March 11, 2025 • 57 mins
In Episode 395 of the Ice Cream Convos Podcast, veteran actor Ricco Ross sits down with Xaviera to discuss his captivating role as Horace Bellarie in Tyler Perry’s "Beauty in Black" on Netflix! 🖤
From almost turning down the role to how a simple audition mistake landed him the job, Ricco gives us the inside scoop on playing one of the most complex characters on TV.
We also dive into his legendary career, working with Hollywood greats like Stanley Kubrick and James Cameron, and the wild ride of filming with Tyler Perry’s unique process!
Plus, did you know Ricco was the leading man in Whitney Houston’s "Saving All My Love for You" music video?! 🤯
Also Read: 5 Things We Learned About ‘Beauty In Black’ Star Ricco Ross
Don’t forget to subscribe & share!🎉
For more on these stories visit: IceCreamConvos.com
For more episodes visit: IceCreamConvosPodcast.com
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/ice-cream-convos-podcast--2027902/support.
From almost turning down the role to how a simple audition mistake landed him the job, Ricco gives us the inside scoop on playing one of the most complex characters on TV.
We also dive into his legendary career, working with Hollywood greats like Stanley Kubrick and James Cameron, and the wild ride of filming with Tyler Perry’s unique process!
Plus, did you know Ricco was the leading man in Whitney Houston’s "Saving All My Love for You" music video?! 🤯
Also Read: 5 Things We Learned About ‘Beauty In Black’ Star Ricco Ross
Don’t forget to subscribe & share!🎉
For more on these stories visit: IceCreamConvos.com
For more episodes visit: IceCreamConvosPodcast.com
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/ice-cream-convos-podcast--2027902/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Ice cream.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Ice ice cover on the grind all day, every day,
ice cream combos always real. They never play, download the podcast,
listen on any day.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Why didn't not do this sooner?
Speaker 4 (00:23):
On that thing?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
And ever say Eximea r best host of all time.
All of the faithful listeners will say they ain't never alive.
Check every story. They run like me with the Brahms,
win not the Sols report. Anything is to be your
crime entertainment news hit.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
I gotta get mine from I C C. And you
should be in.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Con to do the same if you got at Verman,
I do go sign this lady to shine like Franking Stein.
Tell it that they designed ice creamcombos dot com. This
influence fluent for ice for I.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Happy Beauty and Black Day. Thank you, Happy Beauty in
Black Day Part two is officially streaming on Netflix. Your
girls got up six am because I needed to know
if Charlie was in that car. I was up at
six am because I needed Now. You know, I'm East
(01:36):
Coast time, so if I weren't East Coast time, I
would have been able to rock at midnight. But because
I'm East Coast, we don't get in until three am.
And I wanted to be bright eyed and bushy tailed
for this interview because it is such an honor to
talk to you, and I know we are going to
have a good time because, Sir, I went on a
deep dive of you recently and you are just as
(02:00):
fascinating Rico Ross the Man is just as fascinating as
the characters that you portray on screen and film. Thank you,
so just thank you for giving me the opportunity to
chat with you today. Like I told you, we are
going to have a lot of fun. So let's start
with beauty and black. Let's just start where it matters most.
(02:22):
So you are literally killing this role as okay, thank
you in every way possible. You are killing this role.
Harras is probably one of the most complicated characters that
we've seen in quite some time. You know, he's struggling
with his health, he's struggling with his sexuality, he is
(02:44):
struggling with this family that is dismantling in real time.
Talk to me about the journey of this role coming
to you. You reading this script and saying yeah, I'm
ready to take this on.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Well, I'll be honest with you. When I first read
the script, when I first got the the the request
to put myself on tape. I was very busy and
I just I didn't want to put myself on tape.
I've been doing so many tapes and been working on
a film at the time. But something was going on
(03:21):
in my head that was I couldn't stop it, and
it was that saying ninety percent of successes showing up,
and so I just thought, RICO just show up. So
I got my wife, who's my reader, and I asked
to us, says, can we just do this one time?
If I get through it without messing up, then we'll
send that in. And we tried it, and as you know,
(03:43):
I spent a little while memorizing the line so I can,
you know, really get into the character. And then we
did it, and halfway through the recording of it, my
character is supposed to cough because he's sick, and I
coughed at the same time she said the following line.
Speaker 4 (04:01):
I didn't hear it.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
The camera's still rolling, so I say, in character, excuse me,
and she's behind the screen going and then I say,
in character, I didn't hear you, and then she says
the line, and of course we're back on track, and
we finished the scene. Wow, that is the tape I
sent in for them, this for this part. And she
(04:24):
was saying, let's do it again. You made a mistake.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
I said, listen.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
I looked at it, and I said, this is the
essence of the character, and I can do it again
and not make a mistake. But this is the essence
of it. And that's what we sent there, and that's
what ended up getting me the job. I didn't appreciate
the part until I got the sixteen episodes.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
And when I read them, then I realized what I had.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Had on my hands here, and I realized the responsibility
because he is the patriarch of the family, and he
also is the CEO of the company, and he has
so many different layers. When you first meet him, you
think that he is a senior citizen with who's very poor,
living on a fixed income. You think when you first
(05:09):
meet him that he is elderly and he is not
very able. When you first meet him, you think that
he's a nice guy and that you know he could
be weak. You later realize that that saying they say,
don't mistake my kindness for weakness.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
You realize that really applies to Horace.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
You first meet him, you think that he could be
quite homophobic, and later on you find out that he's
actually curious himself. So the character had so many different
layers that I just thought, this is a dream to
play because this character is like embodying the villain and
the hero in the same role. And I just thought,
(05:50):
I've never played a character like this, and I want to.
I really want to maximize this opportunity. It was a
little difficult for me because the description of the character
was a seventy year old man who looked older and
moves older. He's dying of prostate cancer and he uh,
it just came across as someone that when you meet me,
you don't get seventy year old man.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
That's that's ill.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
And and so when I was offered a part, I
talked to production. They were in Atlanta, I was here
in LA and I said, you know, I haven't met
you guys, but I am not that that description he
says when you meet me, that's not what you're gonna
you're gonna think of. And they said, Tyler Perry personally
picked the lead actors and those are the characters he wants,
(06:34):
the actors he wants, and He'll make it fit. And
so when we got when I got to Atlanta, I thought,
how can I find this character? I mean, I read
the sixteen episodes, and I read it a few times,
and I felt like I had a beginning of the character.
Speaker 4 (06:49):
But I just felt like I didn't have it.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
And I started talking to Tyler about it, and then
I realized I needed a foundation. My father was a
big man and statue physical statute, but also in the community.
And my father never raised his voice, and often when
people would raise their voice around him, he would lower
his so that they would listen. And I thought, that's
(07:13):
my foundation right there. Now I have to find I
have to find how I'm going to build this house.
And I start trying on shoes, because I in America,
we tend to work from the inside out on method.
You know, in England they tend to work from the
outside in because they do a lot of period pieces,
so maybe a certain outfit will make them feel the
(07:34):
character a certain pair of shoes. So here I am
using all of all all of my resources, and I'm thinking, Okay,
I've got the foundation, that is my method. I've got
to find the right shoes. I've got to find the
right outfit. Wardrobe was helping me with that. And then
Tyler suggested that I that I use a cigar, that
I smoke a cigar, So I started smoking a cigar.
(07:57):
I don't smoke cigars, but I started smoking. One of
the things I've found was that when I smoke a cigar,
it gave my voice a different tone, and that was.
Speaker 4 (08:07):
A tone that I thought would work for the character.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
And then I think the last thing was when he
suggested that I that I use a cane, and when
I got the cane, it it was a got you now,
I got you now.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
But you know, it's so funny that you mentioned that
about the character because even in watching on the outside
and looking in watching it is like you said, it's
he is. It's almost like watching him evolve as the
series use right a faulting character because even just locking
in this morning, because you know, I told you I
(08:45):
got it early to lock in, and I'm just like,
he is a meaning you know, there is just you
just see these sides. But if you think about us
as human beings, we all have to the right situation
can bring out the wrong person.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
Thank you, And.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
You're watching this and I remember that you know, a
particular episode because I encourage everyone to watch if they
have not already watched, so we don't want to spoil anything.
But there was a particular episode where it was like, oh,
y'all got Horace fed up? He is not, y'all, don't
let I always say Rico, I always say, don't let
(09:23):
the smooth taste fool you, right, And I said, y'all
the cold forty five, y'all, let the smooth fool you.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Don't let the.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Cane mislead you now. And so I just love out
of the entire show. I believe Horace and Charlie Steven g. Northfleet,
who is my buddy? You two are just every time
he's on screen, I'm screaming, just laughing.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
He is, he is on fire. He eats the screen up,
he eats the screen up, and it's just it's just him.
He's got a kind of a of imagination and an
energy that when he's when he's in the room, you
are going to see him in the room, even if
he's not speaking, you're going to see him.
Speaker 4 (10:08):
And he's got that type of energy. I think.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
I think one of the things that that Tyler doesn't
get enough credit for is his casting ability.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
Because he doesn't do a lot of directing, especially with.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
The veteran actors like me and Debbie Morgan, Malik Whitfield. Uh,
that's right, yes, Richard Lawson. He doesn't direct us a lot.
He gives us enough rope to go out there and
possibly hang ourselves, but he lets us roll, you know,
and and we and we take advantage of it. We
don't abuse it, but we do take advantage of it.
And I think for the other the younger actors, they
(10:42):
bring an energy themselves. They bring a certain energy and creativity,
and when you put the two together, it's like building
a championship team. You start off with some rookies and
you and you add some some some veterans, and when
you get that right mix, you know, magic happens.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Absolutely. So let's talk about where with Tyler Perry because
as a veteran in Hollywood, I'm sure you have worked
with many different directors and been on many different sets,
and I always hear stories about Tyler Perry's unorthodox like
style of filming. Like you come in, it's like, hey,
we're gonna we're gonna film a seven series, a seven
(11:20):
season series. Oh, Okay, great, let me look at the schedule. Oh,
three days, you.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
Have done your homework, We're gonna film this. Done your homework, girl.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
You know who you're talking to, Rico, but you know,
talk to me about just that switch up and just
you know, if you had to personally adjust to that
style of filming with all the different sets that you've
been on.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
The first thing I want to say is that there's
something about this guy who because people know him from
a da they think that he is and that he
kind of can be silly and whatnot. But when you
get to know him, you realize this man is a savant.
He is a genius. And I don't use that word lightly.
(12:11):
He is doing to film what Elon must did to cars.
He's doing that and Hollywood, some of Hollywood understands that
right now, but they're going to know.
Speaker 4 (12:24):
Soon because this is the future of filmmaking.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
It's not an easy thing for a veteran actor to
step into his project because it's so different from what
we're used to. And I've worked with the biggest directors
in the in the world. I've worked with Stanley Kubrick,
James Cameron on aliens. I've worked with Brian de Palmer
on Mission Impossible. I could go on and on, and
(12:51):
Tyler has to be put in that conversation because of
his unique way of.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Filming, and you can't. You can't.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
I don't know if it's something that people can can duplicate,
because it's you can duplicate the technical aspect of it.
But Tyler also has this ability, you know, when we
get on set. The first day I got on set
and for decades, so I thought, you know, I can
(13:20):
handle it. These young cats are going to handle it.
I can handle it. The first day I got on set,
it was that they brought in the pages that you
were going to shoot that day. And normally in Hollywood
you shoot six or seven pages a day something like that.
They brought in the page one inch thick of pages,
and I thought, is this the first episode? They were going, No,
that's what we're shooting today. It was eighty one pages.
(13:43):
Let me tell you girl. My butt tightened up so tight.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
I was like, I don't get to get Jesus on
the main line.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
And I had to. I had to talk myself down.
