INTERVIEW: 'JJ' Walker, BernNadette Stanis & Ralph Carter Talk 'Good Times, Animated Reboot, Comedy + More

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Wake that ass up in the morning. The Breakfast Club Morning.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Everybody is the j n V. Jess Hilarious, Charlamagne the guy.
We are the Breakfast Club. We got some special legends
in the man. Come on, now, this is special one
right here, legends of the building. Come on, it's the
cast of Good Times. Fifty years of good Times.

Speaker 3 (00:18):
We got Michael, Thelma and JJ well Carter and Bernadette
Stainers and Jimmy Walker.

Speaker 4 (00:23):
That's right, all right, Good morning, guys. How y'all feeling
good morning?

Speaker 5 (00:26):
Breakfast Club?

Speaker 4 (00:28):
How y'all feeling man? Fifty years a good Times?

Speaker 6 (00:30):
Wow?

Speaker 7 (00:32):
I know wow, and we're still going strong.

Speaker 4 (00:36):
Did y'all know Good Times was going to make the market?
It made well?

Speaker 8 (00:39):
I didn't, No, I had no idea.

Speaker 5 (00:42):
No, we didn't, but we're very grateful it did. Yeah,
thank you to the listeners were.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
Hands well from the beginning. Let's start, how did it
come about? How did Good.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Times come about? And how did you guys audition?

Speaker 2 (00:56):
And how did it make because during that time there
wasn't too many of us on television, So how did
it come about?

Speaker 8 (01:02):
Well?

Speaker 2 (01:02):
And he is black, you know, they joking me all
the time, and I'm black.

Speaker 7 (01:11):
But well, it started with me being in a beauty pageant,
you know, and from there, Uh, there was a manager
watching me in the beauty pageant and gave my mother
a card to say, they're looking for a teenager to
be in the show and meet Norman Lear at CBS,

(01:34):
you know. So we went up there. But there were
thousands of girls when I opened the door. So, I mean,
but that's how it started with me.

Speaker 4 (01:41):
You were a teenager, all good?

Speaker 8 (01:42):
Huh yeah, oh you eighteen?

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Oh okay, have mercy, okay, yeah, all right, okay, he's
still beautiful, absolutely so.

Speaker 7 (01:52):
And then you know, after a couple of months, I
thought I didn't get it, you know, because I didn't
hear back from them. And then I did get the call.
My mom got the call that I was Thelma, and
so they flew me out to California. That's how it
happened for me.

Speaker 4 (02:06):
Wow, what about you, Miss Carton.

Speaker 5 (02:08):
By the time I began to work with Norman Lear,
I had been in my sixth Broadway play. By that time,
I met during my journey with Miss Jane Murray and
also Pat Kirkland. These were two wonderful women who I
auditioned for when I went there. However, I literally had
the job before I got the job. My contract was
brought from The Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansbury.

(02:31):
We did the version of the musical play. By that
time I had won the Tony Award nomination that year
in seventy four. However, as a result of that, Norman
would consistently he came more than twice to see my
work and flew my mother and I out to the
state of California. I you know, I was reluctant because

(02:51):
they always said it never rains in California, and I
was excited. It main for three months when I got
and there are any illusions about Hollywood were always neutralized
as far as our concern. So I'm very grateful to
have not only worked with and still love Jimmy Walker
and Bernadette. But we give respect to the spirit of

(03:14):
Miss Esther Rolene du Bois, and to Johnny Brown who
played Bookman, to Helen Martin who played Weeping Wonder. These
are wonderful people that helped us along the way. Of course,
to mister Ben Powers as well Albert Reed who played
the Alderman. These are the people who accentuated what we did.
Of course, we're working with the wonderful Debbie Allen and

(03:36):
the work that she contributed to our production, so we
thank you.

Speaker 6 (03:40):
What about you, mister Walker, Well, I'm just a hard
core stand up. That's it. That's all I do. I'm
just a stand up to the core. So I was
working in prov me, David Brynner, Bett Mittler, Pat Benatar,
all of us together. We had a comedy team named
Edmund and Curly. They work all the time in those days,

(04:02):
and they couldn't do the job. They were doing like
three shows a day. They said, hey, man, we were
supposed to do these warm ups for this show called
Luci's Department. We can't make it. Do you want to
do take our place and do the warm up thing?
And I said, I don't even know what the warm
up is. Never heard of it, you know that kind
of stuff like that. And they said, they said, look,

(04:25):
they go over there. It's like on fifty seventh and
eleventh or twelfth. You go over there and you do
like a half hour you tell people's shows about. And
I said, I don't want to do it. They say, well,
it's eight hundred dollars. I said, well, who do I
have to kill. I'm in, I said, I'm in. So
I went over there. I did the warm up and
luckily there was a few laughs in there. So everybody

(04:47):
comes up after the show and they go, man, you
are funny. You need to be on this show, you
need to do this thing. I said, Well, in those days,
and I still believe this is this day. Everybody in
this business there's no truth at all. Everybody is something
until you ask for something. They go, well, I was
in charge of that, but now I'm not in charge

(05:10):
of that. My friend is in charge. Everybody's a liar.
So until my line, and I always say this, everybody
is full of Dodo until proven a complete a hole.
That's just everybody lies. That's just me. Freddie Prinz, David Brennan,
Robert Climbed, Richard Lewis, all the guys we said, liars.
So Pat Kirklin comes up and says, hey, we're doing

(05:35):
this show in Los Angeles. We want to be on
the show. I go, she's a liar, so you just go.
I said. So you always say when people ask you
to do something, oh yeah, I'm in. See you there anyway,
So you'll never hear from them again. And everybody women
are liars. Everybody's a liar, so that's it. So I said, yeah,
I'll be in it. So the next week, I'm not

(05:56):
even paying any attention. I go do the warm ups.
Luckily I killed. So Norman Lear is there at that time.
He says, hey, man, you are funny because I just
did the Rodan Martin show. They had called and do
the Ronald Martin thing. So he says, do you want
to be on this show? I said yeah. He says,
we're going to send you a contract. So I knew

(06:18):
he's a liar. So I said, look, don't even send
the contract in my house. Send it to the improv.
So I'm not paying any attention. I'm going out. I'm
doing my dates. I won this thing called a Napti thing,
and a Napti thing is where you go do college
tours and you compete against other people to do it.
So they bring in a whole bunch of acts. So

(06:40):
I was on the show. Edmund Curley again said you
need to do the Nafti thing. I did the nafty thing.
They said, you're going to do the region of the Midwest.
You're going to do South Dakota and North Dakota, Iowa
that kind of stuff like that, and if you win it,
you could get a whole thing. So I came in
second because you get a whole bunch of colleges. I
came in second. The winner was BB King. He won

(07:01):
one hundred and fifty dates. I won ninety dates.

Speaker 5 (07:05):
B B.

Speaker 6 (07:05):
King was the winner. So we're out doing dates and
you know, I'm just bouncing around. So I get a
call from J D. Jorman's Fargo, North Dakota doing dates
and evand Cody said, these people have never seen a
black person in their lives. You'll kill on this thing.
So luckily I was killing on the thing and j

(07:27):
Jo says, well where are you. I said, I'm in Fargo,
North Dakota. She says, you belong in Los Angeles. I said,
I know, I'd belong in Los Angeles, but I had
no reason to be there. So they said, no, we
sent you a ticket to the improv. So I wasn't
in New York at the time, so I never got
the ticket if I was on the road doing my thing.

(07:49):
So she says, look, get on the plane. We have
a ticket waiting for you in Fargo. I thought she's
a liar. So what I said, have optimistic, Yes, positive
people have live They lie, women lie, they lie. It's
just a constant thing. It's just.

Speaker 4 (08:12):
So.

