mean. Their whole
thing is like, yo, you you you still kill you
checking out the dubage you're doing this, you know what
I'm saying. And you know, my dad is a retired
social worker and my mom is a retired teacher, you know,
so they took it real serious. And then I'm in
the middle of a child or two sisters shout out
to my sister's kata in Caira. So no, no, I

(36:20):
didn't really act much different.

Speaker 3 (36:22):
Did people treat you different?

Speaker 1 (36:25):
Yeah? I mean you got to think of like the
people that didn't know me, now, my real homies, you
know who I know, they already knew what was going on.
They was rooting for me. I even put them on
the show because remember I told you a rap two
as well, so we got to perform on the show
too as well. And uh yeah.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
But people that that didn't know me, of course, they
were just fans.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
And that's the thing where you have to navigate as
a team whether this person wants to be my friend
just because I'm on the show or just because you know. Yeah, man,
so yeah, you do have to navigate.

Speaker 3 (36:56):
Did you did you experience any negativity?

Speaker 1 (36:58):
Of course? You know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
Of course you experienced that a lot of times.

Speaker 1 (37:02):
You know, you experienced toxic friends, people in toxic relationships,
all those different things.

Speaker 3 (37:08):
Did you feel at that point in time, You're like, man,
I'm on top of the world. They can't be I
can only go out for here. Ain't no downside this,
It's only up from here.

Speaker 2 (37:15):
No, I never felt like top of the world.

Speaker 1 (37:18):
I think it was a thing where as it was happening,
we were experiencing it in such a way where it
was like really surreal, Like, you know, this show that
we did that was supposed to only be a special
Now it's taken off, and it's taken off very fast.
People are really enjoying it, and so it was like
learning it along the way.

Speaker 3 (37:37):
Yeah, bro, you and Keenan had your characters. Your sketch
turned the characters on Gudburger.

Speaker 1 (37:44):
Yeah bad Yeah, yeah, Gudburger had Gudburger was one of
those sketches where when I did the voice in the
audition and then they created it on the show as
well and gave them a whole entire world musical guests
love to be on the Good Burger, like, you know
sketches which were great. And even before we did the movie,

(38:05):
we had put out a soundtrack and I remember Immature
was the you know, the Big Boy group at the time,
and Brian Robbins shout out to Brian Robbins, Uh, one
of our executive producers he was like, yo, I want you.
We're gonna do an album and play all the musical
guests that were in there, but we're gonna do an
original song and you get to rap with immature And
I was like, oh, dope, you know what I mean.
So I'm thinking I'm rapping his met because you know

(38:26):
I rap, but he's like, no, you gotta wrap his head.
And I was like, from good marker, I gotta wrap
his head, right. So we owe the way to the
studio and I was like, well, it about to be spitting.
I put it together and even to this day now
it's on TikTok and all of this, like people have
discovered the music video again. So it's just been really cool.

Speaker 3 (38:44):
When you do these sketches, when you do these impressions,
do you know, do you have a sense of like, man,
I think this is gonna be really big, or you
just like I'm just doing I'm doing the best I
possibly can and it's gonna go old and it's gonna
do what it does.

Speaker 1 (38:57):
It's always been the best that I can and seeing
it grow and being in awe of that, you know
what I mean, and all of the fan base and
all the people just enjoying it. I never go like, oh,
this is gonna hit, because you don't know, you know
what I mean. You just got to have that faith
that it's gonna rock, you know. And for me being
in a position that I was in, you know, being

(39:18):
on this show, I was thankful to be on it,
you know what I mean, And with this ensemble that
I was on, and it's just rocking and being the
best that I can within each character.

Speaker 3 (39:27):
Yeah, Good Burger has become a cult classic. I mean
they love it.

Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (39:33):
How does that make you feel? Knowing that something you
created such a long time ago has stood the test
of time.