I said, listen, Rica, you're going to take on this
the same way a person walks a thousand miles, one
step at a time to go, and you're gonna focus
on this first scene that you're gonna do. You're gonna
kill that scene. And as you're changing clothes for the
next scene that they have a reader. They have six readers,
(14:10):
and these readers are there with the actors. So while
you're changing clothes, you're running lines for the next scene.
And by the time you finish your wardrobe and you
get back on set, boom, it's the next scene.
Speaker 4 (14:23):
You kill that one. You go change for the next.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
Because you know, if you if you're shooting a scene, say,
for instance, in a hospital, Tyler will shoot all the
scenes in the hospital throughout the sixteen episodes that day
in that location, and there's no way as a as
a as an artist, or as an actor that you
can memorize all of those scenes. So what you do
is you you memorize your your monologues, your paragraphs, and
(14:49):
you become as familiar with it before you walk on
before you ever walk on set, you become as familiar
as possible with your dialogue because you only get your
dialogue the night before.
Speaker 4 (15:01):
That you're going to shoot the next day.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
Wow, Yes, that's when that's when you get your dialogue.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Amazing.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
It depends on what takes place on that.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Day, you know, right, right?
Speaker 4 (15:16):
Wow?
Speaker 3 (15:18):
So that is it is, it is, it is. It
is challenging. And he said that a lot of veteran
actors can't work with him and his way of filming
because they're so used to the pace of Hollywood and
it's a completely different pace. But after the first day,
I realized, Okay, I got you now, brother, you, I
got you.
Speaker 4 (15:37):
We're good.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
So in preparation for this conversation today, because I I
don't like interviews. I like to have a conversation. Doesn't
this feel like a conversation. It's good, right, Yes, As
I was preparing, sometimes I get nervous when I talk
to someone that I really really admired their work, or
their catalog or you know, just them as a human being.
(16:01):
I tend to get nervous. I don't want to say
the wrong thing. I don't want to fumble my words.
I don't want to ramble too much. And then an
amazing actor gave me this jewel that I took with
me today walking into this interview, I don't get nervous,
I get ready.
Speaker 4 (16:20):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Yes, and I said, Rico dropped a gym with that one.
And I said, you know what, rather than being nervous,
I will be prepared. I will do my homework. And
doing my homework on you was absolutely amazing. It was fun,
It was fun to learn. I learned so much about you.
(16:42):
I had to take notes, sir, and we're going to
get into these notes. We're going to get into all that.
I literally had to take notes. I said, I do
not want to miss the opportunity for everyone to learn
how fascinating and amazing that you are. Let's start with you.
Number one, A Chicago native.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Yes, Chicago niggas born in Cook County Hospital.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Cook County, Cook County Hospital. And you have a huge family.
Five siblings and five like five brothers and five.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
Sisters, yes, eleven of us all together, five sisters and
five brothers, which is an amazing upbringing because you know,
I never had to worry about bullying or anything like
that at school because I had my own gang. You know,
pull up, we pull it up. We've pulled it up,
(17:41):
so never had to worry about that. I didn't even
understand it. And as a matter of fact, I always
disliked bullies. The first fight I ever got into at
school was was with a bully that was bullying someone else.
Because I mean, when you grew up with a family
that big, yes, and also we didn't we were very rich,
we were quite you know, didn't have a lot of means.
(18:04):
But what I later realized is that we we we
we had we were wealthy. We grew up wealthy because
we had love, and we had community, and we had family.
And it took me until until college before I understood
that I actually grew up wealthy. My father, he was
an entrepreneur. I'll say entrepreneur because he did everything from
(18:25):
working as a taxi driver, a security guard to uh
running the numbers in Chicago. And he was a special
kind of kind of man. But when the when the
FEDS decided to crack down on number runners, he moved
out to the country and he moved to this area
about an hour outside of Chicago called Pembroke Hopkins Park area,
(18:46):
which Oprah said was the poorest town in the country. Wow,
so that's the type of poor we're talking about. We're
talking about where you can't even afford the two o's.
It's just pope, you know, it's like that, right, and
and and and so I I didn't know it that
that was financially poor because everybody around me was similar.
It wasn't until later on when I went to high
(19:07):
school that I understood that, oh wow, we were poor.
But it was in college that I understood that we
were wealthy.
Speaker 1 (19:15):
So let's talk about high school. Rico. You went to
a high school, Plantation High school.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Girl, planned let me tell you. Can you imagine when
you come from Chicago. Imagine coming from the midwest of
Chicago and your parents split up, and you you're moving
to the South and you're thinking, you know, we have
certain preconceived ideas of what the South.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
Is like anyway.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
We think that people are slow, that they are races,
they're not the smartest people in the country. And I
get there and they tell me that my school is
called Plantation High. Imagine what that does to a young
kid who who's from from sho shy Town. You know, yes,
and I just thought this is crazy. But you know,
that was how I ended up getting into acting. Strangely enough, Yes,
(20:00):
we had a we had a school that was being
built that was going to be called South Plantation, but
until it was completed, they had us go on to
Plantation High and they the student body would the original
student body would go in the morning time and we
would go in the afternoon. And one day we got
there early and I tried to sneak in, and the
teacher caught me, and I lied. I said, I left
(20:22):
my book. I want to go get my book. I
just made it up on the fly, and she could
read right through me. But I was, I was, I
was committed to this, to this lie right. And then
a little white girl came up and said the same thing,
and she had left her her book, and the teacher
allow allowed her to go and get it. And I
just like I played the race card, like like it
(20:42):
was an ace of spade, and I just my eyes
got watery, and I just told her, you let her
go in there, but you wouldn't let me. And what's
the difference between the two of us. We both came
up here and said the same thing. And I just
I'm running it, I'm rolling with it, and I'm convinced, convincing.
And she said, I am not going to allow you
in the school early, but what I will do is
I'll put you in my play. And that's how I.
Speaker 4 (21:04):
Got into it.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
So wow. So she saw the actor in you trying
to get it back. Now do you think it was
two things could be true at the same time.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Exactly that she.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Wasn't letting you into school for obvious reason, but she
also saw the talent within you, exactly. Okay, Okay. So
then from there, so we go to Plantation High School.
Eventually you go head to college and you got into
this UCLA program and.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
Yeah, I got to UL. Yes, they'll accepted twelve people
a year, and I managed to be one of the twelve.
And once I got in there, I thought, yeah, I'm
going to make the most of this, and I did.
And afterwards I started working right out of college, and
I did Young and the Restlers for a while, and
then my second.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
Big job was Hill Street Blues. I don't know if
you that, but.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
You don't know if I remember that. Don't make me
sing the theme song. I absolutely loved and it was
as I was, I'm like the Young and the Restless
because Victor Newman is a card carrying member of my family. Okay,
number one Victor Newman, mister Eric Braden to be exact,
(22:21):
and then weird, I was like Hill Street Blues. I
was like, I have seen Rico my entire life. Oh
my gosh, Hill Street Blues. That was me and my
grandmother used to watch that favorite. Oh oh my goodness,
Hill Street Blues.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
Oh, it was a good show, and it was it
was very it was very innovative at the time. All
of these CSI shows they sprung from the style of
shooting that they did. And I played I played a
gang member, but coming from Chicago, playing a gang member
was very easy. The problem with that was after that
show ended and we won twenty one Emmys that year
(23:00):
that I was on, and that was the last year.
Speaker 4 (23:02):
Every job I got after that.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
For the next three jobs were playing gang members or
those type of characters. So I went back to one
of my professors at UCLA and I wanted to have
an honest conversation. I says, I don't want to seem ungrateful,
because I am very grateful that I'm working. Right out
off the bat, I'm working, But I said, I feel
typecast already, and I'm walking around with a master's degree
(23:25):
from UCLA, but I'm only being seen as a gang
member and that type of role.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
And he suggested, he says.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Acting is. When you're an actor, you're a student of society.
He says, I think you should audition for this Shakespearean
course in London, and if you get accepted, I think
you should move over there. And it would be a
good experience for you as an actor, but it would
also be a good experience for you as a young man.
And I auditioned, I got in, I went over there
and moved over there. And by the time we finished
(23:54):
the program, they had asked all the Americans when they
arrived to acquire British accents. This is because we don't
want you focusing so much on the accent that you
forget about the character. And so by the time the
program was over with, my British accent was as good
as any brit that was in the class.
Speaker 4 (24:11):
And I like them. I followed them, and after.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
The course was over with, they started going on auditions
and meetings and doing British roles and doing Shakespearean roles.
So I made up the equivalent of faith social security.
I started going out on auditions, and for the first
four years after that I worked as an English actor,
(24:37):
and then after four years I got my working visa,
and then I was an American actor based in Europe.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
I was so tempted to come on and say good morning, Bruv.
I was so tempted, so tempted, I was like, nah,
I don't want to. I don't want to jump the shark.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
I gotta because I'll go with you.
Speaker 4 (24:57):
I will go with you.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Is absolutely best me. So you ended up staying over
across the pond for thirteen years.
Speaker 4 (25:06):
Thirteen years.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Yeah, okay, but in these thirteen years, I need you
to talk to me about turning down a professional basketball contract.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
Sir, You'll be hooped, you know. I still I got
to tell you. I still kind of wish I had
taken advantage of that because what was happening at that time.
This was years ago, and basketball wasn't as globally played
as it is now. And so being someone who comes
from you know, I've got five brothers, and my older
(25:40):
brothers they made their their way by playing ball in college.
That's how they got through college. And being a younger brother,
I'm one of the younger ones. We would battle on
the court. And so even though I never played college basketball,
I played like a college basketball player, and so I
would walk, I would have jobs and in France and
(26:01):
Italy and Germany, and as soon as I would arrive,
I would ask him where did the pros play?
Speaker 4 (26:06):
Because they didn't have to pick up basketball.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
I'd walk in there. I'm six three, I'm two hundred pounds.
I'd walk in there. I said, I want to run
with you guys. They hear my accent. I'm a black American,
come on, come on. We would run and we would
ball and I would be great for like the first
half of the practice, and then my win would just
let me down because I wasn't in that type of
condition or in the first half.
Speaker 4 (26:29):
I would kill him.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
So once we were on vacation in Cyprus and I
asked the same question. I went and played with the
pros and there was a big guy on their team.
He was their center. He was about seven feet and
he was talking smack to me. So that kind of
like just lit me up and business.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
Hey.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
He got dunked on and even his teammates were going,
oh my god. And the coach asked me, he says,
would you come tomorrow? I says, of coourse, I'll come tomorrow.
So the next day I knew, I knew he was
looking at me, so I showed out atle Bit and
then he offered me an eight month contract. And I
had just had my daughter, who was only like about
(27:07):
six months old. Yeah, and I had The main reason
I didn't go was because I didn't know Cyprus as
a country. I didn't speak the language, and I had
reservations about bringing a newborn to a country where I
knew nothing about.
Speaker 4 (27:21):
Yeah, but I wish I had played.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
I wish to play.
Speaker 4 (27:26):
Guard point guard.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
And the beauty of that is that they only allowed
They only allowed two Americans on the team. The other
American they had ended up playing for the Lakers and
he's now a coach in the NBA. And I was
going to be the other American. And I think, you know,
if I had played, who knows when my career would
have gone. But I would have had to stop acting,
you know. So that was That was the other thing,
is I had.
Speaker 4 (27:48):
An acting career.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
I was still trying to get that off the road,
off the ground and get traction with that. And I
had gotten traction with and I just thought it would
be a shame to stop all that and try something
completely different.