Speaker 6 (08:13):
Then I go to Los Angeles. My man, Steve Lansburg
is on the show. You guys don't even remember this guy.
It's the Barbie Darren Show. He was a day player
on the Barbie Darren Show. So I said, hey, Lansburg, Chalkman.
Used to call him Chalkman because he had all this
white stuff that he used to do in the chalk Man.
We got to do some shows while we're out here.
So I went to the I went to the comedy store.

(08:34):
I'm doing shows. I go back to bed at like
three o'clock in the morning, get a call JD Joe.
She says, where are you? I said, we're my bed sleeping.
She says, well, you belong across the street. We're doing rehearsals.
I said, rehearsal for what. She says, there's a show
called good Times. You signed on to the show? I
had signed on to it at the improv. Yeah, because

(08:57):
I didn't believe him, because he's a liar. So horrible contract. No,
they had a contract. Kenny the Drunk who was a lawyer,
was at the bar. I said, Kenny, is this any good?
He said, yeah, I think so sign it. I'll send
it back for you. And I thought, I said, Kenny
is a drunk. He's not going to send He's a live,
he's not going to send it. So then he sent

(09:17):
it back. So I was on the show and I
had no idea the contract. Yeah, he's my man, here's
a live the whole time. So Kenny signed me up
for it. So I was in. So I go to
the rehearsal and there's a whole bunch of people there

(09:38):
at the rehearsal because I didn't even know we had
a script because they said this the script downstairs. I said,
I'm going back to bed because I'm not going downstairs
to get a script because they're lying. I don't have time.
So I went. I got the script and I looked
at it and I'm sitting next to Normally. I didn't
know who normally it was, because we're always working at
that time. You know, if you're if you're a night

(10:00):
Love comic, you know, I'm following Robert Klein and following
Steve Martin. I'm worried about holding my spot at the
endprov that's tough enough, you know, as a battle. You know,
Robert Klein's there, Bets singing songs. We got Pat Benatar singing,
and so I said, I better have my little act
together to hang in there because it's a fight for
the spots to get on. So I go and I'm

(10:22):
reading the script and I'm sitting next to Norman.

Speaker 1 (10:25):
I said, huh okay.

Speaker 6 (10:27):
And I'm reading the script and I said, a guy
next to me like you normally. I said, man, this sucks.
What is this? I said. He said, we're going to
do a TV show. I said, really, I said, you're
a liar. It's not going to happen. It's terrible. So
now we finished the rehearsal and Norman Leary and Ala
Man Bruce comes up and he says, hey, you know,

(10:49):
you know you have some problems with the script. You
can't be blasting out loud about how people stink. You
have to like bring it down a little bit. So
as a comic, people tell you how bad you stink
all the time. People always go, you suck, You're a
piece of garbage, you're no good at all, and you
finish and there's always that couple of people that go,

(11:11):
we love you here, but then when you go out,
you know, we had Andy Kauflan and Andy Kafflan was
one of those guys you stink, So that kind of
thing you just have to keep going. And so from
then on we did the show, and I was always
throwing stuff in and people got upset.

Speaker 4 (11:27):
So when did you stop thinking people was liar?

Speaker 6 (11:29):
Never? I think it now. People, I mean agents are liars.
They're all liars. No, very few people. People want to
be bigger than what they are. And the big people
you never meet them. They're in a big glass tower
upstairs on the ninetieth floor. So you know, even if
like berniand Ella to you, even if meet the girl

(11:51):
said give me your number, I know she's lying because
she's not going to give you the number. And then
with the horrible things with the cell phones, they don't answer.
You text them, you email them. They just they sit
in their room and they sit with their girlfriends and
they start laughing. They go this moron I met at Walmart.

(12:13):
He asked for my number. I was busy. I gave
him my number because I know I'm never going to
talk to my answers emails. Ever again, once in a
while somebody will come through, but.

Speaker 9 (12:29):
Very very rarely, and the girl, the girl would be nice,
and some girls will go some girls will go uh.

Speaker 6 (12:41):
And I learned this from a friend of mine who
happens to be a girl. And she said a very
interesting thing. She said, you know, if you want to
get rid of a guy and he asked you to
go out, say, you know, like if she's a girl,
I asked you to go out. I say, what is
your name feeling? Jess? I say, hey, Jess, you know,
why don't we, you know, go to uh, go to

(13:01):
their four seesons and have dinner, just start laughing ahead,
that's what they do. Are you serious? Really? No, it
wasn't lucky yet. But it was a girl that showed promise,
she answered, she answered, And I was like, really, sometimes

(13:25):
sometimes you're so stunnd one did call back. I was,
I was stunned.

Speaker 1 (13:30):
How many times do you give your number out to
these women?

Speaker 6 (13:33):
I'm available anybody, but see they they and I've said
the girls, hey, let's go in the cruise together, and
they just go, They just go.

Speaker 3 (13:50):
Their adults they.

Speaker 6 (13:55):
Just start laughing.

Speaker 9 (13:58):
You know.

Speaker 6 (13:59):
I hear my toasts popping up. I have to go,
so there's no there's no honest woman. And then the
phrase I always hate to hear. You know I'm a
single mom, and you just go, okay, okay, I got it.
You know I can't be worried about that or you
know what happened. I never connection, but anyway, go ahead,

(14:26):
talk about the ship.

Speaker 2 (14:27):
That's that's how I got got good time.

Speaker 6 (14:31):
That's what I just said.

Speaker 1 (14:32):
Iver got it.

Speaker 6 (14:33):
But I've never I've never I've never i never auditioned
for any show ever. I've never auditioned for a show him.
I've never auditioned, I never tried out. I never tolerate
him because.

Speaker 7 (14:47):
This just like I'm doing, just like people just see
my afternoon.

Speaker 6 (14:56):
Let's hire this guy.

Speaker 8 (14:58):
And we know how to do that.

Speaker 1 (15:00):
We'll let them go.

Speaker 3 (15:01):
How much of y'all real lives did you implement in
these characters? You know, especially you know you missed the
Carter because Michael was like one of the most pro
black figures that early on we ever saw them.

Speaker 5 (15:12):
Well originally from Brooklyn, Brenda Dead and I both from Brownsville,
giving our shout out to Brownsville Grafton Street.

Speaker 6 (15:19):
You do Martain Blake.

Speaker 5 (15:21):
That's where I used to live when I was growing
up in the heart of Brooklyn. However, my point is
that by virtue of the fact that I grew up
in an African American church, one of the most memorable
productions we ever did on good Times when we had
the Black Jesus. However, what happened in my case is
that I physically grew up with, like the wonderful images
in this fantastic sound room, that I grew up with

(15:44):
people who look like that on the walls of my church.
So it was almost a form of symbiosis when the
good times parallel came up with how I was able
to see that. But due to the fact that we
were able to locate in the verses of the Bible,
the example that is used hair of wool, skin of bronze,

(16:04):
and like me in Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. You know,
I was a kid, but I got some unkind male
But I was abdull from all of that by just
taking myself to another level and not deal with the
riff rap.

Speaker 3 (16:19):
I love the episode of when You Broke Down That
boy Boy Mama. Boy is a white racist word.

Speaker 5 (16:24):
And it still is what I love about what we've
done together as a team is that I'd rather be
relevant than a relic. And because of the fact that
people who are genuinely very kind to us, I know
from my personal experience, we're bombarded with positive energy. So
I believe that the human beings very difficult to be
negative when you're always being given good energy from the

(16:48):
people that we meet. And I'm personally indebted to the
people who viewed our work, the people who continue to
like our work, And all I can say is, thank you.
We respect that.

Speaker 4 (16:59):
How much of dumb would you miss, Bernadette Oh with me?