Speaker 1 (39:39):
It's a blessing, man. I mean to have a character
that put a smile on people faces, you know, hearing
the stories of people, you know, saying the first time
they saw Goodburger or the sketches that they enjoy. I
have one person come up to me and saying, man,
I was in the hospital and Good Burger came on
and it just made me laugh and it helped with
my healing process.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
And here's stories like that is what's beautiful to me,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (40:03):
And then to be blessed to come back and do
good Burger too after so many years and have young
kids that are five years old. It wasn't born when
the first one came out. Doing good Burger you know,
parties and birthday parties and themed parties.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
It's been awesome man.

Speaker 3 (40:17):
Yeah, with all the success, obviously that money is involved.
So how did that change your life? I mean, did
you did y'all? Do did you ever just move on up?
Or did you did you stay in the location where
you where you and your family? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (40:31):
Man, So here's the thing. Like we started to show
in Florida, Okay, right, and like I said, like I
was in high school and then I graduated, and then
it was time for college.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
So all of us had to kind of like figure
that out.

Speaker 1 (40:43):
So we all started staying in our own places at
that point and navigating being an adult.

Speaker 2 (40:48):
And so now it was a delting you know, with
this and all of that. So yeah, we had some
we had some fun.

Speaker 3 (40:55):
So did you So what did you do? I mean,
obviously you're making we're making great money. You make more
than the average fifteen, sixteen, seventeen year old. Did you
were you reckless?

Speaker 1 (41:07):
I don't know if I was reckless with my spending.
I wasn't reckless. It was definitely a learning curve as
far as like learning. But shout out to my parents
for helping me within that. But yeah, I tested certain
things that I wouldn't have before. Was definitely there.

Speaker 3 (41:21):
Yeah, I read that Nick Cannon was in the audience.
You and Nick became very good friends. He's in the
audience when all that, So talk to us about the
relationship that you developed with Nick over the years.

Speaker 1 (41:32):
Yeah, that was like little bro. I remember he was
doing stand up and he actually got on there and
I remember him being on there and he was super funny,
warming up the audience. Yeah, so that was pretty cool.
So you were warm up the audience, make everybody laugh.
And they asked us the producers, actual, yo, do y'all
want him to be on the show to do a sketch?

Speaker 2 (41:52):
And we're like yeah, like of course, dude, it's funny,
and he killed it.

Speaker 3 (41:56):
Yeah, And that was the start because did you know
did you know him Nick prior to him coming and.

Speaker 1 (42:02):
Not prior to him coming on and being a warm
up guy because we always had warm up guys that
would do it, and this was a team that was
actually the warm up guy for the show. To make
everybody laugh in between sets because they're there for like,
you know, three four hours in an audience, and he
would make them laugh in between scenes.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
And yeah, super talented man. Great family too.

Speaker 3 (42:21):
I read you inspired Nick on naming of some of
his kids. He gotta mean, yeah, there's only so many names.
He got a bunch of kids.

Speaker 1 (42:29):
He got a bunch man.

Speaker 3 (42:31):
Yeah, Sola explained, I mean, how do you I mean,
when you talk to Nick and you guys your relationship,
do y'all like, are you serious? Or do y'all joke
a lot with each other?

Speaker 1 (42:43):
I mean, yeah, So here's the dynamic all of us are.
You know, we're grown ups now, you know what I mean,
we're dad's you know what I mean. But before it
was like big brother. You know what I'm saying, I'm
his big brother. He was little brouh and he's just
learning the ropes, learning, you know, Hollywood, learning all these
different things. And I would definitely looked out for him,
saying with me and Keenan, we were just like big bros.

Speaker 3 (43:05):
Yeah, bro, you own everything you on sister sister you
Steve Harvey show bro, you got a lot of credits.

Speaker 1 (43:10):
Thank you. I appreciate.

Speaker 3 (43:11):
I mean, you don't graduated college by sam a time
with all the credits you guys.

Speaker 2 (43:14):
I appreciate that.

Speaker 3 (43:15):
I mean, why why did you? I guess I mean
I shouldn't say why, But how were you able to
get on so many sitcoms?