Speaker 4 (28:00):
That was that was why I passed on it.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
That is, you are so so just interesting. You are
just it's funny. I was like, what it be? My
first thought was, Rico Ross has lived many lives because
in addition to acting, going across the pond, becoming an
illegal brit for a little bit.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
Yes, yes, then you.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Had an offer to play pro ball, you were modeling.
But let me tell you what made me scream up
in here? You were the leading man and Whitney Houston
saving all my love for you, mister Rico Ross, I said,
(28:50):
look at him at the at the studio keeper.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Again, you have done your homework.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
You stolen moments. I said, that's Rico still in the moment.
Go mister Ross, put some respect on it. Talk to
me about that. How did that come to be? Because listen,
let me show you it is not a game with
me and miss Whitney like I literally have. That is
(29:19):
the woman I wanted to be when I was younger.
I wanted to be a thank just like Whitney Houston.
I'm from Jersey, moved to atlant I wanted to have
two albums, independent albums. I wanted to be Whitney Houston, sir.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
But I just.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Didn't have what it take. I didn't have anythink but
the dream was real. I loved this woman and I said, look,
e Rico up in the thing. Talk to me about
that was that during I made an assumption that that
was during your modeling era. Am I right?
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Good assumption? Good assumption, good assumption. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
I you know, I was working as an actor in London.
But I you know, when you're working as an actor often,
you know, there are times when you go.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
Months without work.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
So I thought I had to find something else, and
I auditioned for you know, one of the things that
I was when I first started in this entertainment business.
When I was in college, I took a bunch of
ballet classes and I was drawn to the ballet classes
because of the girls in the ballet.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
Classes and sous but a lot.
Speaker 3 (30:30):
And I thought, yeah, I thought, I'm black, I can dance.
Black people can dance. So I thought, I'll figure it out.
And I get into class and it is not an
easy thing to become good at ballet. You have to
put the time in, yes, But coming from a competitive family,
my ego got the best of me and I was
I refuse to let these other guys in the class
be better than me. And because of my basketball when
(30:52):
it comes to leaps and things like that, I was
just like I was, you know, I was showing off. Anyway,
I got very good at it, and I got offered
a contract to play to be a ballet dancer and
uh Broward Civic Ballet in Florida, and I did it
a show for them and it was a great show
and they offered me a permanent space spot in it.
(31:14):
But I just remember thinking, it's a lot of time
in the studio preparing your body for what you're going
to do, and you can't talk, and I like to
talk too much. I'm like you girl, I like to
use my voice a little bit.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
So when it came to when you know, so, I
just felt like when it comes to when it came
to modeling this, there was an audition. They wanted tall
guys who could move, who could move because there was
like slight movement and it was choreography, and I thought, oh,
I can do this. I got the job. And once
(31:53):
I got the job, the choreographer says, we book men
in three shows a year, and we were the country.
We tour the world for those three shows three seasons.
We women have four seasons, the men have three I
would like to offer you a position as a regular member.
The only thing I asked for you, she said, is
(32:13):
that if you accept the job, that you do, the job,
that you show up, you don't cancel on me. That's
the only thing I accept. And so what would happen
is you would do Springs Show tour all around. We
would hit London, Paris, Milan, Munich, New York, and maybe Vegas,
and at the end of the tour she would book
(32:34):
you for the following spring and the only thing she
asked is that if you accept, don't cancel. So I
was doing this for four years and I was kind
of acting because I just thought, I'm going to act
like a model and if they if they buy it,
I'm just gonna go head on and let them pay
me for it because I'm traveling around the world with
the most beautiful women in the world. Naomi Campbell was
(32:58):
modeling when I was there, and they're paying me and
getting to experience this whole different lifestyle. But what happened.
Batman offered me a small role in the very first
Batman with Jack Nicholson, and it was playing opposite Jack
Nicholson and my dates worked with their dates, and so
I accepted their job. And it was a small part,
(33:22):
and my career was taking off as an actor a bit,
and I just thought, I'll take this small part because
it's with Jack Nicholson. But then they started moving the
dates and they ended up moving it to the conflicted
with this modeling date, and I had to make a decision,
and I had told her, you know, if I accept
I'll do it. So I passed on the Jack Nicholson.
And you got to keep in mind, Batman. This was
(33:42):
the very first one. No one knew Batman was going
to be Batman. It became so I passed on it
and I did the show, but I told her after
that that I can't do it anymore because it's conflicting
with my career.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
Rico, just listening to your story and just digesting it all.
You have been in multiple situations like many of us,
but I feel like you have been in crossroad positions
like do I continue to model? Do I take my
chance here? Not to get personal, but do you rely
(34:20):
on a higher power for guidance, because just from the
outside looking in, it appears that you have always seemingly
made the right choice. Because me, they still would have
been talking about me over at the thing, because I'd
have been like writ in front of Jack Nicholson, like
get out of here, batman.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
You know.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
It's just it's like, it's not like you had to
decide am I going to go to McDonald's or Wendy's.
You had to decide are you going to stay true
to it? And I think that's probably one of the
reasons why God has always blessed you, because you are
a man of your word and you're honorable, right, And
but how how do you what do you rely on?
(35:00):
I know now you have a beautiful wife and a
beautiful family, But as a young man who is navigating
his life and seeing the world, let's not overlook that
you have literally seen the entire world. Some people ain't
left their zip code, you know what I'm saying. So
just what did you rely on at that time? You know,
(35:22):
just to make the right decision in your career.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
I don't know. I think coming from a big family,
when you have eleven siblings in one family, there are
a lot of personalities that you have to learn to navigate,
and you take this as like boot camp for getting
out into the real world. So by the time I
got into the real world. I think I have an
(35:47):
advantage in some respect because of those eleven kids. As
a matter of fact, when I was growing up, I
always thought, when I grew up, I want to have
eleven kids, until I had one and I realized how
much work it is. I'm consuming it is.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
Making them, but taking care of them something different.
Speaker 3 (36:05):
Exactly exactly, So I always I always appreciate the wealth
that I came from. And people always associate wealth with money,
but I think Africans from the Motherland, they understand the
real meaning and the definition of wealth and wealth is
community and family. And I grew up with such wealth
(36:26):
that I think it prepared me for being out there
and I and I think it also helped me make
the decisions. And I don't know if all the decisions
were the right decisions to make. I might have been
successful at being a model.
Speaker 4 (36:39):
I was.
Speaker 3 (36:40):
Actually I was good at it because I could move
well and I and I have personality. I'm not shy,
and so you put me on a runway and you're
going to be watching me.
Speaker 4 (36:50):
And I was successful at basketball, you.
Speaker 3 (36:53):
Know, I was really good at it. And I had
I had this this this young boy with big brothers
chip on my shoulders. So when I played against guys,
especially bigger guys, you know, I went at them like
I was going at my brothers, you know, and trying
to prove something to them. So I often had these opportunities,
and I tried to make the most of them. But
(37:14):
I think what I really focused on my decision making
was what's going to be the best in the long term.
I didn't want to be a ballet dancer because one
of the things I thought is that you're thirty years
old and your career is at an end.
Speaker 4 (37:28):
You're forcing to retirement. I felt the same thing about basketball.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
You become you know, you're in your thirties, and you
start looking at retirement, and so that was part of
helping you make the right decision. And then I also thought,
you know, what is best for my family, for my
wife or my kids, you know, those those came into
my life, into my brain about making this decision. And
(37:53):
I would often ask my family. My older brothers who
played pro ball, I asked him, you know, he he
counseled me and said, you know, listen, you got to
do what works for you right now. And so I
took this I took this this information from my older
brothers and sisters and and they kind of helped me,
help guide me through these difficult times when I had
(38:16):
come at a crossroad and I never I never looked
at it. I never looked at it as a cross
work road, per se. But that is exactly what they were,
now that you've mentioned it, UH, and I will look
at it in the future that way, because that's what
they were.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Mm hmm. Okay, So I don't you know, I tend
to get distracted a little bit. I you still have
not told me how you ended up sitting across from
Whitney Houston and she was saving all her love for you.
Speaker 4 (38:41):
I tell you about Whitney. Let me tell you about her.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
Tell me about her.
Speaker 4 (38:46):
First of all.
Speaker 3 (38:47):
When I was working with her, I was modeling at
the time, and that's how I got invited to UH
to meet with him about this project. And the director
had actually told me he says, I had already cast this,
but the guy at cast was too good looking, and
that was kind of like a backhand slo and he
(39:07):
did not smile when he said it. But I thought,
what I thought, what I'm bringing to it is I'm
bringing some skills to it, and I had been acting,
and so this was not a modeling job. This was
an acting job. And that's the way I approached it.
And as a matter of fact, Whitney at the time,
she hadn't done any acting. She was just a beautiful
young sister. And we got along great, and I kind
(39:30):
of helped her with the acting part of it. I said, listen,
just how we're talking right now. When we started getting
in front of the camera, forget about the camera. We're
going to have some fun. If you get inspired to
say something, say it. I'll back. I'll come back with something.
And if I get inspired to say something, I'll say it,
and let's just have this little back and forth. And
she loved the idea and we started playing around, and
when we got on camera, that chemistry happened. I also,
(39:52):
I mean, she's a beautiful girl. Yes, he's a beautiful girl.
I found her very attractive, and I did not know
how talented she was. I had heard the song because
they would play it, but it was played on a
loop and you didn't see her singing it. And I
remember there was this one scene and I'm behind the glass,
I'm the producer and she's out there in front of
the mic and she's singing, and we had done about
(40:13):
three or four takes and it wasn't working, and the
director kept saying cut and he goes, Whitney, can you
actually sing it? Because I need to see your voice
and all that, and she started singing. And that's when
I thought, this girl here, because I had no one
knew who she was, really this girl here. When she
started singing, I said, I don't know how big she's
(40:33):
going to be, but every box that you would tick
for somebody who has it, she was ticking it. She
looked amazing, she sounded like, I mean, a voice like
that coming from a young girl at that age, you know,
it was just I couldn't believe it. And when she
started singing, actually singing that song, that's when I knew,
I don't know what this video is going to do.
(40:55):
I don't know what this song is going to do,
but this girl has the potential to be one of
the greatest singers ever. And I to this day, and
it's not just because I was in the in the
video with her and because I got to know her personally,
but I still think she has one of the best
voices bar none, I mean maybe away the Franklin.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
The voice she has, there's.
Speaker 3 (41:17):
Something about her voice when she sings, it's like she's
singing from her soul. And if you're a human being,
you're gonna feel that. And I don't know, I don't
It's like she hasn't had an old soul that at
that time. And we got along so well. We actually
exchanged numbers and we were gonna gonna hang out and
in contact, but she was living in New York and
I was living in London, so it didn't work out.
(41:38):
And then shortly afterwards I heard about some guy named
Bobby Brown and I thought.
Speaker 1 (41:43):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's his put to you so full
circle moment. You played Uncle Ray in the Bobby Christina movie.
Speaker 3 (41:55):
Yes, And that was that was kind of that was
kind of emotional for me, you know, one because of
the story itself. When I when I when I read
the story, I wasn't familiar with the story and when
I read the story, and it was just such a
tragedy and and so I played. Interest Interestingly enough, the
(42:16):
girl who played Bobby Christina is named Joy and she
is in Beauty and Black and her and I were
the only two people that hadn't worked with Tyler before.
Speaker 4 (42:26):
We were the only newbies, and we.
Speaker 3 (42:28):
Had only worked together because we had done uh the
Bobby Christina story and I played I played the uncle
slash bodyguard and she played Bobby Christina and we had
an amazing time. Her and I just love working together,
and when we saw each other on Beauty and Black.
She's my favorite actress of all because her name is Joy,
(42:51):
and that's what she brings. She brings joy to the
to the set, and you don't see it, but behind
camera she is. She is the life of the party.