Speaker 7 (17:02):
A lot of my character was, you know, the way
I was. I grew up in a family you know,
five well they're five children, you know, I'm the oldest,
and a mom and dad, and so you know, my
father would always say, even though it was in the projects,
he always say, what's around you does not have to
be in you. And that's kind of how we were.
So I knew my character and that young girls in

(17:23):
the projects do grow up to be become someone, you know,
I strive to be the good girl, you know, and
you know, the positive person so very much. So the
character is very much like who I was then.

Speaker 5 (17:36):
But Bernadette consistently he has always had high standard and
she has never belivers herself in that context.

Speaker 4 (17:43):
What about you, mister Walker, how much of you with JJ?

Speaker 6 (17:47):
Well, goat. I remember, I'm a comic. So we just
we just sit around and all we do is jokes.
That's it. It's just jokes every day, every hour, every battle,
every whatever. That's all we do. And at that time,
Johnny Carson was it. So our main goal in life
was to get on the Johnny Carson Show. Because if

(18:08):
you get on the Johnny Carson Show the next day,
you can draw, and that's the key thing. You must
be able to draw, put tushies in the seats. I
don't care how great you think you are, you what
you are. It's like now with Netflix, your goal in life,
nothing else counts. Mom, dad, family, Get on Netflix and

(18:31):
take your shot. So in terms of my thing of
being on the show, I wanted to get on Johnny Carson,
I didn't want to do anything else. So you just
wrote jokes all day.

Speaker 4 (18:42):
How did you feel when you know?

Speaker 3 (18:44):
Eesterole and John Amos they said they used to criticize
your characters, saying it was a poor role model for
black teenagers back then.

Speaker 6 (18:51):
Well at that time, I was not really aware of it.
You got to remember, we didn't have media like we
had now and with our cast. For me, I didn't
really it's going to sound strange. I never watched the show.
I never really John is a great actor. He I mean,
he's probably one of the best black actors in America.

(19:13):
I'm best actor in general. I didn't really talk to John,
so I didn't really know him. And Esther, I don't
think in my humble I don't think i've ever Bernadette
was very close with Esta, very very very close. I
don't think I ever said a word to Esther because
being in a comedy lineup of like thirty guys you
don't and girls too, you don't. Really there's people you

(19:37):
just you know, you never talk to. I mean, you know,
there's people you talk to all the time, and then
I maybe you may talk to ten guys all the time,
and there's another ten guys you never talk to at all.
You don't know them, you see them, and you just
so I'm used to not mingling with some guys. That's it,

(19:57):
that's the reality of it all.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
I was gonna ask after Good Times, was it difficult
to get other parts in movies and sitcoms and things
like that, because people look at you as characters of
Good Times, Like when I see you, I still see Michael,
like I still see No, I still see JJ And
I was a kid like when I was coming up,
there was only I think at the time, it was.

Speaker 1 (20:20):
Your show and what's his name?

Speaker 4 (20:23):
Jefferson?

Speaker 1 (20:24):
Nope, before the Sun and that was the only two. Yeah,
I would see blacks on television. So was it difficult
after that.

Speaker 5 (20:30):
No. As a matter of fact, my transition, once I
finished Good Times, I still had to complete high school.
So after I did my works in high school.

Speaker 1 (20:38):
I went back to high school.

Speaker 5 (20:40):
I completed. I graduated on June sixth, nineteen seventy nine,
which was a Friday, along with my colleague Lawrence Fishburn.
We were in the ninth grade together and we went
all through that part of our education together as brothers.
My point being that once I completed the work in
Good Times, I was also invited to the wonderful nation
of Nigeria, and at that time I couldn't wait to

(21:04):
get to West Africa. The point being that I grew
up in an apple centric consciousness and due to men
like Jimmy Walker. He's one of the most well read
men I've ever met, so he became a blueprint for
me as far as wanting to know information, I figured,
if I love and respect the history of not just Africa,
but the global experience, because you know, everybody here is

(21:26):
a human We belong here. You know, if you ain't
come on earth to do your thing, then what you
come here for, If you ain't come here to be
the best you can while you're here, and what you
come here for. So my point is that I wanted
to make it and I did make it my business
to read as many books that related to my particular
subject matter. I originally went to Los Angeles Community College

(21:47):
in my early years and majored in poetry there. Then
from there I moved to meet up with a man
named doctor John Henry Clark, who became my primary mentor.
Through him, I met of the phenomenal historians like Joseph
Vijaik and doctor Ivan and Curdemer, the brilliance of Amos Wilson,
who wrote just consistential books that helped to heal our people,

(22:11):
because in this culture, we've all been wounded and we're
still in the process of repairing ourselves. But we must
understand this time around, ain't nobody coming to our rescue.
Therefore you must rescue yourself.

Speaker 3 (22:25):
So you bought all the energy to Michael because the
ain't no white people can write that character.

Speaker 5 (22:30):
I'm very grateful two men like Eric Monty and Michael
Evans due to the fact that Eric is from in
Chicago from Cabrini Green. One of the highlights of working
on the show was that consecutively for three years, due
to the genius of esther role, she asked us to
join and participate in the Bud Billiken Day Parade, which
very popular in Chicago. But also there were people who

(22:53):
lived in Cabrini Green who knew that Burneddett, myself, Jennet
de Wis Esther of course, were coming in advance. And
these are times when John blessed my father's heart because
he is one of the people on good times that
I worked long before. I haven't worked in that production.
But my point is that some of the residents in
those wonderful complexes, they physically invited us to have dinner

(23:16):
with us. I'm talking delicious food. But the Calmoradity was there,
so I think it helped us to be authentic because
during the time I worked on Good Times, I never
saw the show. I was forbidden to watch the show.
John Namis and Esther Rolle told my mother Lucille, who
fortunately lived to be ninety seven and she would be

(23:36):
one hundred and one this year. But my point is
that my mother kept me grounded and listened to what
esther Role and John Ames told her to do. Don't
let him watch the show due to the fact that
sometimes children tend to imitate their selves, so they wanted
me to stay as authentic and it was organic as possible.
So I didn't really understand the bombardment of people at

(23:59):
that time, you know, coming after me for years. I
stopped wearing jewelry because people thought they had the pivot
of the right to snatch it off of me. I
was like, yoh, man, you know, you know, this is
a ninety dollars shirt in nineteen seventies and you just
made my shirt my shirt.

Speaker 9 (24:16):
You know.

Speaker 5 (24:16):
So with that said, it also is a very humbling
experience because ultimately, anyway you look at it, you just
got to treat people the way you want to be
treated and that is my personal philosophy.

Speaker 4 (24:29):
Well, what was stardom like back then, Miss Bernie Dead
like in that era?

Speaker 7 (24:33):
Well, back then, it wasn't that many black stars there.
So was this like a handful of us and you
know Red Fox, Richard pryor those kind of people, you know,
and they would have parties or whatever, and you know,
they would invite just a handful who was there. But
other than that, it wasn't a lot of us there. Yeah,

(24:54):
so it was kind of empty in a way.

Speaker 4 (24:57):
How was it when you did the covered Jet magazine? Oh?

Speaker 7 (25:00):
I Sutton took a picture. He was a friend of
mine and he's invited me over to eat. He would
cook like eight course meals for me.

Speaker 8 (25:08):
I mean, just me. I'm like, come on, you know.
So then we take the pictures.

Speaker 7 (25:13):
And so you know, it was just Jane Kennedy then
and me and people like that. So he just said
he wanted to do a cover for me, and he
did it and I was.

Speaker 1 (25:25):
On the cover.

Speaker 3 (25:26):
Wow, that's different though. You're on the cover of Jet
magazine back then.

Speaker 7 (25:30):
Yeah, and also one inside the Week the centerfold and
I did that one too.