Speaker 1 (43:26):
Humm? So many sitcoms? Well, okay, so Sister Sister happened
because when we were on that show on Keenan to
Keel and we were doing that, I wanted to be
on other shows as well, you know, and the guy
that actually created Keenan n Keel, he also created his
Sister Sister show took you know what I mean. So

(43:47):
it was cool to have that same, yeah, natural transition.
But my thing was I started going when we came
to LA. I started like sitting down in the audience
at other shows. Yeah. I would sit down another shows
and just kind of rub show, and uh, they were
like they all need to be on one of the episodes,
like yeah, yeah, let's get it in the Keenan Now.

(44:07):
They put us on Sister's Sister, which was awesome. Uh.
Then we got on the Steve Harvey Show as well.
We don't still we might as well have become regulars
on the Steve Vibus shows. We did so many episodes
over there.

Speaker 3 (44:17):
Did you get an opportunity to to meet, to mingle
and hang with Steve?

Speaker 2 (44:21):
Of course?

Speaker 1 (44:22):
Yeah. Steve gave me a lot of great advice.

Speaker 3 (44:24):
Everybody everybody says that I'm talking you had a lot
of comedian They had a lot of people come on
the show and they say, Steve is great man.

Speaker 1 (44:32):
Bro Steve's that dude. Man. He gave it like great.
He told me. He was just like, you're not gonna
are you gonna still be able to do that character
with you know, with a beard and you get a
mustache and do you still want to do this? And
so you got to start thinking of like what's your
transition of graduating to different roles? And I thought about
that a lot, you know what I mean within him
giving me that advice, and it was great advice to
have it.

Speaker 3 (44:52):
How much they're gonna pay me to shave? The question
time at the time.

Speaker 1 (44:57):
We were, you know, we were definitely shaving and all
that stuff. Say, yeah, I gotten.

Speaker 3 (45:02):
Lady for hero, how about they paying me you on
the Parkers?

Speaker 1 (45:06):
Yeah, Monique, Yeah, shout out to Monique Man. Also amazing
at a great time counts. Vine. Yes, Monique is amazing
me and Monique also worked with Spike Lee as well,
did a Pepsi commercial Super Bowl commercial. So yeah, I
mean we've known it, Like I said, Man, we've been
at it since ninety four.

Speaker 3 (45:23):
So Bro, I mean half and half one on one
of the game's rental of the Teenage which cousins Keeter
Bro you got like, No, I don't know if any
kid has been on more More. Anybody's been on more
Sick called the TV shows and you Bro, Man.

Speaker 1 (45:36):
I appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (45:37):
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All the things that you've done thus far? What's your favorite?

Speaker 1 (46:35):
All the things I've done?

Speaker 3 (46:36):
All the things? I mean, because you're a musician, you wrap,
you've been in the sitcom, you done, sketch com, you've done.
I mean, you're minister. So what's the what what gives
kill the most fulfillment.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
Being being me and doing what God wants me to do.
You know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (46:55):
I really feel like enjoying the journey it's been. It's
been a journey like y'all.

Speaker 1 (46:59):
You know when you talk about all those different resumes
and the things I did, But what I remember is
the things that I was going through throughout their entire process,
every time and every moment of the journey within learning
this journey, and so for me, that's what it's about.

Speaker 2 (47:15):
You know, you get one life. Yeah, then you live
again in heaven.

Speaker 1 (47:18):
But it's just having this one life, you know what
I mean, and where it can take, you know, those
different steps in learning from everything.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
That's that's been the beauty in it, you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (47:28):
I'm looking at some of your voiceover work Player for
The Big Red Dog, Proud Family, Curious, George Robot, Chicken,
Benky Tail, SpongeBob Squat. Yeah, I mean I've done. I
did one voice so I did one voice over. Actually
I was actually myself. I think it was an American
dad and I really liked it. And a lot of
and you see a lot of big times of lambs

(47:50):
are doing voiceovers. Did you really do you like it?

Speaker 1 (47:53):
I really enjoyed. One person that I really looked up
to was John Ritter, Right, John Riddle was amazing. When
I was a kid, I used to have this little TV,
you know with the little buttons. So I used to
turn that on, turn it down very low so my
parents can hear it, and we'll watch it under my
blanket and watch these company and his comedic physical physicality
as far as the physical comedian, he was Clifford, Clifford

(48:18):
the Big Red Dog. And so that was like my
first introduction to doing voiceover work and working with Cree Summers,
who is just amazing voiceover actress. And uh, I just
learned it. And I love doing voiceover work. I mean,
and you can do it in your pajamas if you want,
if you want to, but you really got It's it's
an art to doing it too.