And I had not worked with anyone else on the
show before, and so it was the first time that
I worked on the show with all of these people,
but the only person I had worked on was Joy,
and it was it was great that we had come
(43:12):
full circle from Whitney Houston project.
Speaker 4 (43:15):
Was it was.
Speaker 3 (43:16):
It was kind of emotional for me because it brought
it back to me. And and also it was just
such a tragedy, you know, such a tragedy because I
think if Whitney had had managed to to stay true
to her art and her talent, you know, I don't
know what she would have come up with afterwards. You know,
(43:37):
it's the same sort of thing you think about Prince
and Michael Jackson if they had lived on how would
they have evolved, How would their music had evolved? How
would they have changed music in around the world because
they had that type of talent, as you knows.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
As I know, as I absolutely now. So swinging back
to Beauty and Black, a question that I had for
you as one of the stars of the show. You well,
I guess you already mentioned that. But after filming, do
you guys get to screen the whole thing or do
you watch it in real time with us?
Speaker 3 (44:13):
No, we've been fortunate enough to have Tyler has invited
us to his house. I'll see house.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, yeah, his community, one hundred million dollars on a place.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
It's it's gonna look a little bigger than the house.
Yeah yeah, in Georgia at that Yeah. So, but he
invited us to screen the first two episodes before they
came out of Okay part and uh, we we went
to his house and we had dinner and then uh afterwards,
he says, we're gonna go downstairs to my screening room
and we're gonna watch watch the first two episodes. His
(44:49):
screening room was a theater basically yeah yeah, yeah, with
beautiful chairs and all that. But we went and watched it,
and then afterwards, before before watching it, he pulled me
over to the side and he says, Rico, I want
to explain something to you. And he says, I want
your character to be mysterious, So I'm introducing him very slowly,
(45:09):
and that's going to give us room to go as
the series progresses. And he did just that, and so
he warned me that because you wouldn't see me very
much in the first two episodes. And we saw the
first two episodes and we were surprised at how you know,
when you're filming something, you know, you're so preoccupied with
(45:29):
in the moment, getting into character, getting your lines right,
making sure you have the right outfit on all these
things that you're really not taking in. Everything else is happening, right,
But the way Tyler shoots, there's so many moving parts happening.
And an example, maybe I'll walk onto the set to
do a scene with me and one other person and
he'll go, Okay, Rico, what's the scene about? And he
(45:51):
knows what the scene is about. And as I'm explained,
he wants to know if I know, and make sure
we're on the same page. And as I'm explaining to him,
halfway through, he'll do this sign like this and say rolling.
So now the cameras are starting to roll even though
I'm still talking. And by the time I finished talking,
he stepped out and he'll go and action and you're
(46:12):
on it's it's it's like that.
Speaker 4 (46:16):
It's like that.
Speaker 3 (46:17):
Okay, so it's it's a whole different way of filming,
and it's a whole it's a lot of a lot
of you. You have to be on your a game,
you have to be focused. And so when we get
to the screening room and we're watching it and we're
seeing that it looks more like a movie than like
a than like a TV show. Jimmy jam Does did
the music, so it sounds it sounds new too, and
(46:39):
we're watching this and we're just very we're very pleased
with the with the teamwork, because a lot of people
don't understand that when you when these actors win awards,
it's not because of them alone. There's a team of
people behind them that makes that performance what it was.
Speaker 4 (46:59):
There's makeup, there's hair, there's there.
Speaker 3 (47:03):
There's there's a crew that the camera man, there's an editor,
there's there's so many that there. There are the people
that feed you. You know, there's so many people that
assist you to be able to create that performance that
you create, and I think they don't get the credit
for it. But when we saw the finished product, we
were able to appreciate the teamwork and how that teamwork
(47:25):
had worked. You know, sometimes you can have all the
right parts, you can have all the right characters, the
right director, the right script, and the project doesn't work.
And other times, you know you'll get something and you
and you feel it feels rushed. It always feels rush
with Tyler because he likes to shoot at a pace
that's very different from Hollywood, and he doesn't like to
do multiple takes.
Speaker 4 (47:46):
He likes to do one take.
Speaker 3 (47:47):
Okay, to imagine, you know, you're doing this scene and
you got and you lose your line, You just forget
your line. He's cool with that ask for line. Somebody
throws you the line, You digest it, and then you
say it in character and you can keep it going.
And as a veteran actor, I understood at one point, Oh,
he's only doing one take, and there's sometimes there is
a line that I want to I'm not sure whether
(48:09):
I want to go this way or that way with it.
Speaker 4 (48:11):
So what I would do is I'll.
Speaker 3 (48:12):
Give him one one version of it, and then I'll
ask him let me get one?
Speaker 4 (48:17):
Can I one? And then I'll do my version of it?
Speaker 3 (48:19):
And sometimes my version will be different words completely, but
I would ask for one every now and then or
ask for two because I want to. I want the
editor to have choices when he gets into the editing room.
So as a veteran, I have the knowledge to understand
that this is something that that that will enhance my
performance later on when they get into the editing room.
(48:40):
So you know, there's little tricks like that that the
veterans would use. And I think like like like rookies
that watch veterans in in pro sports, they pick up
on some of these techniques and they start using it too,
and before you know what, everybody's on the same page
and the performances are real because we're allowed to do
(49:02):
things like that.
Speaker 4 (49:03):
And when we.
Speaker 3 (49:04):
Saw it on the screen, yeah, we were very pleased,
and he was very pleased. You could tell he was very.
Speaker 4 (49:10):
Pleased with it.
Speaker 1 (49:11):
Yes, So I'm not putting you on this spot, but I.
Speaker 4 (49:15):
Foresee the spot now.
Speaker 1 (49:17):
Yeah, but I'm the spot. I foresee multiple seasons of
this show. Would you give me a nod that you
would be down because I need more Horace because listen,
I'm already praying for his condition. I'm praying because I
(49:38):
know God is a good guy. He in the healing business.
So I need Horras to get that cough together because
he is so far every time he coughed, I say,
oh Lord every time he But you know, is that
something that you could see yourself kind of stand around
for the long haul? You know, because I know an
(50:01):
answer to your question.
Speaker 4 (50:02):
An answer to your question, I'll say this.
Speaker 3 (50:05):
We were doing a scene and it was an office
scene where we're at the office and it's the boardroom
and there's a big clash between Horace and his brother Norman,
and you see these two you see these two bulls clash.
And we finished the scene and Tyler says cut, and
(50:27):
he comes into the room and he tells the cast
look at that monitor. And we look over at a
monitor and there's like fifty sixty people around the monitor
watching the scene we just shot. And they're extras, their
crew members, they're the people who feed you, they're they're
all watching the scene we just shot. And he says,
(50:51):
that doesn't happen very often. And we've got something because
nobody asked them to watch the scene. They want to
see the play of that scene that you just shot.
That doesn't happen very often. Then he pulled me over
to the side and he says, Rico, I'm watching this
scene and I'm watching what you do. And he says,
I'm having a hard time focus, focusing, and he says,
(51:13):
the reason why is because in the back of my mind,
I'm thinking I can't kill him off. He says, I
love killing off, killing off characters, but he says, I'm
thinking I cannot kill him off. And he asked me
at that time, this is halfway through the first season.
He asked me if I would be willing to stay on.
He says, if you've got some other things happening, I understand,
(51:35):
but I would love you to stay on for season two.
And it was at that time that I told him,
I said, listen, this character that you've entrusted me to
breathe life into is I've never played a character where
you're at some point you're the villain, at some point
you're the hero in the same role. I said, these
(51:56):
parts don't come come around very often for actors, so
of course I want to I'm.
Speaker 4 (52:01):
With you until the wheels drop off front. Yes and
so and so that was like, uh, that was like
the the uh, the moving forward moment for.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
Love to hear it, Love to hear it, love to
hear it. I think this is a perfect place for
me to wrap up this beautiful conversation with you, because
then I'll start rambling like, well, what kind of cartoons
did you like to watch? Because I just I just
find you so fascinating. I just when people who have
(52:32):
lived like just I admire you because what I see
when I look at your life is someone who live fearlessly.
There are a lot of people who want to try
to do things, people who want to go live abroad,
people who want to try to see if they can hoop,
and fear keeps them stagnant. And just reading your story
(52:54):
and doing a deep dive in your career. Not to mention,
you're in half of every favorite show or movie I
ever watched, and it's just like this man has lived
fearlessly and do you feel that? Do you feel like
I do?
Speaker 3 (53:11):
I do, because I think when you come from from
from small beginnings, you know that you can handle that.
So everything else has been a bonus, you know. And
I don't take it for granted. I pray every morning
and most of my prayer is about gratitude and the
gratitude of the wealth that has been bestowed upon me.
(53:34):
And I'm not talking about about dollars either when I
talk about that. So yeah, and I do I make
choices that are risky choices, but I think in life,
life is pretty much all about the choices you make.
Speaker 4 (53:50):
Some people make bad choices and they suffer the consequences
of them.
Speaker 3 (53:53):
Some people make wrong choices and they learn from them
and they move forward. But it is about the choices
that you make in life. And I've just I've always
tried to make the right choice. But I've always also
not been afraid of that it could be wrong.
Speaker 4 (54:09):
You know. I heard from Richard.
Speaker 3 (54:12):
Lawson has a podcast, and I know he didn't create
this quote, but I heard it on it, so I'm
going to give him credit for bringing it to me.
And he says, when you're chasing greatness. You have to
learn to be comfortable with the uncomfortable wow. And and
sometimes it's uncomfortable to move to another country where you
(54:33):
don't know anybody in that country and you're living there.
It's an uncomfortable feeling. You don't know how it's going
to work. It's uncomfortable to to work. And in some
of these countries I had, I did a movie in
I did a movie in Hungary and it was at
a time when they had just stopped being a communist
(54:54):
country and they were a capitalist country, and they weren't
used to seeing black people. And I was walking around
and people would stare at me as if I was
from Mars. And the difference between them and us is
when when we see someone staring at us, and we
catch someone staring, they turn away.
Speaker 4 (55:10):
It's not there.
Speaker 3 (55:11):
You catchum staring at you. They keep on staring and
it's a very uncomfortable thing. But you know, it also
helps that I'm a big guy. I figure, you know,
I could handle myself. I used to teach kung fu
in London, so you know, I'm very capable of handling myself.
And I think it would be very different if I
was a female, A black woman walking through this country
and people are just staring at you with a blank expression.
Speaker 4 (55:34):
Completely blank.
Speaker 3 (55:35):
You don't know whether they think, oh she's attractive or
oh she's interesting, or whether they think I hate this person.
Speaker 4 (55:41):
You know, you don't know what. And it's very uncomfortable.
Speaker 3 (55:44):
But you I learned from taking these uh, making these
decisions and taking these chances, that I have learned to
become comfortable with the uncomfortable.
Speaker 1 (55:54):
Wow. And my last question for you, what is your
favorite flavor of ice cream? Do you eat ice cream?
Because you know I'm ice cream conversations, so I have
to ask people will be like you didn't even ask
him about the ice cream girl.
Speaker 4 (56:06):
It was like, I mean, any Rocky Road ice cream
near me?
Speaker 1 (56:11):
You Rocky. I'm a butter girl myself, but Rocky love me.
Speaker 3 (56:17):
Some butter pecan. Not only that, I love me some
I love me some pecan pie too.
Speaker 1 (56:21):
Oh see, I haven't ventured to the pie. I don't
mess with pie too, Monie Less because you know Yecky Road.
Thank you so much, Rico for just giving me the
opportunity to have this conversation with you. Thank you for
sharing your talent with us. You are always welcome to
come sit down and chat with me some more when
(56:42):
we talk about season three and four and five and
seasons If you are always going to wait.