Speaker 5 (25:36):
And you knew you were popular when you're black and
you on the cover of Ebney and Jet. Yeah, I said,
oh lord, I know we on a lot of other magazines,
but when you were received by your own people, it
has a different type of connection. And I say that
because of the fact that who would have thought that
he was going to be on the covers of those
and I regardless of maybe the topics that they were

(25:57):
talking about, we still were well received by the people.
And there is no show without the people to participate
with us, so we thank them.

Speaker 1 (26:05):
What was the most difficult episode to shoot for me?

Speaker 5 (26:08):
It was actually the contradiction of a character came to
the show in the script where there was a Caucasian
young woman who I was supposed to have an on
screen kiss with right then, and then my antennae went
up because it would destroy everything I had built with
that particular character as far as as pro pan Africanism is.

Speaker 4 (26:28):
Love you for that, I remember that.

Speaker 5 (26:31):
Yeah, So what I did do I took my grievances
to the adults. Keep in mind, Johnny Jackson and I
are still minors, so therefore any type of script issues
that we had. Jimmy was always in has been my
advocate along with Bernadette, and I brought my issue to
them and Esther said, this cannot happen. You can't do
this for this particular character, because it will. You know,

(26:55):
mostly all the the young young African American women said, Wow,
here we go again. So I decided to just pull
back and it worked out in my favor and that
didn't happen.

Speaker 3 (27:08):
Wow, is that the episode that ended up being when
you were supposed to move in?

Speaker 6 (27:12):
Yes?

Speaker 4 (27:12):
Okay, that's right.

Speaker 5 (27:13):
But they they we had to change that script because
they had an intimate moment which again would a contradicted
the policies and the integrity of the character that I played.

Speaker 3 (27:23):
Absolutely, I always wondered because I was when I found
out that, you know, people they didn't like the JJ character.
I was like, I never looked at y'all as ignorant,
Like I didn't think that was reinforcing any stereotypes. How
were y'all able to portray being from the hood but
not come off as ignorant?

Speaker 8 (27:39):
Well, a lot of people in the hood are not all.

Speaker 7 (27:42):
And I looked at Jimmy's character as you know, like
very very intelligent, you know, an artist and everything like that.
And you know, sometimes in a family. There's always one
kid that makes the family laugh. I mean I have
I had a brother who's who's a pastor now Kyle,
and he used to make my mom laugh. You know,
you do silly things. But I mean that's just something

(28:04):
that lifts a spirit. That's that's all it is. And
that's how I saw Jimmy. I didn't see him as
a character that no one liked it. And I in
esther Roll's defense, I would say that she just didn't
want them to make him a thief or a fool
like and but she loved the character too, but she

(28:24):
didn't want the writers or anybody to make him look
like that, like with the little hat or whatever. And
you know, in the beginning, they always had Jimmy find
in something, you understand, so so finding is stealing and
she cut that out.

Speaker 8 (28:39):
I don't want that finding. And I just found this pan,
I just found this shirt, you know. So she said, no,
she didn't want that.

Speaker 7 (28:48):
So those are the things that they harped on, you know,
like she didn't like the character, but she she of
course they did.

Speaker 4 (28:55):
I just wonder when did Hollywood take a turn?

Speaker 3 (28:57):
Because it feel like you know that then y'all always
had a hand in the creative y'all always had a
hand in how y'all were portrayed. So when did Hollywood
take the turn the way It's just like all of
these negative stereotypes of black people just started, well.

Speaker 5 (29:09):
I think because a different breed of producers came through
that were in contact and in touch with the people.
And when you disconnect yourself from the people, then you
become in a box. And one thing I work with
myself is that the only opinion about me that matters
is my own. And therefore, by not allowing myself to

(29:30):
be in a box, I was able to take my
work to another level. And being a historian, in the
context of the work that I did, I not only
wanted to study the history of Africa, but I wanted
to understand how valuable the contributions of people globally has been.
You know, my ancestors have been here since seventeen ninety nine,

(29:52):
and my great great great ancestor, she was kidnapped from
Cameroon sold on the Charleston auction block on December seventeenth,
seventeen ninety nine. And as a consequence of that, I
wanted to study as much as I could because you
used to be against the law for people of color
to read in this country. So I made it my
business to read as much as I can. Just for

(30:13):
the record, brother man, I've read both your books, and
you are an excellent writer. I got a lot of
information on your journey, you know, and to the way
you gave the salutations to your mother Julia and to
your father Larry. It was a wonderful experience.

Speaker 4 (30:30):
Thank you.

Speaker 5 (30:31):
I want to tell you that to your face.

Speaker 4 (30:32):
Thank you, brother. I got any one coming out, I'm
give it to you for you week.

Speaker 5 (30:36):
Yeah, okay, my birthday coming up. Where my gift I
got you? I brought you as in bonds and Nobles,
I appreciate.

Speaker 2 (30:45):
Now you mentioned Janet, So I was working with Jannon
on the set. How was that for me?

Speaker 5 (30:49):
It was refreshing because for stranger, Yeah, for many years,
I was the only child on set. Therefore, that type
of isolation, it didn't affect me because every time we
went on hiatus, I always came back to New York
and too Brooklyn, and I was with my peer group,
so I fundamentally didn't have an offbeat energy as whatever

(31:11):
a child star means. And also I was never financially
exploited by my family. That was not my experience. In
my experience, no one ever put an offending hand on me.
You know, I'm from Brooklyn. I jack you up. What
I did learn in that process of working with Janet,
who was beyond a consummate professional, but she's a brilliant

(31:33):
observer and she watched because we spent the most time together, y'all.
And in California state law, we have to go to
school for three hours before we can appear on set,
So our actual working day after the three hours of
school would be a five hour working day. So we
had tutorists who protected us. My mother and missus Lucille

(31:53):
Carter and missus Captain Jackson. They got along like peas
in the park. And because of the fact that our
parents got along, and this would apply to Hey with
Nelson and Lawrence Fishburn myself, our mothers got along. Therefore
we got along too. So in that context my job
was too. Because I'm Bernardet's bully. Anybody stepped to her incorrectly,

(32:16):
there's going to be an issue. And I was able
to because of that loneliness. Jannet was like a beacon
of light when she came on the set, and I
still so proud of what she has done in the
work that she continues to do.

Speaker 3 (32:30):
I want to go back and ask Miss Berniett about
the mister the direction of Hollywood and how I went
another direction.

Speaker 7 (32:36):
Oh yes, thank you. I just want to say that
Esther Roll was an advocate for all of us. And
I remember there was a week that we had and
I actually had really nothing much to say. It was like,
you know, hi, Mom, Hi Dad, I was in the bathroom,
shut up JJ, and that's about it.

Speaker 8 (32:53):
You know, the character had nothing.

Speaker 7 (32:55):
So I was very bored that week and I said,
this cannot go.

Speaker 8 (33:00):
I can't sit here every week and just be this bored.
So I did. I asked Mom. I used to call mom,
say Mom, you know I was so bored this week.

Speaker 7 (33:08):
She said, what do you mean? I said, I just
did nothing. I just sat there and I was bored.
So she says, well, what do you want to do?
I said, I need more to say. I need I
need a I need something character. So she she said,
let me handle it, and we had a reading at
the round table, and that that week I had my
two or three little lines. Okay, and so Estra said,

(33:31):
at the end of the reading, she asked the producers
and the writer. She says, I want to ask a question,
and they said sure, asked what is it? You know,
what is it? She said, I want to ask you
ashamed of my daughter? And they said no, and she said.
Then she went on to say, you know, well, I
think that we should do a little better with her.

(33:51):
I think that we have my son JJ who has
a lot to say, and my son Michael, who has
a lot to say, and I want my daughter to
have a voice. And she said to me, and they said, oh, certainly.
And so that afternoon she said, you go up there
and you tell them who Thelma is. Now, how can
you develop a character? I mean, you know what I'm saying,
you're telling the character to develop a character. So I

(34:12):
knew who she was. So I ended up going up
there and telling them what I'd like her to be,
who I need.