Speaker 3 (48:36):
If a kid actor, what advice would you give kids
that want to go the route that you did? What
some of the device you would give them?

Speaker 6 (48:45):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (48:45):
Man, I have a good uh sense of self and
who you are.

Speaker 1 (48:50):
You know, you go through a lot within his business
and ups and downs and things that you go through, right,
and it's finding don't lose sight of yourself throughout the process.
When we brought all that back in twenty nineteen, it
was very important to me that I spoke to the
kids and I remember when I saw all of them
for the first time, it was a whole new cast.

(49:13):
I remember going in there and I said, Yo, the
Lord told me, tell all of them something that you
wish somebody told you. And I told them, like, this
is not the thing that makes you important, or this
is not the thing that makes you like, oh I
can do this is this is one stepping stone of
your life that you're going to be in and so
you were made special when you were needed in the

(49:34):
room when you were born. So don't competition with one another.
Have fun while you're doing this, but understand this is
a job. I understand that this is a job and
it's going to be other jobs do as well. And
seeing them grow now with them being on other different
shows now, and they really understood that. And then I
flew my parents out too. I flew my parents out
because a lot of parents are green within it too

(49:56):
when it's just starting. And I wanted my parents to
give that person respective to their parents and it was
a beautiful moment. A lot of their parents were crying
within that moment when they heard my parents talking to
them as well, and it was just a great moment.
And I asked Nickelodeon to be able to do that
because I feel like it's very important. It's at least
you know, a lot of you guys, you get other
older at least that you know pull back kind of

(50:17):
tell you advice about what to expect these actors, we
just get thrown into it, you know what I mean.
And so we got to look back, as you know,
veteran actors and actually sit down and have real conversations
with the younger ones to let them know what to
expect and how to navigate through it too as well.

Speaker 3 (50:34):
How difficult was it navigating those early years because, like
you said, you didn't have what you could give someone
now because I don't like the mentorship, like if somebody
could act, but there was no one that you could
possibly ask about what you were going through.

Speaker 2 (50:52):
Facts in facts, it was coming fast.

Speaker 1 (50:55):
So here's the thing. So I was playing it this
way because a lot of people, like I said, I
don't know the timeline because I've been in this business
for so long, I don't really understand the time. Yeah yeah,
over thirty years man. So when you look at it,
I remember, what got me through was definitely the Lord.
So that's what got me through. And then what got

(51:17):
me through too is you know, staying the course. But
how it started was was that I remember when I
was doing the show ninety four, you know, having fun
doing working on the show. But then around like when
we started to come to La right when we started
coming to LA and we did the show. I want
to say that was ninety eight, I believe. So I

(51:39):
had to be like nineteen or twenty years old, like
not nineteen nineteen years old.

Speaker 2 (51:44):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (51:44):
So at this point, this is where I really understood
branding and you and ownership. I love my characters that
were on the show, because remember now I was creating
these characters even within auditions, you know what I mean.
So I love these characters. But I had to realize
is that, but I don't own these characters. I don't
own the show, do you know what I mean? These

(52:05):
are people that work within the business, you know what
I mean. And so I remember there was a point
where one of the exacts and one of the head
writers the show started changing a little bit, you know,
the writing of the show started to change, and I
didn't like the direction that was going in, you know
what I mean. And I was just like, okay, and
so we started butting hands a little bit, you know,

(52:26):
within that, and this was the point where I remember,
he got upset in front of everybody, took me, you know,
took me to a room, you know what I mean,
And it was just like said some real derogatory things,
you know, and went off.

Speaker 2 (52:40):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (52:41):
I mean being from the South side of Chicago, in
that thought process, it was like, Okay, either I could
put ends on them, right, or we could go argue,
this is not going any well, do you know what
I mean? And with him doing that, I mean, I
am an adult, but I ownso on nineteen you know
what I mean, and the things that he said was crazy,
and in that moment, I'm not the man I am

(53:01):
today stand here.