Speaker 3 (56:46):
Till you see to you to you finish seeing that
the first on the second part of season one, and
I want to talk to you about that after you've
seen that, because it's going to be a ride, girl.
It's going to be how are you going to follow
up season the first half? And I know how they
did it, and so it's going to be a ride.
It is interesting to get your views on the second part.
Speaker 1 (57:06):
I would love to give them to you. So far
season well, I want to say season two, but it's
part two. So far Apart two is giving it up.
It's giving it up. It is Part two is giving
it up. So I am locked in, completely locked in.
I am going to continue watching after our conversation, but
just congratulations on all of your success and make the
(57:28):
Lord bless you. Keep you, continue to keep giving you roles,
and keep you on all of our screens and in theaters.
I'll talk to you soon. Have a great day.
Ice cream.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Ice ice cover on the grind all day, every day,
ice cream combos always real. They never play, download the podcast,
listen on any day.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Why didn't not do this sooner?
Speaker 4 (00:23):
On that thing?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
And ever say Eximea r best host of all time.
All of the faithful listeners will say they ain't never alive.
Check every story. They run like me with the Brahms,
win not the Sols report. Anything is to be your
crime entertainment news hit.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
I gotta get mine from I C C. And you
should be in.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Con to do the same if you got at Verman,
I do go sign this lady to shine like Franking Stein.
Tell it that they designed ice creamcombos dot com. This
influence fluent for ice for I.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Happy Beauty and Black Day. Thank you, Happy Beauty in
Black Day Part two is officially streaming on Netflix. Your
girls got up six am because I needed to know
if Charlie was in that car. I was up at
six am because I needed Now. You know, I'm East
(01:36):
Coast time, so if I weren't East Coast time, I
would have been able to rock at midnight. But because
I'm East Coast, we don't get in until three am.
And I wanted to be bright eyed and bushy tailed
for this interview because it is such an honor to
talk to you, and I know we are going to
have a good time because, Sir, I went on a
deep dive of you recently and you are just as
(02:00):
fascinating Rico Ross the Man is just as fascinating as
the characters that you portray on screen and film. Thank you,
so just thank you for giving me the opportunity to
chat with you today. Like I told you, we are
going to have a lot of fun. So let's start
with beauty and black. Let's just start where it matters most.
(02:22):
So you are literally killing this role as okay, thank
you in every way possible. You are killing this role.
Harras is probably one of the most complicated characters that
we've seen in quite some time. You know, he's struggling
with his health, he's struggling with his sexuality, he is
(02:44):
struggling with this family that is dismantling in real time.
Talk to me about the journey of this role coming
to you. You reading this script and saying yeah, I'm
ready to take this on.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Well, I'll be honest with you. When I first read
the script, when I first got the the the request
to put myself on tape. I was very busy and
I just I didn't want to put myself on tape.
I've been doing so many tapes and been working on
a film at the time. But something was going on
(03:21):
in my head that was I couldn't stop it, and
it was that saying ninety percent of successes showing up,
and so I just thought, RICO just show up. So
I got my wife, who's my reader, and I asked
to us, says, can we just do this one time?
If I get through it without messing up, then we'll
send that in. And we tried it, and as you know,
(03:43):
I spent a little while memorizing the line so I can,
you know, really get into the character. And then we
did it, and halfway through the recording of it, my
character is supposed to cough because he's sick, and I
coughed at the same time she said the following line.
Speaker 4 (04:01):
I didn't hear it.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
The camera's still rolling, so I say, in character, excuse me,
and she's behind the screen going and then I say,
in character, I didn't hear you, and then she says
the line, and of course we're back on track, and
we finished the scene. Wow, that is the tape I
sent in for them, this for this part. And she
(04:24):
was saying, let's do it again. You made a mistake.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
I said, listen.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
I looked at it, and I said, this is the
essence of the character, and I can do it again
and not make a mistake. But this is the essence
of it. And that's what we sent there, and that's
what ended up getting me the job. I didn't appreciate
the part until I got the sixteen episodes.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
And when I read them, then I realized what I had.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Had on my hands here, and I realized the responsibility
because he is the patriarch of the family, and he
also is the CEO of the company, and he has
so many different layers. When you first meet him, you
think that he is a senior citizen with who's very poor,
living on a fixed income. You think when you first
(05:09):
meet him that he is elderly and he is not
very able. When you first meet him, you think that
he's a nice guy and that you know he could
be weak. You later realize that that saying they say,
don't mistake my kindness for weakness.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
You realize that really applies to Horace.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
You first meet him, you think that he could be
quite homophobic, and later on you find out that he's
actually curious himself. So the character had so many different
layers that I just thought, this is a dream to
play because this character is like embodying the villain and
the hero in the same role. And I just thought,
(05:50):
I've never played a character like this, and I want to.
I really want to maximize this opportunity. It was a
little difficult for me because the description of the character
was a seventy year old man who looked older and
moves older. He's dying of prostate cancer and he uh,
it just came across as someone that when you meet me,
you don't get seventy year old man.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
That's that's ill.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
And and so when I was offered a part, I
talked to production. They were in Atlanta, I was here
in LA and I said, you know, I haven't met
you guys, but I am not that that description he
says when you meet me, that's not what you're gonna
you're gonna think of. And they said, Tyler Perry personally
picked the lead actors and those are the characters he wants,
(06:34):
the actors he wants, and He'll make it fit. And
so when we got when I got to Atlanta, I thought,
how can I find this character? I mean, I read
the sixteen episodes, and I read it a few times,
and I felt like I had a beginning of the character.
Speaker 4 (06:49):
But I just felt like I didn't have it.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
And I started talking to Tyler about it, and then
I realized I needed a foundation. My father was a
big man and statue physical statute, but also in the community.
And my father never raised his voice, and often when
people would raise their voice around him, he would lower
his so that they would listen. And I thought, that's
(07:13):
my foundation right there. Now I have to find I
have to find how I'm going to build this house.
And I start trying on shoes, because I in America,
we tend to work from the inside out on method.
You know, in England they tend to work from the
outside in because they do a lot of period pieces,
so maybe a certain outfit will make them feel the
(07:34):
character a certain pair of shoes. So here I am
using all of all all of my resources, and I'm thinking, Okay,
I've got the foundation, that is my method. I've got
to find the right shoes. I've got to find the
right outfit. Wardrobe was helping me with that. And then
Tyler suggested that I that I use a cigar, that
I smoke a cigar, So I started smoking a cigar.
(07:57):
I don't smoke cigars, but I started smoking. One of
the things I've found was that when I smoke a cigar,
it gave my voice a different tone, and that was.
Speaker 4 (08:07):
A tone that I thought would work for the character.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
And then I think the last thing was when he
suggested that I that I use a cane, and when
I got the cane, it it was a got you now,
I got you now.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
But you know, it's so funny that you mentioned that
about the character because even in watching on the outside
and looking in watching it is like you said, it's
he is. It's almost like watching him evolve as the
series use right a faulting character because even just locking
in this morning, because you know, I told you I
(08:45):
got it early to lock in, and I'm just like,
he is a meaning you know, there is just you
just see these sides. But if you think about us
as human beings, we all have to the right situation
can bring out the wrong person.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
Thank you, And.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
You're watching this and I remember that you know, a
particular episode because I encourage everyone to watch if they
have not already watched, so we don't want to spoil anything.
But there was a particular episode where it was like, oh,
y'all got Horace fed up? He is not, y'all, don't
let I always say Rico, I always say, don't let
(09:23):
the smooth taste fool you, right, And I said, y'all
the cold forty five, y'all, let the smooth fool you.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Don't let the.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Cane mislead you now. And so I just love out
of the entire show. I believe Horace and Charlie Steven g. Northfleet,
who is my buddy? You two are just every time
he's on screen, I'm screaming, just laughing.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
He is, he is on fire. He eats the screen up,
he eats the screen up, and it's just it's just him.
He's got a kind of a of imagination and an
energy that when he's when he's in the room, you
are going to see him in the room, even if
he's not speaking, you're going to see him.
Speaker 4 (10:08):
And he's got that type of energy. I think.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
I think one of the things that that Tyler doesn't
get enough credit for is his casting ability.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
Because he doesn't do a lot of directing, especially with.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
The veteran actors like me and Debbie Morgan, Malik Whitfield. Uh,
that's right, yes, Richard Lawson. He doesn't direct us a lot.
He gives us enough rope to go out there and
possibly hang ourselves, but he lets us roll, you know,
and and we and we take advantage of it. We
don't abuse it, but we do take advantage of it.
And I think for the other the younger actors, they
(10:42):
bring an energy themselves. They bring a certain energy and creativity,
and when you put the two together, it's like building
a championship team. You start off with some rookies and
you and you add some some some veterans, and when
you get that right mix, you know, magic happens.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Absolutely. So let's talk about where with Tyler Perry because
as a veteran in Hollywood, I'm sure you have worked
with many different directors and been on many different sets,
and I always hear stories about Tyler Perry's unorthodox like
style of filming. Like you come in, it's like, hey,
we're gonna we're gonna film a seven series, a seven
(11:20):
season series. Oh, Okay, great, let me look at the schedule. Oh,
three days, you.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
Have done your homework, We're gonna film this. Done your homework, girl.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
You know who you're talking to, Rico, but you know,
talk to me about just that switch up and just
you know, if you had to personally adjust to that
style of filming with all the different sets that you've
been on.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
The first thing I want to say is that there's
something about this guy who because people know him from
a da they think that he is and that he
kind of can be silly and whatnot. But when you
get to know him, you realize this man is a savant.
He is a genius. And I don't use that word lightly.
(12:11):
He is doing to film what Elon must did to cars.
He's doing that and Hollywood, some of Hollywood understands that
right now, but they're going to know.
Speaker 4 (12:24):
Soon because this is the future of filmmaking.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
It's not an easy thing for a veteran actor to
step into his project because it's so different from what
we're used to. And I've worked with the biggest directors
in the in the world. I've worked with Stanley Kubrick,
James Cameron on aliens. I've worked with Brian de Palmer
on Mission Impossible. I could go on and on, and
(12:51):
Tyler has to be put in that conversation because of
his unique way of.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Filming, and you can't. You can't.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
I don't know if it's something that people can can duplicate,
because it's you can duplicate the technical aspect of it.
But Tyler also has this ability, you know, when we
get on set. The first day I got on set
and for decades, so I thought, you know, I can
(13:20):
handle it. These young cats are going to handle it.
I can handle it. The first day I got on set,
it was that they brought in the pages that you
were going to shoot that day. And normally in Hollywood
you shoot six or seven pages a day something like that.
They brought in the page one inch thick of pages,
and I thought, is this the first episode? They were going, No,
that's what we're shooting today. It was eighty one pages.
(13:43):
Let me tell you girl. My butt tightened up so tight.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
I was like, I don't get to get Jesus on
the main line.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
And I had to. I had to talk myself down.
I said, listen, Rica, you're going to take on this
the same way a person walks a thousand miles, one
step at a time to go, and you're gonna focus
on this first scene that you're gonna do. You're gonna
kill that scene. And as you're changing clothes for the
next scene that they have a reader. They have six readers,
(14:10):
and these readers are there with the actors. So while
you're changing clothes, you're running lines for the next scene.
And by the time you finish your wardrobe and you
get back on set, boom, it's the next scene.
Speaker 4 (14:23):
You kill that one. You go change for the next.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
Because you know, if you if you're shooting a scene, say,
for instance, in a hospital, Tyler will shoot all the
scenes in the hospital throughout the sixteen episodes that day
in that location, and there's no way as a as
a as an artist, or as an actor that you
can memorize all of those scenes. So what you do
is you you memorize your your monologues, your paragraphs, and
(14:49):
you become as familiar with it before you walk on
before you ever walk on set, you become as familiar
as possible with your dialogue because you only get your
dialogue the night before.