Speaker 8 (34:17):
Her to be.

Speaker 7 (34:19):
And after that the scripts came, you know, the dialogue came,
you know, a voice became. And I give her all
the credit for doing that. People don't really fight for
people anymore like that. So she she did, and that's
how you know, she gave Thelma a voice.

Speaker 4 (34:35):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (34:37):
Absolutely, and where did white people like Norman Lear in
Hollywood passed away?

Speaker 5 (34:41):
This are those type of people no more. When they
did kick they were really good, you know, because for me,
in the context of history, you would not really have
had a good times if you didn't have an Amos
and Andy. And Amos and Andy was also a product
television station CBS. However, when I did my research and

(35:04):
with the catalog of that particular show, it was hilarious
the men and women who performed on Amos and Andy.
We're speaking of veteran actors who had done vaudeville and
the so called chitting circuit. As Jimmy Walker really knows
all about that. You know, he's been on the chitten
circuit so long he was cleaning the chitting. So my

(35:25):
point is that we were able to embrace through the
genius of Normally, because keep in mind, Normally was a
magnet in the respect that he had all in the family,
more Jeffersons, Good Times, the ac Junket. Along with Bud Yorken,
they also had What's Happening, in which you had the
works of Hayvid Nelson, Fred Barry. Of course, mis Shirley

(35:46):
Hempfield and their wonderful cast Danielle Spencer. Mabel King of
course played the mother. But my point is that there
was a connection in a bond that we even on
set had we crossed reference with the wonderful people on
All in the Family with Jeans Staple, tend and Carola Khana,
and we weekly saw Beatrice Author and Bill Macy while

(36:07):
they were doing their works on more so because of
the work that Esther did that allowed us as artists
to get a gig. But Esther to me is the
foundation of good times, along with John Names absolutely.

Speaker 10 (36:23):
Mister Jimmy, did you ever ever get tired of saying
down at any point?

Speaker 6 (36:27):
I don't think we ever did it that much. No,
because you know, again being a stand up people came
to cheap stand up, you know, and and at the
improv of the store or anything like that, and again
not I guess we were in such competition. And plus
we had Paul Mooney, and Paul Mooney straightened everybody out.

(36:52):
Wont E would just say, man, your stuff is weak.
What are you doing? You stink? And he I remember,
like we'd have somebody like a Gary Shanling who worked
so hard. I was like, that's what made me get
writers to help me out, because he would have two
notebooks full of jokes every day and you just go, hey,

(37:12):
how's this guy doing this. So in terms of the
dynamite thing, it didn't play in a club. You know,
we had Freddie Prinz who always said, I am the funniest,
I am the best. You guys stink I'm great, I'm
the youngest and I'm the baddest. I'm eighteen. You guys
will never be as good as me. You'll never be

(37:33):
as funny as me. Don't even try it. And then
you had Gary Shanling who said quietly, I'm the best
writer out of everybody, I will eventually have my own show.
None of you will be as big as me. That's
the way it is. Because he had a shot to
do the Johnny Carson Show and he said, I don't
want to be encumbered by network. I'm going to have

(37:55):
my own show where I'm in charge, in which he
did with The Ry Sanders Show, and it's the Gary
Shandley Show. He was completely in charged, says, I will
never do a network show that I have to listen
to other people. So for me, the dynamite thing was
like not relevant to the people that were come into
the show. I mean, you know. And plus I was

(38:16):
the MC for UH for our ethnic shows, so we
would do the Chicago Show. Chicago Show would be the Emotions,
the shylights, Jerry Butler, so they weren't even for that
because they were kind of like, Hey, I'm Jerry Butler,
I'm the iceman. I don't care about any dynamite stuff.

(38:38):
And then you do the you do the Philadelphia show
where you have Teddy Prenagrass, who would say, I am
the prettiest, the baddest, the most good looking chicks will
look at me and I'm great, so mean, And then
you'd have the Motown Show, which I was MC of,
and the Temptations would go, there's no group that can
dance better than us, that can say, ain't better than us.

(39:01):
We are we don't care about any dynamite stuff. So
it was never that kind of thing. I was always
very secondary because I was the youngest guy. We had STEVIEE.
Wonder's mom who used to drive him behind us in
her little station wagon, so we never Jimmy Walker was
never a big thing. He was just a little part
of the MC work. That was it, That was that

(39:23):
was That was John Rich. I did it one day
in rehearsals and John Rich says, I like that dynamite thing.
I said, what dynamite thing? So he just did it.
I said, oh, that was just fooling around. He says.
John Risch said to me, he says, this is going
to be the biggest thing on this show. This will
be the big I said, what he said, the dynamite thing,
I said, he said, And he got up a little

(39:45):
fat guy and showed me how to do it. And
I said, John, people are not that stupid. They'll never
go for this. He says, yes, they will, And he
put it out there and Norman hated it. Wow, just
hated it. And and everybody was threatening to walk. John says,

(40:05):
if he doesn't do it, I'm walking. Normal Lea says,
if he does it, I'm walking. So he was whatever.
So he did it, and it became like Michael Buffer's
thing when he says, looks get ready to rumble. If
you ever watched, you guys are too young. But when so,
whenever he would do a fight, it would be like
a sugar Ray Leonard. He's won ninety seven knockouts, He's

(40:28):
killed his last ten opponents. He's the champion of the
middle Way, He's the champion of the and you he'd
get ready to say ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls
across the world, and you could hear the people.

Speaker 4 (40:38):
Go, let's generate.

Speaker 6 (40:42):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, yes, oh yes. It's only
ten thousand dollars a pop. If he does it nothing serious.
That's all he gets is he gets ten thousand dollars
a pop. He does it all. So that's the way
the dynamite thing rolled. But we nobody was that enthused.
I mean I had guys like Steve Martin who was
selling out fifteen thousand people, and you just go, just go, boy,

(41:04):
I would like to be like that.

Speaker 4 (41:06):
Do you have any problem with women calling you back
back then?

Speaker 6 (41:09):
Yes, definitely, without a doubt. Oh no. You got to
remember I was with Richard Pryor and Richard Pryor who
was a guy, and Freddie Prince. Those two guys had
all the women. I can tell you stories about Richard
that you don't want to hear on the air that
you would go, are you hitting me? Because women would No.

(41:35):
I will not tell you. I will not tell you
two gianic stories that about Richard and Freddie. Freddie's the
kind of guy had so much confidence. If he saw
her and we walked outside, he says, I can get her.
I go, Freddy, She's like, you know, she's a woman,
she's going for the woman thing, to have her own thing,
and says, I will get her and you will go.

(41:58):
At the end of the night they're walking out together.
You go, damn, how did Freddie pull this off? He's
that kind of guy and he just believed I'm the prettiest,
I'm the baddest, I'm the funniest, and I will get
any chick I want. Go ahead, y'all ling, Yeah, that's
not your job. And it was just amazing. But yeah,

(42:19):
so that was that.

Speaker 4 (42:20):
Do y'all remember the first day on the set versus
the last day?

Speaker 8 (42:24):
Yes, I do. I remember the first day. It was interesting,
you know. I was really watching Esther and John how
they handled a lot of stuff, you know, and I
learned a lot. I really really did.

Speaker 7 (42:36):
But I remember when like the first year, well the
first maybe a couple of months, talking about women and JJ.

Speaker 8 (42:44):
Okay, I remember he said something to me like, what
do you do what do you get? What do you
do with these women?

Speaker 1 (42:51):
Why do you?

Speaker 8 (42:51):
I mean, what did I do? I said, you know,
the first thing you should do is when you have
a girl, you need to buy her a little jewelry.

Speaker 1 (43:00):
Telling I'm telling on you.