Speaker 2 (53:03):
So my thought process was I right, bet.

Speaker 1 (53:05):
Well, I'm gonna leave you set and we're not gonna
feel them today, you know what I mean. So I
walked off set now knowing now being a producer, money,
you gotta pay camera men, you gotta pay all these
different things that could start a you know, that could
be a training racket, that could be a tornado.

Speaker 2 (53:21):
Right, But at that moment, I felt.

Speaker 1 (53:23):
Disrespected about what was said and how it was said,
and when he said that, within that moment it became
real where it was like, oh, okay, this is this
is really a job, and this has really changed everything
of how you think about it, right, And it wasn't
as fun anymore when that was happening at the same time.

(53:47):
I was also in a relationship as well. And when
I was in that relationship when this happened too, I
had gotten you know, a girl pregnant. This is my
ex wife. She was pregnant at the time. So all
this was going on at the same time. And so
this frustration and the reason I'm explaining this to you
is because I want people to understand the mindset of,

(54:08):
you know, what might happen to young actors and the
things that they're going through. You know, we see it
all the time with the suicide raid with actors and
what goes on. And I was friends with a lot
of the actors that are not here anymore, and so
just the process of the things that you deal with, right,
So I'm, you know, button hands with this producer says
this thing.

Speaker 2 (54:26):
At the same time, my ex wife is pregnant. We're
dating at this time.

Speaker 1 (54:31):
And also too, as I'm going through all of this
at the same time and dealing with this whole process,
I'm upset about it. I call my pops and I'm
just like, when that happened with the producer, I'm upset,
and he was just like, heyo, you know, did he
disrespect you.

Speaker 2 (54:48):
As a man? How do you feel the man I
am today?

Speaker 1 (54:50):
I should have told my dad, yeah, come on out,
because he said, yo, I want to come out be
there with you.

Speaker 2 (54:55):
But I said, no, it's all good. I had to
it's all good.

Speaker 1 (54:58):
And what I did was I just said, you know what,
all right, I'm always just do my job and I'm
gonna do the best at what I can do. But
as far as everybody else, you know what I mean,
it's just me right now, and I'm just gonna make
the show happen the way that I do. And because
at that point it was a thing of I ended
up going from here to here being a kid and
then now being an adele. My mom was my manager

(55:19):
at that time. And with my mom being my manager
at the time, I didn't want to tell her I
got a girl pregnant, you see what I'm saying. So
if it was someone that was a manager and I
could have just told him yeah, but I couldn't tell
him at that time.

Speaker 2 (55:30):
So it was like, oh, shoot, I can't. I can't
tell him this, you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (55:34):
And so I'm dealing with that because you know, I'm
dealing with that the whole time, she's you know, Belly
Stun's show.

Speaker 2 (55:40):
We're trying to hide it. You know what type of thing.

Speaker 3 (55:42):
You're just eating a little more than what you're shooting.

Speaker 1 (55:44):
Yeah, right, right, And and I'm having this frustration, you know,
with this writer as well too, and that's going on.
And then I remember she ended up she was just like, yo,
I want to have an abortion right and dealing with
that too as well, with no one knowing, no one knowing,
So no one knowing we're doing that. And I'm still, hey,
welcome to good Berg, Home to good you know, doing

(56:05):
all these shows making people laugh and all these different
things because I've been on you know, uh, good Morning America,
all these different you know, interviews and shows and telling
people about uh suicide of thoughts and emotions that you
might go through. And I never really pointed pinpointed who
the person was or who it is, you know, or
the things that were going on.

Speaker 2 (56:24):
And this is what is going on. Something that's from
sharing it with you.