Speaker 4 (15:01):
That you're going to shoot the next day.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
Wow, Yes, that's when that's when you get your dialogue.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Amazing.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
It depends on what takes place on that.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Day, you know, right, right?
Speaker 4 (15:16):
Wow?
Speaker 3 (15:18):
So that is it is, it is, it is. It
is challenging. And he said that a lot of veteran
actors can't work with him and his way of filming
because they're so used to the pace of Hollywood and
it's a completely different pace. But after the first day,
I realized, Okay, I got you now, brother, you, I
got you.
Speaker 4 (15:37):
We're good.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
So in preparation for this conversation today, because I I
don't like interviews. I like to have a conversation. Doesn't
this feel like a conversation. It's good, right, Yes, As
I was preparing, sometimes I get nervous when I talk
to someone that I really really admired their work, or
their catalog or you know, just them as a human being.
(16:01):
I tend to get nervous. I don't want to say
the wrong thing. I don't want to fumble my words.
I don't want to ramble too much. And then an
amazing actor gave me this jewel that I took with
me today walking into this interview, I don't get nervous,
I get ready.
Speaker 4 (16:20):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Yes, and I said, Rico dropped a gym with that one.
And I said, you know what, rather than being nervous,
I will be prepared. I will do my homework. And
doing my homework on you was absolutely amazing. It was fun,
It was fun to learn. I learned so much about you.
(16:42):
I had to take notes, sir, and we're going to
get into these notes. We're going to get into all that.
I literally had to take notes. I said, I do
not want to miss the opportunity for everyone to learn
how fascinating and amazing that you are. Let's start with you.
Number one, A Chicago native.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Yes, Chicago niggas born in Cook County Hospital.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Cook County, Cook County Hospital. And you have a huge family.
Five siblings and five like five brothers and five.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
Sisters, yes, eleven of us all together, five sisters and
five brothers, which is an amazing upbringing because you know,
I never had to worry about bullying or anything like
that at school because I had my own gang. You know,
pull up, we pull it up. We've pulled it up,
(17:41):
so never had to worry about that. I didn't even
understand it. And as a matter of fact, I always
disliked bullies. The first fight I ever got into at
school was was with a bully that was bullying someone else.
Because I mean, when you grew up with a family
that big, yes, and also we didn't we were very rich,
we were quite you know, didn't have a lot of means.
(18:04):
But what I later realized is that we we we
we had we were wealthy. We grew up wealthy because
we had love, and we had community, and we had family.
And it took me until until college before I understood
that I actually grew up wealthy. My father, he was
an entrepreneur. I'll say entrepreneur because he did everything from
(18:25):
working as a taxi driver, a security guard to uh
running the numbers in Chicago. And he was a special
kind of kind of man. But when the when the
FEDS decided to crack down on number runners, he moved
out to the country and he moved to this area
about an hour outside of Chicago called Pembroke Hopkins Park area,
(18:46):
which Oprah said was the poorest town in the country. Wow,
so that's the type of poor we're talking about. We're
talking about where you can't even afford the two o's.
It's just pope, you know, it's like that, right, and
and and and so I I didn't know it that
that was financially poor because everybody around me was similar.
It wasn't until later on when I went to high
(19:07):
school that I understood that, oh wow, we were poor.
But it was in college that I understood that we
were wealthy.
Speaker 1 (19:15):
So let's talk about high school. Rico. You went to
a high school, Plantation High school.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Girl, planned let me tell you. Can you imagine when
you come from Chicago. Imagine coming from the midwest of
Chicago and your parents split up, and you you're moving
to the South and you're thinking, you know, we have
certain preconceived ideas of what the South.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
Is like anyway.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
We think that people are slow, that they are races,
they're not the smartest people in the country. And I
get there and they tell me that my school is
called Plantation High. Imagine what that does to a young
kid who who's from from sho shy Town. You know, yes,
and I just thought this is crazy. But you know,
that was how I ended up getting into acting. Strangely enough, Yes,
(20:00):
we had a we had a school that was being
built that was going to be called South Plantation, but
until it was completed, they had us go on to
Plantation High and they the student body would the original
student body would go in the morning time and we
would go in the afternoon. And one day we got
there early and I tried to sneak in, and the
teacher caught me, and I lied. I said, I left
(20:22):
my book. I want to go get my book. I
just made it up on the fly, and she could
read right through me. But I was, I was, I
was committed to this, to this lie right. And then
a little white girl came up and said the same thing,
and she had left her her book, and the teacher
allow allowed her to go and get it. And I
just like I played the race card, like like it
(20:42):
was an ace of spade, and I just my eyes
got watery, and I just told her, you let her
go in there, but you wouldn't let me. And what's
the difference between the two of us. We both came
up here and said the same thing. And I just
I'm running it, I'm rolling with it, and I'm convinced, convincing.
And she said, I am not going to allow you
in the school early, but what I will do is
I'll put you in my play. And that's how I.
Speaker 4 (21:04):
Got into it.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
So wow. So she saw the actor in you trying
to get it back. Now do you think it was
two things could be true at the same time.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Exactly that she.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Wasn't letting you into school for obvious reason, but she
also saw the talent within you, exactly. Okay, Okay. So
then from there, so we go to Plantation High School.
Eventually you go head to college and you got into
this UCLA program and.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
Yeah, I got to UL. Yes, they'll accepted twelve people
a year, and I managed to be one of the twelve.
And once I got in there, I thought, yeah, I'm
going to make the most of this, and I did.
And afterwards I started working right out of college, and
I did Young and the Restlers for a while, and
then my second.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
Big job was Hill Street Blues. I don't know if
you that, but.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
You don't know if I remember that. Don't make me
sing the theme song. I absolutely loved and it was
as I was, I'm like the Young and the Restless
because Victor Newman is a card carrying member of my family. Okay,
number one Victor Newman, mister Eric Braden to be exact,
(22:21):
and then weird, I was like Hill Street Blues. I
was like, I have seen Rico my entire life. Oh
my gosh, Hill Street Blues. That was me and my
grandmother used to watch that favorite. Oh oh my goodness,
Hill Street Blues.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
Oh, it was a good show, and it was it
was very it was very innovative at the time. All
of these CSI shows they sprung from the style of
shooting that they did. And I played I played a
gang member, but coming from Chicago, playing a gang member
was very easy. The problem with that was after that
show ended and we won twenty one Emmys that year
(23:00):
that I was on, and that was the last year.
Speaker 4 (23:02):
Every job I got after that.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
For the next three jobs were playing gang members or
those type of characters. So I went back to one
of my professors at UCLA and I wanted to have
an honest conversation. I says, I don't want to seem ungrateful,
because I am very grateful that I'm working. Right out
off the bat, I'm working, But I said, I feel
typecast already, and I'm walking around with a master's degree
(23:25):
from UCLA, but I'm only being seen as a gang
member and that type of role.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
And he suggested, he says.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Acting is. When you're an actor, you're a student of society.
He says, I think you should audition for this Shakespearean
course in London, and if you get accepted, I think
you should move over there. And it would be a
good experience for you as an actor, but it would
also be a good experience for you as a young man.
And I auditioned, I got in, I went over there
and moved over there. And by the time we finished
(23:54):
the program, they had asked all the Americans when they
arrived to acquire British accents. This is because we don't
want you focusing so much on the accent that you
forget about the character. And so by the time the
program was over with, my British accent was as good
as any brit that was in the class.
Speaker 4 (24:11):
And I like them. I followed them, and after.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
The course was over with, they started going on auditions
and meetings and doing British roles and doing Shakespearean roles.
So I made up the equivalent of faith social security.
I started going out on auditions, and for the first
four years after that I worked as an English actor,
(24:37):
and then after four years I got my working visa,
and then I was an American actor based in Europe.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
I was so tempted to come on and say good morning, Bruv.
I was so tempted, so tempted, I was like, nah,
I don't want to. I don't want to jump the shark.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
I gotta because I'll go with you.
Speaker 4 (24:57):
I will go with you.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Is absolutely best me. So you ended up staying over
across the pond for thirteen years.
Speaker 4 (25:06):
Thirteen years.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Yeah, okay, but in these thirteen years, I need you
to talk to me about turning down a professional basketball contract.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
Sir, You'll be hooped, you know. I still I got
to tell you. I still kind of wish I had
taken advantage of that because what was happening at that time.
This was years ago, and basketball wasn't as globally played
as it is now. And so being someone who comes
from you know, I've got five brothers, and my older
(25:40):
brothers they made their their way by playing ball in college.
That's how they got through college. And being a younger brother,
I'm one of the younger ones. We would battle on
the court. And so even though I never played college basketball,
I played like a college basketball player, and so I
would walk, I would have jobs and in France and
(26:01):
Italy and Germany, and as soon as I would arrive,
I would ask him where did the pros play?
Speaker 4 (26:06):
Because they didn't have to pick up basketball.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
I'd walk in there. I'm six three, I'm two hundred pounds.
I'd walk in there. I said, I want to run
with you guys. They hear my accent. I'm a black American,
come on, come on. We would run and we would
ball and I would be great for like the first
half of the practice, and then my win would just
let me down because I wasn't in that type of
condition or in the first half.
Speaker 4 (26:29):
I would kill him.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
So once we were on vacation in Cyprus and I
asked the same question. I went and played with the
pros and there was a big guy on their team.
He was their center. He was about seven feet and
he was talking smack to me. So that kind of
like just lit me up and business.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
Hey.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
He got dunked on and even his teammates were going,
oh my god. And the coach asked me, he says,
would you come tomorrow? I says, of coourse, I'll come tomorrow.
So the next day I knew, I knew he was
looking at me, so I showed out atle Bit and
then he offered me an eight month contract. And I
had just had my daughter, who was only like about
(27:07):
six months old. Yeah, and I had The main reason
I didn't go was because I didn't know Cyprus as
a country. I didn't speak the language, and I had
reservations about bringing a newborn to a country where I
knew nothing about.
Speaker 4 (27:21):
Yeah, but I wish I had played.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
I wish to play.
Speaker 4 (27:26):
Guard point guard.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
And the beauty of that is that they only allowed
They only allowed two Americans on the team. The other
American they had ended up playing for the Lakers and
he's now a coach in the NBA. And I was
going to be the other American. And I think, you know,
if I had played, who knows when my career would
have gone. But I would have had to stop acting,
you know. So that was That was the other thing,
is I had.
Speaker 4 (27:48):
An acting career.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
I was still trying to get that off the road,
off the ground and get traction with that. And I
had gotten traction with and I just thought it would
be a shame to stop all that and try something
completely different.
Speaker 4 (28:00):
That was that was why I passed on it.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
That is, you are so so just interesting. You are
just it's funny. I was like, what it be? My
first thought was, Rico Ross has lived many lives because
in addition to acting, going across the pond, becoming an
illegal brit for a little bit.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
Yes, yes, then you.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Had an offer to play pro ball, you were modeling.
But let me tell you what made me scream up
in here? You were the leading man and Whitney Houston
saving all my love for you, mister Rico Ross, I said,
(28:50):
look at him at the at the studio keeper.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Again, you have done your homework.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
You stolen moments. I said, that's Rico still in the moment.
Go mister Ross, put some respect on it. Talk to
me about that. How did that come to be? Because listen,
let me show you it is not a game with
me and miss Whitney like I literally have. That is
(29:19):
the woman I wanted to be when I was younger.
I wanted to be a thank just like Whitney Houston.