Speaker 8 (43:01):
And he said what I said, yeah, buy some you know,
jewelry and stuff and break it in that way.

Speaker 7 (43:07):
And so he said, okay. So that lunchtime he went
to Farmer's market and he bought some jewelry and he
came back he said, how how does this look?

Speaker 8 (43:16):
What's this about? And it was it was a turquoise piece,
you know, with the silver around.

Speaker 1 (43:20):
It was this big. I said, what are you doing?

Speaker 8 (43:23):
I said, well, you're dating a giant.

Speaker 4 (43:25):
What do you doing? Come on?

Speaker 7 (43:28):
So I said, no, go back over there, take that
back and get some fine jewelry, you know, really go
a little gain something. Yeah, And so that's what he did.
And so to this very day, if you date Jimmy Walker,
you're gonna get some jewelry.

Speaker 8 (43:44):
I'm telling you.

Speaker 4 (43:46):
Here. Man.

Speaker 7 (43:57):
The last day, Wow, for me, well, it it was
like a little unreal, you know, because I came to
Hollywood right into a show, so I didn't know what
it was like living outside of that. I mean here
in California, you know, in California. So for me it
was very different.

Speaker 1 (44:15):
It was like is this the end?

Speaker 4 (44:17):
Is this really the end?

Speaker 6 (44:19):
You know?

Speaker 7 (44:19):
What am I going to do when I get up tomorrow?
You know kind of thing. So that's how it felt
to me.

Speaker 8 (44:25):
The ending what a good.

Speaker 5 (44:27):
Times ended on March the eighth, which was a Thursday
in nineteen seventy nine. We had already braced ourselves for
it because you could feel the momentum of the production
was starting to lose his pace. So I already knew
I had to graduate from high school, and I already
knew I had my ideas to go to college and
to travel. So thereby I used the rest of my

(44:49):
twenties traveling to East and West Africa, primarily to Sudan, Ethiopia,
and Egypt. And by doing that consecutively. As a historian,
I read the information before I went on the journey.
So my affinity with the wonderful monuments that I saw,
the parallels in Egypt with the parallel, the parallel of

(45:10):
the pyramids in Egypt and in Mexico are phenomenal because
there was a wonderful connection between those two cultures where
they did not destroy each other, but they complimented each other.
And you could see that the earth winding fires has
a wonderful song. It's in the stone. So in the

(45:30):
stone the people left how they looked, and that we
were here and this is what we did while we
were on the planet. So it was a phenomenon for
me to not only just theoretically do the work, but
to physically go and see the monuments for myself.

Speaker 4 (45:46):
Wonder it felt like.

Speaker 3 (45:48):
They could have showed y'all outside of the projects, because
the last episode, y'all, everybody did get out the project to.

Speaker 4 (45:53):
Go move in the same building, a better buildings. They
could have showed that.

Speaker 5 (45:57):
But you know, what's done is done. The past is
the past, Charla Man. So you don't want to regress,
you want to progress. And people have constantly asked us
to do a reboot of Good Times. However, you've lost
some of their major primary characters, so you know it
wouldn't work to do that anymore. So you come up
with new ideas, like my new television series is entitled

(46:18):
Grandma's Hands and I deal with five generations of African
women from the age of thirteen to the age of
ninety eight, along with my wonderful co writer mister Gregory A. Holtz,
beautiful SES's named Janine, and my young sister VICKI. So
as a team, a quorum of four, we've been able
to write some wonderful scripts and all things. In time,

(46:41):
I could show you better than I can tell you,
and I just hope that people will the opportunity comes
where I can present this particular production so that people
can experience us from another perspective as I do as
a writer. I've completed my autobiography in five volumes. Years ago,
I had a dialogue with all his Wilson and he

(47:01):
was one of the very rare, rare writers who had
a play written for every decade of the last century
that we've gone through. But my point being, I asked
him his technique and what should I do when I
want to write my autobiography? And I got a lot
of advice from my good friend mister Irvin Panton. He said,
do it and I'll help you copy the books. So

(47:23):
I began on a wonderful journey of getting wonderful information,
and I didn't know that there was so much information
on the work that I did in my early theater years.
My point is that I had a resource with Schomberg.
I had a resource with Lincoln Center and the people
who were there in that area, the librarians, so to speak.
They were very gracious to me. So it helped me

(47:45):
to complete five complete volumes of my autobiography. I taught
out a child development for five years. I'm the author
of twenty children's books as well. So as a musician,
I still sing, I do my voice. I hope that
people will continue to like the work that not just
myself does, but Bernadette and Jimmy too. We we literally

(48:06):
have never stopped being friends.

Speaker 1 (48:08):
That's why we're still here. That's amazing.

Speaker 4 (48:11):
How do how do y'all feel about the The Good
Times cartoon on Netflix?

Speaker 6 (48:16):
Well, that's Bernadette's thing. She'll tell you.

Speaker 4 (48:20):
How do you feel?

Speaker 6 (48:21):
It?

Speaker 4 (48:21):
A reboove?

Speaker 1 (48:22):
But that's not a no, that's not that's not it
at all.

Speaker 8 (48:25):
No, that's not it at all. I think that.

Speaker 7 (48:28):
Our audience missed something, you know, they missed what happened
to us. It's always they want the completion of it
and it never really happened, you know.

Speaker 1 (48:39):
So far.

Speaker 7 (48:41):
My thing about the the animation was this that you know,
I know that Jimmy Walker came to them and he
presented a cartoon about five years before this, before this one,
and it was it was the really the the all
of us, the way we are in a in animation

(49:01):
and we have our same voices and everything like that.

Speaker 8 (49:04):
And they they didn't bite that.

Speaker 7 (49:06):
But later on came up with they're gonna do an
animation and I remember my manager called them and said, well,
what are they gonna you know, are we gonna be
in it or not. So the way they describe the
animation to us was this, it was going to be
a modern day, you know, progression of what everything is

(49:27):
going to be for the good Times family. So you know, fine,
But they asked Jimmy and I to do a tiny
little part. But it sounded okay, you know, we didn't
see the scripts. So Jimmy did a part. I did
a little part. My character's name is Peaches. You know,
she's like a project lady. That's whatever. But when the
when the when it came out, when the trailer came out,

(49:52):
we saw it and everybody was like, no, you know,
you don't have a crack baby in somebody in the
mother's arms.

Speaker 8 (49:57):
You don't do that.

Speaker 7 (49:58):
So and I I remember having an interview with the
singer Gilstrap, Jim Gilstrap a year before, and he was saying,
you know, there are some lyrics that they took out.
So I said, were the lyrics and he said, well,
you know they say roaches roaming the hallway, roaches roaming

(50:19):
the hallway and the landlord lives on the other side
of town or something like that. He said that they
took it out because fifty years ago now they thought
that that would be offensive to black people. Okay, but
fifty years later you have two roaches singing in a shower.
They sing in the song good Times. So I'm like,

(50:41):
this is not it, you know, I'm sorry. You know,
I know people have you know, want to write it
at they want to do this and that, but you
have to do it right, you know, you have to
represent it correctly.

Speaker 8 (50:54):
So to me, it was not represented correctly, and I
had to say that, you know.

Speaker 4 (51:00):
I haven't watched it, mister card.

Speaker 5 (51:01):
I actually was quite disappointed with the actors who took
the time to sign on to that project. These are
actors and the artists and comedian that I really had
a high regard for I won't use the past tense
with them right now, but I'm disappointed at the fact
that they did that. When I did take a quick
review of this particular rubbish that I saw, I was

(51:23):
contacted by some media outlets from my point of view,
but I refused to dignify it with a response. And
I'm just pretty much disappointed with the artists who signed.

Speaker 1 (51:33):
On to it.