Speaker 1 (56:27):
And so within that process of going on with that,
it's emotional roller coaster that was going on at that point.
And so that happens, and then what I ended up
doing right after that, you know, ended up getting pre
pregnant again, you know, throughout that process, even after we
have the abortion, and then ended up getting married right

(56:49):
as well. And so while that's going on with Nickelodeon,
I'm sort of like about to be on my way out,
I became this I don't want to say where what's
the word. It's more of likeer one lady. One lady
ended up saying it like this what she called me
the tupacat Nickelodeon, you know what I mean. So one

(57:12):
of the people that we work with, I wouldn't say that,
but this was what was said about me. And so
because of the point where I just was kind of like,
hey man, this is gonna be my show now, I'm
gonna do it this way. And I didn't agree, and
I didn't tell anybody what that you know, producer had
said to me at that time, and what was going on,
you know, and what was said and even what I

(57:34):
was going through personally within my life, what I was
going through, I wasn't sharing that with anybody.

Speaker 2 (57:39):
And that's a lot of a.

Speaker 1 (57:40):
Problem when you isolate that and within that process you
can go through a lot, you know what I mean.
And holding all that frustration inside, right, but I still
was able to have an outlet through the show, you know,
through the show and doing that process. And I remember
Mystery Man had came along with this movie called History

(58:00):
that I did with Ben Stiller, Genega Raffalo, and so
to me it was like, well, I'm on my way
out in Nickelodeon.

Speaker 2 (58:05):
It's all good, you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (58:07):
And a lot of people talk about, you know, Keenan
and I as far as like the split between the
keen and Niquel show. This is where it started. And
I think that even Keenan didn't really know either what
was going on because I didn't share what was going
on with me in the head writer on the show

(58:28):
when that happened, and what was going on, and I
didn't trust anybody at that moment either.

Speaker 3 (58:34):
Yeah, you speak about these thoughts that you were having,
and I think it was around two thousand and four,
and you said that you were at your lowest and
you contemplated taking your own life. You didn't talk, you
didn't have a therapist, you didn't have anybody that you
felt comfortable enough with to go sit down and have

(58:56):
a conversation with, even if it's not a therapist, maybe
a past or maybe closest friend. You held that you
bottled that up inside and dealt with it on your own.

Speaker 1 (59:04):
So this is what I mean about the understanding of
the timeline. Okay, So because that's a big speed up,
you know what I mean. So the start of that
from where the suicide is where I was just talking about.
So there was a start of that which was, like
I said, ninety nine, you know what I mean, around

(59:25):
that time. And so when that was going on, all
this process and me not sharing what was happening and
holding all of that and dealing with that, that's what
led to that party. So in the beginning of that,
with me holding all those that information, then Mystery Man
came along, you know that show, and I remember I'm

(59:47):
out the Nickelodeon.

Speaker 2 (59:48):
I'm like, I'm all good.

Speaker 1 (59:49):
And I remember the head writer who's Das Schneider, That's
what I was talking about, who was wrote on the
show at that time. He was also doing a a
movie I think believe it was a Liar Liar Okay, yeah,
with a matter with a matter, that lion of liar.
It was, Oh man, I'm trying to remember the name
of It wasn't Lion Liar, but it was a Mandabides

(01:00:11):
was supposed to be. It was in the movie, yes, yeah,
and it was about a kid, the lives and all
this stuff like that. But they wanted me to actually
be in that movie at first, you know, and I
was like, Yo, we should put Keenan in it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:22):
That would be dope to pick Keenan in it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:24):
And we both do that because we had a three
picture deal at Paramount when we were doing that, but
they decided that, you know, they didn't want they didn't
do the other movies. We just did Good Burger and
but but I was doing Mystery Man, so they were like, yo,
you should be on that and I was like, oh yeah,
but let's put keen in And they were like nah,
I think this is just be with you and I'm
like no, but I feel like, you know, we got

(01:00:45):
the show, let's do it. And also to the writers,
the same writer I had fallen out with, you know
what I mean, that's in the room and so I'm.

Speaker 2 (01:00:52):
Just like, A right, you know what I mean, I
don't want to do that.

Speaker 1 (01:00:54):
And I remember I left out of the room. H
and you know, all these producers exciting about doing this movie.
And I remember I left out of that room in
that situation, and then I saw Keenan and then I
saw Nick and they were like, yeah, we heard about
that meeting. They just started laughing, And for me, I
was just I felt like, yo, y'all was in there
fighting for you, you know what I mean, And that

(01:01:16):
kind of hurt at that moment. Think about me was
that I didn't relationship is very important and you need
to let people know how you feel.