I'm from Jersey, moved to atlant I wanted to have
two albums, independent albums. I wanted to be Whitney Houston, sir.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
But I just.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Didn't have what it take. I didn't have anythink but
the dream was real. I loved this woman and I said, look,
e Rico up in the thing. Talk to me about
that was that during I made an assumption that that
was during your modeling era. Am I right?
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Good assumption? Good assumption, good assumption. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
I you know, I was working as an actor in London.
But I you know, when you're working as an actor often,
you know, there are times when you go.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
Months without work.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
So I thought I had to find something else, and
I auditioned for you know, one of the things that
I was when I first started in this entertainment business.
When I was in college, I took a bunch of
ballet classes and I was drawn to the ballet classes
because of the girls in the ballet.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
Classes and sous but a lot.
Speaker 3 (30:30):
And I thought, yeah, I thought, I'm black, I can dance.
Black people can dance. So I thought, I'll figure it out.
And I get into class and it is not an
easy thing to become good at ballet. You have to
put the time in, yes, But coming from a competitive family,
my ego got the best of me and I was
I refuse to let these other guys in the class
be better than me. And because of my basketball when
(30:52):
it comes to leaps and things like that, I was
just like I was, you know, I was showing off. Anyway,
I got very good at it, and I got offered
a contract to play to be a ballet dancer and
uh Broward Civic Ballet in Florida, and I did it
a show for them and it was a great show
and they offered me a permanent space spot in it.
(31:14):
But I just remember thinking, it's a lot of time
in the studio preparing your body for what you're going
to do, and you can't talk, and I like to
talk too much. I'm like you girl, I like to
use my voice a little bit.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
So when it came to when you know, so, I
just felt like when it comes to when it came
to modeling this, there was an audition. They wanted tall
guys who could move, who could move because there was
like slight movement and it was choreography, and I thought, oh,
I can do this. I got the job. And once
(31:53):
I got the job, the choreographer says, we book men
in three shows a year, and we were the country.
We tour the world for those three shows three seasons.
We women have four seasons, the men have three I
would like to offer you a position as a regular member.
The only thing I asked for you, she said, is
(32:13):
that if you accept the job, that you do, the job,
that you show up, you don't cancel on me. That's
the only thing I accept. And so what would happen
is you would do Springs Show tour all around. We
would hit London, Paris, Milan, Munich, New York, and maybe Vegas,
and at the end of the tour she would book
(32:34):
you for the following spring and the only thing she
asked is that if you accept, don't cancel. So I
was doing this for four years and I was kind
of acting because I just thought, I'm going to act
like a model and if they if they buy it,
I'm just gonna go head on and let them pay
me for it because I'm traveling around the world with
the most beautiful women in the world. Naomi Campbell was
(32:58):
modeling when I was there, and they're paying me and
getting to experience this whole different lifestyle. But what happened.
Batman offered me a small role in the very first
Batman with Jack Nicholson, and it was playing opposite Jack
Nicholson and my dates worked with their dates, and so
I accepted their job. And it was a small part,
(33:22):
and my career was taking off as an actor a bit,
and I just thought, I'll take this small part because
it's with Jack Nicholson. But then they started moving the
dates and they ended up moving it to the conflicted
with this modeling date, and I had to make a decision,
and I had told her, you know, if I accept
I'll do it. So I passed on the Jack Nicholson.
And you got to keep in mind, Batman. This was
(33:42):
the very first one. No one knew Batman was going
to be Batman. It became so I passed on it
and I did the show, but I told her after
that that I can't do it anymore because it's conflicting
with my career.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
Rico, just listening to your story and just digesting it all.
You have been in multiple situations like many of us,
but I feel like you have been in crossroad positions
like do I continue to model? Do I take my
chance here? Not to get personal, but do you rely
(34:20):
on a higher power for guidance, because just from the
outside looking in, it appears that you have always seemingly
made the right choice. Because me, they still would have
been talking about me over at the thing, because I'd
have been like writ in front of Jack Nicholson, like
get out of here, batman.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
You know.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
It's just it's like, it's not like you had to
decide am I going to go to McDonald's or Wendy's.
You had to decide are you going to stay true
to it? And I think that's probably one of the
reasons why God has always blessed you, because you are
a man of your word and you're honorable, right, And
but how how do you what do you rely on?
(35:00):
I know now you have a beautiful wife and a
beautiful family, But as a young man who is navigating
his life and seeing the world, let's not overlook that
you have literally seen the entire world. Some people ain't
left their zip code, you know what I'm saying. So
just what did you rely on at that time? You know,
(35:22):
just to make the right decision in your career.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
I don't know. I think coming from a big family,
when you have eleven siblings in one family, there are
a lot of personalities that you have to learn to navigate,
and you take this as like boot camp for getting
out into the real world. So by the time I
got into the real world. I think I have an
(35:47):
advantage in some respect because of those eleven kids. As
a matter of fact, when I was growing up, I
always thought, when I grew up, I want to have
eleven kids, until I had one and I realized how
much work it is. I'm consuming it is.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
Making them, but taking care of them something different.
Speaker 3 (36:05):
Exactly exactly, So I always I always appreciate the wealth
that I came from. And people always associate wealth with money,
but I think Africans from the Motherland, they understand the
real meaning and the definition of wealth and wealth is
community and family. And I grew up with such wealth
(36:26):
that I think it prepared me for being out there
and I and I think it also helped me make
the decisions. And I don't know if all the decisions
were the right decisions to make. I might have been
successful at being a model.
Speaker 4 (36:39):
I was.
Speaker 3 (36:40):
Actually I was good at it because I could move
well and I and I have personality. I'm not shy,
and so you put me on a runway and you're
going to be watching me.
Speaker 4 (36:50):
And I was successful at basketball, you.
Speaker 3 (36:53):
Know, I was really good at it. And I had
I had this this this young boy with big brothers
chip on my shoulders. So when I played against guys,
especially bigger guys, you know, I went at them like
I was going at my brothers, you know, and trying
to prove something to them. So I often had these opportunities,
and I tried to make the most of them. But
(37:14):
I think what I really focused on my decision making
was what's going to be the best in the long term.
I didn't want to be a ballet dancer because one
of the things I thought is that you're thirty years
old and your career is at an end.
Speaker 4 (37:28):
You're forcing to retirement. I felt the same thing about basketball.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
You become you know, you're in your thirties, and you
start looking at retirement, and so that was part of
helping you make the right decision. And then I also thought,
you know, what is best for my family, for my
wife or my kids, you know, those those came into
my life, into my brain about making this decision. And
(37:53):
I would often ask my family. My older brothers who
played pro ball, I asked him, you know, he he
counseled me and said, you know, listen, you got to
do what works for you right now. And so I
took this I took this this information from my older
brothers and sisters and and they kind of helped me,
help guide me through these difficult times when I had
(38:16):
come at a crossroad and I never I never looked
at it. I never looked at it as a cross
work road, per se. But that is exactly what they were,
now that you've mentioned it, UH, and I will look
at it in the future that way, because that's what
they were.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Mm hmm. Okay, So I don't you know, I tend
to get distracted a little bit. I you still have
not told me how you ended up sitting across from
Whitney Houston and she was saving all her love for you.
Speaker 4 (38:41):
I tell you about Whitney. Let me tell you about her.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
Tell me about her.
Speaker 4 (38:46):
First of all.
Speaker 3 (38:47):
When I was working with her, I was modeling at
the time, and that's how I got invited to UH
to meet with him about this project. And the director
had actually told me he says, I had already cast this,
but the guy at cast was too good looking, and
that was kind of like a backhand slo and he
(39:07):
did not smile when he said it. But I thought,
what I thought, what I'm bringing to it is I'm
bringing some skills to it, and I had been acting,
and so this was not a modeling job. This was
an acting job. And that's the way I approached it.
And as a matter of fact, Whitney at the time,
she hadn't done any acting. She was just a beautiful
young sister. And we got along great, and I kind
(39:30):
of helped her with the acting part of it. I said, listen,
just how we're talking right now. When we started getting
in front of the camera, forget about the camera. We're
going to have some fun. If you get inspired to
say something, say it. I'll back. I'll come back with something.
And if I get inspired to say something, I'll say it,
and let's just have this little back and forth. And
she loved the idea and we started playing around, and
when we got on camera, that chemistry happened. I also,
(39:52):
I mean, she's a beautiful girl. Yes, he's a beautiful girl.
I found her very attractive, and I did not know
how talented she was. I had heard the song because
they would play it, but it was played on a
loop and you didn't see her singing it. And I
remember there was this one scene and I'm behind the glass,
I'm the producer and she's out there in front of
the mic and she's singing, and we had done about
(40:13):
three or four takes and it wasn't working, and the
director kept saying cut and he goes, Whitney, can you
actually sing it? Because I need to see your voice
and all that, and she started singing. And that's when
I thought, this girl here, because I had no one
knew who she was, really this girl here. When she
started singing, I said, I don't know how big she's
(40:33):
going to be, but every box that you would tick
for somebody who has it, she was ticking it. She
looked amazing, she sounded like, I mean, a voice like
that coming from a young girl at that age, you know,
it was just I couldn't believe it. And when she
started singing, actually singing that song, that's when I knew,
I don't know what this video is going to do.
(40:55):
I don't know what this song is going to do,
but this girl has the potential to be one of
the greatest singers ever. And I to this day, and
it's not just because I was in the in the
video with her and because I got to know her personally,
but I still think she has one of the best
voices bar none, I mean maybe away the Franklin.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
The voice she has, there's.
Speaker 3 (41:17):
Something about her voice when she sings, it's like she's
singing from her soul. And if you're a human being,
you're gonna feel that. And I don't know, I don't
It's like she hasn't had an old soul that at
that time. And we got along so well. We actually
exchanged numbers and we were gonna gonna hang out and
in contact, but she was living in New York and
I was living in London, so it didn't work out.
(41:38):
And then shortly afterwards I heard about some guy named
Bobby Brown and I thought.
Speaker 1 (41:43):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's his put to you so full
circle moment. You played Uncle Ray in the Bobby Christina movie.
Speaker 3 (41:55):
Yes, And that was that was kind of that was
kind of emotional for me, you know, one because of
the story itself. When I when I when I read
the story, I wasn't familiar with the story and when
I read the story, and it was just such a
tragedy and and so I played. Interest Interestingly enough, the
(42:16):
girl who played Bobby Christina is named Joy and she
is in Beauty and Black and her and I were
the only two people that hadn't worked with Tyler before.
Speaker 4 (42:26):
We were the only newbies, and we.
Speaker 3 (42:28):
Had only worked together because we had done uh the
Bobby Christina story and I played I played the uncle
slash bodyguard and she played Bobby Christina and we had
an amazing time. Her and I just love working together,
and when we saw each other on Beauty and Black.
She's my favorite actress of all because her name is Joy,
(42:51):
and that's what she brings. She brings joy to the
to the set, and you don't see it, but behind
camera she is. She is the life of the party.
And I had not worked with anyone else on the
show before, and so it was the first time that
I worked on the show with all of these people,
but the only person I had worked on was Joy,
and it was it was great that we had come
(43:12):
full circle from Whitney Houston project.
Speaker 4 (43:15):
Was it was.
Speaker 3 (43:16):
It was kind of emotional for me because it brought
it back to me. And and also it was just
such a tragedy, you know, such a tragedy because I
think if Whitney had had managed to to stay true
to her art and her talent, you know, I don't
know what she would have come up with afterwards. You know,
(43:37):
it's the same sort of thing you think about Prince
and Michael Jackson if they had lived on how would
they have evolved, How would their music had evolved? How
would they have changed music in around the world because
they had that type of talent, as you knows.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
As I know, as I absolutely now. So swinging back
to Beauty and Black, a question that I had for
you as one of the stars of the show. You well,
I guess you already mentioned that. But after filming, do
you guys get to screen the whole thing or do
you watch it in real time with us?