Speaker 6 (51:34):
I don't think anybody ever saw it. I mean, I
know Seth mcfollowen to me, is very, very funny, but
this is not his bag. It would be like saying, hey,
we're doing Romeo and Juliet. You know we hired JJ
Walker and Lawanda Page.

Speaker 8 (51:55):
Really wow, that's a good analysis.

Speaker 6 (52:01):
I mean, it's just Seth is. I mean, I love
all his stuff. It's racist, it's terrible, it's fantastic. It
kills me. But he's yeah, it's funny, but he's not
right for this. And Steph Curry, I know he's went
watching Lebron James and he sees Lebron James has his projects. Look,

(52:22):
let me tell you something. I'm from New York. I
played basketball against Nate Archibald. You guys are too young.
You remember Nate Archibald, but he's a big star. I mean,
I played against Nate Archibal and he only scores sixty
three on us three times that we played them. He
called sixty one, sixty three and sixty three. Look, let
me tell you something. It'd be like me going to

(52:42):
Steph and say, look, I played against Nate Archibald. I
want to be on the Golden State Warriors. And you go,
why I play against Nate Archibal. I belong on the team.
Come on, but no, he's just the wrong guy to
be in this.

Speaker 4 (52:57):
Y'all don't like the good times to say that fifty
years a good times.

Speaker 3 (53:04):
I'm talking like nobody did a documentary or some type
of you know, reunion show, Like y'all didn't get approached about.

Speaker 4 (53:10):
None of that.

Speaker 5 (53:10):
Now, the anthology that I did, right it wouldn't be
a product commercially right now, again because of the losses
that we had.

Speaker 8 (53:20):
They we didn't have people that we worked that we're
going to put together, and we had all the characters.

Speaker 5 (53:24):
It's just this is the now ancestors.

Speaker 6 (53:28):
So this is Brett Miller, who works with Norman and
that's the guy who kind of kind of gabashed us,
and that that was it. I mean, that's the way
because when I took it around, everybody I talked to says,
well do you own the rights? And we go no,
and they said, well, nothing we could do for you.
And these are all friends of mine. So that's the

(53:50):
way it was. I just think that, you know, they
they didn't want us involved, and they achieved their goal.

Speaker 4 (54:00):
We love y'all, y'all.

Speaker 7 (54:03):
Yes, our fans really kept writing us and telling us
how much that they loved us, and we did. They
did not like the animation, you know, they respect us
in so many different ways. So we still got our
satisfaction out.

Speaker 1 (54:15):
Of it, you know, absolutely.

Speaker 5 (54:17):
And when the people don't like it, watch out.

Speaker 10 (54:20):
Because they're writing and what they think people want to
see you, Well, it's a disconnect.

Speaker 8 (54:26):
It's a disconnect because that's not what the people really
want to see.

Speaker 10 (54:29):
But yeah, but you have like those pockets of people,
like like people trying to appeal to what media is
like feeding, you know what I mean, and all that
ghetto rad shirt roach singing, and it's like how.

Speaker 8 (54:40):
They they see it.

Speaker 5 (54:42):
Yeah, but all of that, all of that rubbish tends
to dumb people down. You know, and that's what how
people will for it, you know, Like, you don't try
to make me spotted a long time to be just dumb. Yeah,
so don't try to make me want to think. And
that's the the in my critical analysis. People must think
for theirselves and solve their own problems. I guess when

(55:05):
you do that, you can help other people.

Speaker 7 (55:06):
Yeah, I guess they felt that. You know, fifty years later,
no one would notice. We can make them look like
the way we want them to look.

Speaker 1 (55:15):
I don't know.

Speaker 5 (55:16):
I've never craved for attention like that. I like, I
live an isolated life to the degree that I live alone,
but I'm not lonely, you know. I have a loving
family that I speak to practically every week, and by
virtue of that, my sense of grounding is a lot
different than some people.

Speaker 8 (55:34):
You know, which was in the original Good Times.

Speaker 5 (55:37):
Yeah, well, I am to be taken seriously because life
is serious, or.

Speaker 4 (55:42):
Don't want the legacy at Good Time to ultimately be.

Speaker 5 (55:45):
I hope that we made people enjoy the process of
a family that was able to stay cohesive and live
together in spite of the financial conditions. That we had
a tendency to be a part of but the fact
that we tried to make as many people for happy
as possible without placating them with patronizing them. We just
did our job as artists.

Speaker 7 (56:06):
And Good Time solved a lot of problems for people,
showed people how you know, if you didn't have a father.
John Namis was a father type to you, your mom,
you know. So we did a lot for our people,
I think, you know, and I would like it to
stay that way.

Speaker 5 (56:23):
And it helped us grow and stay grounded more than anything,
you know. I like that part about it, you know,
because I thoroughly enjoyed going to work. I was devastated,
of course when John Amis's character left, but beyond that
because I'm glad because my biological father, Ralph and John
Amis got along life brothers, so it was you know,
I had co fathers, so to speak. But the truth

(56:46):
of the matter is is that I think that we
left aunt a paramount impact on people because again we're
bombarded with positive energy. I know I am, and being
that I'm able to walk the streets of Brooklyn on
my own, I'm able to greet some about people. I
don't walk around the streets son, Hey, look at me,
I'm here. No, if anything, I know when to shut down.

(57:10):
That's what I love about Jimmy Walker as a comedian.
He's not always on. When Jimmy's locked into what he's
gonna do, he's gonna do it. But other than that, no,
you won't get him to say dynamite because he's already
done that. You can see the reruns. When you want
to play that, you can do it like that. But
I just think that working with our people here has

(57:31):
been a reward for me because I've learned a tremendous
a lot of information from Ben and Dead and from Jimmy.

Speaker 4 (57:37):
What do you want the legacy to be? Mister Walker?

Speaker 6 (57:39):
You know, I really hadn't thought about it until Norman
Lear died and then everybody started jumping up and down
about Norman dying and stuff like that. It really, I
hate to say it, it never crossed my mind. I never,
I never ever thought about it, just never.

Speaker 4 (57:57):
In there.

Speaker 6 (58:00):
Thinking about them girl calling girls and getting my shots
on the When I was doing the David Letterman Show,
which is my opinion, my alleged best work, I loved it.
It was fabulous, you know, because Letterman started out with
me as a writer, and uh, you know my writing staff.
I'm so proud of all those guys. Is the old
man that's dying. But it's them, I mean had Jay Leno,

(58:22):
and Louis Anderson and and Elaine Boosler, who to me
represents the good in women's comedy. She has the greatest
stuff because women. Now it's a little rough out here
what women are doing. But Elaine wrote, great, clean, solid,
monster jokes man, and this is perfect example. You won't

(58:43):
see this kind of joke done anymore, but this is
kind of joke she wrote. She says, men are so hypocritical.
They want you to scream. Now, this is the best
you've ever had while swaying. You've never done this before.
Now see that, to me is a joke. That's a solid, killer, monster,

(59:04):
clean joke that is.

Speaker 9 (59:07):
Well.

Speaker 6 (59:08):
Please, I'm sorry all those people on your writing staff. Yeah,
Jay Leno, Louis Anderson, Elaine Boosler, Ralphie may Byron now
started me he was fourteen years old. No, he started
writing for me? Is doing jokes for me? I always

(59:28):
tell the same thing, but it's true. He was doing comedy,
claiming he was eighteen years old at the store. Okay,
got on one of my writers saw him. He says,
do you write? He says, yeah, I do write. He says,
could you write for Jimmy Walker? He says, ja ja Yeah.
He says, oh yeah, I could do it. So he
calls me up. And I got Leono at the house,
and I got Louis at the house, and I got

(59:49):
David let him in at the house, and I got
Ralphie May at the house. And I said, well, says Wayne,
Wayne the joke train says, you're good. Once you come
over the house and we'll see what you got. He says,
I'll come over, but I have to wait for my mom.
I said, why, what's happening? He said, my mom has
to drive me over.