Speaker 2 (01:01:25):
At that time, really wasn't doing that. There was a
trusting you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (01:01:29):
I had already been through death, you know, within my
family in Chicago, and all these things were going on
at this point.

Speaker 2 (01:01:36):
Both of my uncles was murdered. I had a friend
that was murdered that we talked about.

Speaker 1 (01:01:40):
All this happened around the same time, and so there
wasn't any no I wasn't seeing any therapist or anything
of that nature. I was just working constantly with working
on the show and within doing that. And then at
that time too, I ended up marrying my ex wife,
you know, because we had another baby. We had the baby, right,

(01:02:03):
we had the abortion, but then we had a baby
and she ended up telling me that the baby that
was aborted wasn't mine. And so within that process you
are immediately married within the lie already. Yeah, you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:02:21):
So the marriage was never the same after.

Speaker 1 (01:02:23):
That wasn't no, it was this is this is at
the beginning. You know what I'm saying is that at
the beginning. And so within that.

Speaker 3 (01:02:28):
Process you probably should have kept that to herself.

Speaker 1 (01:02:31):
Well you know, I'm glad she didn't. And so within
that process, with that being known, it was just like, yo,
and now I'm on TV.

Speaker 2 (01:02:40):
All this year. I'm still on TV all this thing. Man,
I don't have time to really process that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:44):
And she almost, you know, with even in being you know,
the pregnancy, she almost died within the pregnancy.

Speaker 2 (01:02:50):
So that was a hard time too.

Speaker 1 (01:02:51):
And I remember the some of the writers coming to
this set, to the hospital and they were like bringing
presents and I'm thinking like.

Speaker 2 (01:02:58):
Oh, yeah, cool, thank you, And then they were like, yo,
what can you be back on set?

Speaker 3 (01:03:02):
And it was just low, yeah, see what I'm dealing with.

Speaker 1 (01:03:05):
We'll see what I'm dealing with. But you know, no
no shout out to you know, no no shade to them.
They were just they were doing what they were told
as far as the job to see if Kel can
get be back on set. And I was the one
that you know, ended up getting someone pregnant, you know,
around that time. But I'm just setting up so you
understand what was really going on when we get to
two thousand and four, you know what I mean, And

(01:03:27):
that in that process, so and now knowing that this
you know, the kid is in you know, his mind,
and then now leaving the show you know, on Nickelodeon,
and then I had Mister Man, this big show, and
I'm thinking like, oh, yeah, that's gonna be it, you
know what I mean, And learning within that process too
where it was like, hey, well no, I don't want

(01:03:47):
to renew on all that ken nick Kel, I'm good,
do you know what I'm saying. And I already know
what's going on as far as what's happening within this
realm of what's going on with the show behind the
scenes and what's going on with me, and I was
just like, yo, I'm ready to leave anyway. And then
Mystery Man didn't do as well as we thought, you
know what I mean, as we thought it was gonna do.

(01:04:08):
Within that process, and then just navigating through that now
being a father. And here's the thing about it is
that the reason I didn't have anybody relate to because
I was the first one out of the entire cast
to be married, to have a house, you know, have kids,
and Keenan Nick, none of them could relate to that.

(01:04:29):
They were still being kids. And also too, there was
this process of I got it known again. I already
know what I'm doing.

Speaker 2 (01:04:36):
You know what I mean, and that's what I was doing.

Speaker 1 (01:04:38):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (01:04:39):
To me, it was like, I gotta I can handle this.
I can handle this.

Speaker 1 (01:04:42):
You couldn't tell you you can't handle this within the
start up because you're really going through something that is
really deep and you need to let people know and
let people know how you feel and let people know
what's on your heart, what's really going on. But I
kept it in. It was like I can handle this. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
This concludes the first half of my conversation. Part two
is also posted and you can access it to whichever
podcast platform you just listen to part one on. Just
simply go back to Club Shay profile and I'll see
you there.