Speaker 3 (44:13):
No, we've been fortunate enough to have Tyler has invited
us to his house. I'll see house.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, yeah, his community, one hundred million dollars on a place.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
It's it's gonna look a little bigger than the house.
Yeah yeah, in Georgia at that Yeah. So, but he
invited us to screen the first two episodes before they
came out of Okay part and uh, we we went
to his house and we had dinner and then uh afterwards,
he says, we're gonna go downstairs to my screening room
and we're gonna watch watch the first two episodes. His
(44:49):
screening room was a theater basically yeah yeah, yeah, with
beautiful chairs and all that. But we went and watched it,
and then afterwards, before before watching it, he pulled me
over to the side and he says, Rico, I want
to explain something to you. And he says, I want
your character to be mysterious, So I'm introducing him very slowly,
(45:09):
and that's going to give us room to go as
the series progresses. And he did just that, and so
he warned me that because you wouldn't see me very
much in the first two episodes. And we saw the
first two episodes and we were surprised at how you know,
when you're filming something, you know, you're so preoccupied with
(45:29):
in the moment, getting into character, getting your lines right,
making sure you have the right outfit on all these
things that you're really not taking in. Everything else is happening, right,
But the way Tyler shoots, there's so many moving parts happening.
And an example, maybe I'll walk onto the set to
do a scene with me and one other person and
he'll go, Okay, Rico, what's the scene about? And he
(45:51):
knows what the scene is about. And as I'm explained,
he wants to know if I know, and make sure
we're on the same page. And as I'm explaining to him,
halfway through, he'll do this sign like this and say rolling.
So now the cameras are starting to roll even though
I'm still talking. And by the time I finished talking,
he stepped out and he'll go and action and you're
(46:12):
on it's it's it's like that.
Speaker 4 (46:16):
It's like that.
Speaker 3 (46:17):
Okay, so it's it's a whole different way of filming,
and it's a whole it's a lot of a lot
of you. You have to be on your a game,
you have to be focused. And so when we get
to the screening room and we're watching it and we're
seeing that it looks more like a movie than like
a than like a TV show. Jimmy jam Does did
the music, so it sounds it sounds new too, and
(46:39):
we're watching this and we're just very we're very pleased
with the with the teamwork, because a lot of people
don't understand that when you when these actors win awards,
it's not because of them alone. There's a team of
people behind them that makes that performance what it was.
Speaker 4 (46:59):
There's makeup, there's hair, there's there.
Speaker 3 (47:03):
There's there's a crew that the camera man, there's an editor,
there's there's so many that there. There are the people
that feed you. You know, there's so many people that
assist you to be able to create that performance that
you create, and I think they don't get the credit
for it. But when we saw the finished product, we
were able to appreciate the teamwork and how that teamwork
(47:25):
had worked. You know, sometimes you can have all the
right parts, you can have all the right characters, the
right director, the right script, and the project doesn't work.
And other times, you know you'll get something and you
and you feel it feels rushed. It always feels rush
with Tyler because he likes to shoot at a pace
that's very different from Hollywood, and he doesn't like to
do multiple takes.
Speaker 4 (47:46):
He likes to do one take.
Speaker 3 (47:47):
Okay, to imagine, you know, you're doing this scene and
you got and you lose your line, You just forget
your line. He's cool with that ask for line. Somebody
throws you the line, You digest it, and then you
say it in character and you can keep it going.
And as a veteran actor, I understood at one point, Oh,
he's only doing one take, and there's sometimes there is
a line that I want to I'm not sure whether
(48:09):
I want to go this way or that way with it.
Speaker 4 (48:11):
So what I would do is I'll.
Speaker 3 (48:12):
Give him one one version of it, and then I'll
ask him let me get one?
Speaker 4 (48:17):
Can I one? And then I'll do my version of it?
Speaker 3 (48:19):
And sometimes my version will be different words completely, but
I would ask for one every now and then or
ask for two because I want to. I want the
editor to have choices when he gets into the editing room.
So as a veteran, I have the knowledge to understand
that this is something that that that will enhance my
performance later on when they get into the editing room.
(48:40):
So you know, there's little tricks like that that the
veterans would use. And I think like like like rookies
that watch veterans in in pro sports, they pick up
on some of these techniques and they start using it too,
and before you know what, everybody's on the same page
and the performances are real because we're allowed to do
(49:02):
things like that.
Speaker 4 (49:03):
And when we.
Speaker 3 (49:04):
Saw it on the screen, yeah, we were very pleased,
and he was very pleased. You could tell he was very.
Speaker 4 (49:10):
Pleased with it.
Speaker 1 (49:11):
Yes, So I'm not putting you on this spot, but I.
Speaker 4 (49:15):
Foresee the spot now.
Speaker 1 (49:17):
Yeah, but I'm the spot. I foresee multiple seasons of
this show. Would you give me a nod that you
would be down because I need more Horace because listen,
I'm already praying for his condition. I'm praying because I
(49:38):
know God is a good guy. He in the healing business.
So I need Horras to get that cough together because
he is so far every time he coughed, I say,
oh Lord every time he But you know, is that
something that you could see yourself kind of stand around
for the long haul? You know, because I know an
(50:01):
answer to your question.
Speaker 4 (50:02):
An answer to your question, I'll say this.
Speaker 3 (50:05):
We were doing a scene and it was an office
scene where we're at the office and it's the boardroom
and there's a big clash between Horace and his brother Norman,
and you see these two you see these two bulls clash.
And we finished the scene and Tyler says cut, and
(50:27):
he comes into the room and he tells the cast
look at that monitor. And we look over at a
monitor and there's like fifty sixty people around the monitor
watching the scene we just shot. And they're extras, their
crew members, they're the people who feed you, they're they're
all watching the scene we just shot. And he says,
(50:51):
that doesn't happen very often. And we've got something because
nobody asked them to watch the scene. They want to
see the play of that scene that you just shot.
That doesn't happen very often. Then he pulled me over
to the side and he says, Rico, I'm watching this
scene and I'm watching what you do. And he says,
I'm having a hard time focus, focusing, and he says,
(51:13):
the reason why is because in the back of my mind,
I'm thinking I can't kill him off. He says, I
love killing off, killing off characters, but he says, I'm
thinking I cannot kill him off. And he asked me
at that time, this is halfway through the first season.
He asked me if I would be willing to stay on.
He says, if you've got some other things happening, I understand,
(51:35):
but I would love you to stay on for season two.
And it was at that time that I told him,
I said, listen, this character that you've entrusted me to
breathe life into is I've never played a character where
you're at some point you're the villain, at some point
you're the hero in the same role. I said, these
(51:56):
parts don't come come around very often for actors, so
of course I want to I'm.
Speaker 4 (52:01):
With you until the wheels drop off front. Yes and
so and so that was like, uh, that was like
the the uh, the moving forward moment for.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
Love to hear it, Love to hear it, love to
hear it. I think this is a perfect place for
me to wrap up this beautiful conversation with you, because
then I'll start rambling like, well, what kind of cartoons
did you like to watch? Because I just I just
find you so fascinating. I just when people who have
(52:32):
lived like just I admire you because what I see
when I look at your life is someone who live fearlessly.
There are a lot of people who want to try
to do things, people who want to go live abroad,
people who want to try to see if they can hoop,
and fear keeps them stagnant. And just reading your story
(52:54):
and doing a deep dive in your career. Not to mention,
you're in half of every favorite show or movie I
ever watched, and it's just like this man has lived
fearlessly and do you feel that? Do you feel like
I do?
Speaker 3 (53:11):
I do, because I think when you come from from
from small beginnings, you know that you can handle that.
So everything else has been a bonus, you know. And
I don't take it for granted. I pray every morning
and most of my prayer is about gratitude and the
gratitude of the wealth that has been bestowed upon me.
(53:34):
And I'm not talking about about dollars either when I
talk about that. So yeah, and I do I make
choices that are risky choices, but I think in life,
life is pretty much all about the choices you make.
Speaker 4 (53:50):
Some people make bad choices and they suffer the consequences
of them.
Speaker 3 (53:53):
Some people make wrong choices and they learn from them
and they move forward. But it is about the choices
that you make in life. And I've just I've always
tried to make the right choice. But I've always also
not been afraid of that it could be wrong.
Speaker 4 (54:09):
You know. I heard from Richard.
Speaker 3 (54:12):
Lawson has a podcast, and I know he didn't create
this quote, but I heard it on it, so I'm
going to give him credit for bringing it to me.
And he says, when you're chasing greatness. You have to
learn to be comfortable with the uncomfortable wow. And and
sometimes it's uncomfortable to move to another country where you
(54:33):
don't know anybody in that country and you're living there.
It's an uncomfortable feeling. You don't know how it's going
to work. It's uncomfortable to to work. And in some
of these countries I had, I did a movie in
I did a movie in Hungary and it was at
a time when they had just stopped being a communist
(54:54):
country and they were a capitalist country, and they weren't
used to seeing black people. And I was walking around
and people would stare at me as if I was
from Mars. And the difference between them and us is
when when we see someone staring at us, and we
catch someone staring, they turn away.
Speaker 4 (55:10):
It's not there.
Speaker 3 (55:11):
You catchum staring at you. They keep on staring and
it's a very uncomfortable thing. But you know, it also
helps that I'm a big guy. I figure, you know,
I could handle myself. I used to teach kung fu
in London, so you know, I'm very capable of handling myself.
And I think it would be very different if I
was a female, A black woman walking through this country
and people are just staring at you with a blank expression.
Speaker 4 (55:34):
Completely blank.
Speaker 3 (55:35):
You don't know whether they think, oh she's attractive or
oh she's interesting, or whether they think I hate this person.
Speaker 4 (55:41):
You know, you don't know what. And it's very uncomfortable.
Speaker 3 (55:44):
But you I learned from taking these uh, making these
decisions and taking these chances, that I have learned to
become comfortable with the uncomfortable.
Speaker 1 (55:54):
Wow. And my last question for you, what is your
favorite flavor of ice cream? Do you eat ice cream?
Because you know I'm ice cream conversations, so I have
to ask people will be like you didn't even ask
him about the ice cream girl.
Speaker 4 (56:06):
It was like, I mean, any Rocky Road ice cream
near me?
Speaker 1 (56:11):
You Rocky. I'm a butter girl myself, but Rocky love me.
Speaker 3 (56:17):
Some butter pecan. Not only that, I love me some
I love me some pecan pie too.
Speaker 1 (56:21):
Oh see, I haven't ventured to the pie. I don't
mess with pie too, Monie Less because you know Yecky Road.
Thank you so much, Rico for just giving me the
opportunity to have this conversation with you. Thank you for
sharing your talent with us. You are always welcome to
come sit down and chat with me some more when
(56:42):
we talk about season three and four and five and
seasons If you are always going to wait.
Speaker 3 (56:46):
Till you see to you to you finish seeing that
the first on the second part of season one, and
I want to talk to you about that after you've
seen that, because it's going to be a ride, girl.
It's going to be how are you going to follow
up season the first half? And I know how they
did it, and so it's going to be a ride.
It is interesting to get your views on the second part.
Speaker 1 (57:06):
I would love to give them to you. So far
season well, I want to say season two, but it's
part two. So far Apart two is giving it up.
It's giving it up. It is Part two is giving
it up. So I am locked in, completely locked in.
I am going to continue watching after our conversation, but
just congratulations on all of your success and make the
(57:28):
Lord bless you. Keep you, continue to keep giving you roles,
and keep you on all of our screens and in theaters.
I'll talk to you soon. Have a great day.
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