Speaker 4 (01:00:06):
Wow.

Speaker 6 (01:00:07):
I said, drive you over? He says, yeah, I'm fourteen
years old. I said, oh okay. Because his mom worked
for NBC. She was she was on staff over there
as a pr gal. Right, so it comes over. First
joke Byron never wrote for me fourteen years old. First
joke he says white people black people are much different.
Says white people go to a movie, they don't like it.

(01:00:28):
They say, I would like my money back. This is
what black people go to the movie. He says, I
didn't like this movie. I want everybody's money back. Fourteen
year old that joke. Wow, see that's the kind of
stuff I look for.

Speaker 1 (01:00:44):
Got you And now he just mentioned it. But do
you get tired of saying not on my.

Speaker 4 (01:00:49):
Do people go to it?

Speaker 5 (01:00:50):
No?

Speaker 4 (01:00:50):
Don't do it?

Speaker 1 (01:00:50):
No, no, no, no, I'm not asking to say no.
I'm going to ask.

Speaker 5 (01:00:53):
No.

Speaker 1 (01:00:54):
I would never ask. I would say, do you get tired?

Speaker 6 (01:00:56):
Because I mean, people don't really people don't really ask
because the comedy crowd is different than a TV crowd.
You know, they come, if that's all I did, people go, well,
it wasn't worth paying to see this guy because that's
all he did. But when you see my act, people go,
you know, I think some of the best comments I've

(01:01:17):
ever got. My guys who are valets because I travel
every week to do the road, they go, hey, man,
we saw that specially did with Michael Winslow. You know,
we always knew you were funny. This is much better
than I ever thought that you had. I didn't know
you had this kind of stuff. That to me is
like a great compliment.

Speaker 8 (01:01:35):
I like that.

Speaker 4 (01:01:36):
I just feel like a white man asking you to dance.

Speaker 1 (01:01:43):
No, I don't.

Speaker 10 (01:01:44):
You know.

Speaker 6 (01:01:44):
People ask, but I don't really do it, but I have.
I never did it in my act until recently. I
found a spot for it and it works great. So
it's a very good piece. I have to admit that
I wrote it myself. Thank you. I can't really do
it now, and it's not dirty. I don't do any
dirt or anything like that. That's another thing. I grew

(01:02:04):
up in the non dirt area. And there's only I'm
not kidding, allegedly there's nine thousand comics making twenty five
thousand or more up to the Dave Chappelle two hundred
thousand a night kind of level. I would say there's
no more other than the religious guys, the Ricky Smiley
type of cats. I would say there's no more than

(01:02:25):
twenty five clean guys in America and girl girls. I'm stunned.
I don't think there's any Well, no, she's not a joke.
I don't think. I to me, I haven't I got

(01:02:49):
she's got. I got Wendie Leeman, I got Ellen DeGeneres,
I got elayinne Boozler. And I'm going to add on
three more just for the kicks. That maybe I left out.
I don't think there's ten clean women comics in America.
I don't think there are. I mean, maybe there's somebody
I'm missing. I have not met them. And see, when

(01:03:12):
I started, women were the cleanest. They were talking about
their husbands or their boyfriends. And I think the joke
I just did by Elaine or if you look at
Ellen that that to me is the hardest stuff to do.
That And women now they're talking about their sexual act.

(01:03:33):
From the beginning, I met this guy and I went
home and I did this and I did that, and
he couldn't do it. You go, hey, easy, I don't
want to know about all that. You know, that kind
of stuff like that.

Speaker 4 (01:03:46):
They call you back, you don't want to know about
all I'm not in a public setting.

Speaker 6 (01:03:52):
If they do it on stage, I mean they talk
about it on stage where you just go.

Speaker 1 (01:03:58):
Oh my god, I'm on you to be funny.

Speaker 6 (01:04:02):
Yeah, that's it, you know. And see, I tell comics
all the time, whether they're women or men, if you
do the F word or whatever, if you only do
it once, it will have more impact than just saying
it all the time, all the time, all the time.
If you say it once or twice, it will have
tremendous impact. You know, I always bring up and I

(01:04:23):
don't mean the curse about anything, but I always bring
up Cosby, who I think is the most devastating thing
I've gone through with the Cosby thing because I opened
for Cosby for like two three years and I knew
they had a lot of women. That was the thing
that But see, to me, this is Camille's problem. It's

(01:04:44):
not our problem. It's Camille's problem. And I think what
killed Cosby, and I say this all the time, was
that he got on and he stood on top of
a mountain saying, I'm America's dad, follow me, pull your
pants up. Don't use language. I think, and I've always
used this line. It's true. I think if he hadn't

(01:05:07):
done that, if he hadn't been such the guy to
just say you can't do this, I think it would
have gone away. And I used this. If it had
been Mick Jagger, nobody would have said anything, because you know,
Mick Jagger has had more women than Cosbrey's had. But
you'll never know about it because you go, it's the

(01:05:28):
Rolling Stones, man, what do you expect? But Cosmy gives us.
I would never do that. I raised my kids, I've
done my so you got to come down off the mountain. Sometimes,
unless you're totally innocent.

Speaker 4 (01:05:41):
You agree with that take. You agree with that take?

Speaker 1 (01:05:44):
Yeah, way, you know, well, we appreciate you guys for
joining us.

Speaker 8 (01:05:50):
Fifteen the lyrics to the theme song.

Speaker 4 (01:05:55):
You'll all know that.

Speaker 6 (01:05:56):
No, I don't know it. I think Rolf knows it.

Speaker 5 (01:05:58):
Just looking out of the window watching yesphalt girl, seeing
how it all looks. Tear me down, but you're keeping
your head above water, making a wave when you can.
Temporary layoffs, good times, easy credit, ripall good time, scratching
and surviving, good good times. Hanging in a child line.

Speaker 1 (01:06:19):
That's how I have.

Speaker 8 (01:06:23):
Yes, it is hanging in versions, hanging in.

Speaker 5 (01:06:26):
Ting and and driving. But also I have on document
and my archive hanging in the child, so they versions
of it. However, it really caught on the way that
the wonderful Ja wrote this the the soundtrack for moving
on Up for the Jeffersons do Wise, there is the

(01:06:49):
writer and the musician and the vocalist that sings that song,
so that in itself, when you deal with themed songs,
and when we were coming on y'all were grace is
enough to play for us. So it was a nice
way to walk into your sound studio, and we thank you.

Speaker 4 (01:07:05):
So the mystery continued. We still don't know if it's
hanging in the child.

Speaker 8 (01:07:11):
Hanging, it's hanging in and giving.

Speaker 5 (01:07:13):
Yeah, that's what it is, Anderne. They're not going to
have this going on for a while.

Speaker 7 (01:07:19):
Jim Jim Gilsdraft, the one who sung it, told me.
He said it was hanging in and giving.

Speaker 8 (01:07:25):
That's what it was.

Speaker 7 (01:07:26):
But it came off I don't know if it was
the annunciation of it or not, but it came off
as hanging in a chow line. It sounds that way,
but it really was hanging in and giving.

Speaker 5 (01:07:35):
And there's a second verse that people have never heard
that goes to the same song. So the information that
I do have it has what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:07:44):
That's a little.

Speaker 8 (01:07:46):
Singing in the shower.

Speaker 5 (01:07:48):
So you guys have been wonderful. I thank you for
thinking enough of us. Again to your listening audience, we
thank you again for wonderful fifty years. May you be
blessed by every do you breathe in every beat of
your heart.

Speaker 4 (01:08:03):
Thank you very much.

Speaker 1 (01:08:04):
That's right. It's the Breakfast Club. Good morning, thank you.

Speaker 6 (01:08:06):
Wake that ass up in the morning. The Breakfast Club