September 14, 2024 • 66 mins
BLOG TALK RADIO #1 RADIO PODCAST...11 YEARS IN A ROW! MAN ABOUT TOWN WITH DONN CARL HARPER TALK RADIO TONIGHT! JOIN US IN THE ART OF CONVERSATION! EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT!....MAN ABOUT TOWN! WITH YOUR HOST: DONN CARL HARPER AND Guest "...LIVE CALL IN 646-200-0948
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Love talk radio.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Come far.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
But now.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
I didn't make a shoe pay. I got a hearty
but no violence. I'm checking travel sugar, moving down the
I come a party, but that's a cake trouble me,
don't get in wad I come a far, I go
(00:52):
REALM gonna give you, gonna go down? How about getting down?
That's gonna great. That show help us start the time.
(01:14):
They're not home, they're not nice.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
Here. Well that is what you do.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Got mad for him?
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, what's up? What's up? Y'all? Welcome
to the talk radio Man About Town. My name is
Don Carl and your host. A little bit about this show.
It is a talk radio show. And so even though
(02:04):
you see me on Instagram, we are broadcasting all over
the world right now. We've been doing the show going
into our twelfth year in a couple of weeks, and
we've been doing this show for twelve years about that,
(02:25):
and we have over fifty five thousand listeners now listening tonight,
but on the stream, and we have folks in the Netherlands,
in China, in the UK and Africa and Brazil. Down
(02:48):
in Brazil, San Paolo, Real, decent Airo. They light up
and they tell me what my dashboards. So fifty five
thousand listeners. So this is a top radio show dealing
with entertainment, politics, sports, and life, and we talk about
some of everything for one hour. We do have a
(03:10):
live call in number. It is six four six two
zero zero zero nine for eight, so that six four
six two zero zero zero nine four eight. You can
call in on your phone and I patch you into
the board. Let's you see, there's some callers already there
(03:35):
and we just talked. We chime it up, talking, maybe
listening to a little music. But like I said, we
talked about entertainment, politics and sports and life. You know,
some of your questions that you might have. You may
(03:55):
want to ask a question you can't hear me. Huh, okay,
that's cool. Let me let me uh, let me turn
off my mic. Yeah, so I see in the guest
tonight on that. So also I am broadcasting on Instagram
and uh so those of you see me on Instagram.
(04:18):
And then other people who link in to the computer
to the board is uh the other people that link
in are chiming in from all over the world. So
kind of got the best of the both things. So
this is not a podcast where you will be seen.
(04:43):
The only people to see is me and uh, I
see you. So if you call in, it'll be on
the radio, it'll be here, and it will go out
to the world, but they won't see. That's unique. So
it's like for those of you are on the computer,
(05:04):
it's like listening to a radio from home anyway. So
it's been a long week. First off, I want to
give let me give a shout out to the pretty
Tony Winners. Pretty Tony Winters a talented actor. Okay, a
(05:27):
lot of movies, TV, theater, just what's up town. I
used to I was an actor. I lived in LA
for twenty years and worked and saw some of the
best acts that were there. But then I relocated to
Chicago a while back, and so I haven't seen my
(05:49):
LA group. But Tony Winners is a very, very talented actor.
I know he was in the You Sell Queen Sugar
if y'all remember Queen Sugar Oprah's Shell Queen Sugar, and
he was the owner of the restaurant. And then I
(06:13):
saw him in a couple of plays in LA and
also he did Uh he's got a new TV project
called something about the Supremes, something like that. But anyway,
it's not dealing with the supremes. It's just dealing with
(06:34):
three three black ones and three stars. And I think again,
he's the owner of the restaurant. What's home. You own
the restaurant, You're the man. Okay. Anyway, Telly do actor
thinks he's joining in, and then we have a bunch
of people that are lined up to chat, that are
(06:54):
checking out, checking us out. But shout out to Tony Winners.
Walter tabayo Ya said, maybe we should do a one
on one interview because we do interviews, and uh, we
do a lot of interviews with celebrities. That's how I
started out, just doing this on the local thing. We
(07:17):
started in l a and then we moved to Las Vegas.
We've done shows in Philadelphia and New York, just about
everywhere I travel any anyway. But we're I'm in Chicago.
Uh here la is burning up out there. It's hot weather.
We we're turning into fossil group cool here. It's it's
(07:41):
mellowing out really really good. But uh, it's been a
wild week.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
Man.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
First off, I want to give a shout out to
some newminaries that have have checked out you know, passed on.
We wanted to give us great shout out to the great,
(08:09):
the goat, James Earl Jones. You guys remember James Earl Jones,
don't god you know, when I think of his career, uh,
he was truly the goat. And and I have never
seen anything that James Earl Jones has done that I
(08:33):
didn't like or I didn't learn from my first time
meeting him. Yes, I met him. The first time I
met him, he was doing uh shit, well he was
at the Student Baker Theater. Robinson Robertson, Robinson Robinson, I mean,
(08:56):
do has done so much stuff. So it was uh,
Paul Robinson, and he was a tour and he did
it here in Chicago at the Studebaker Theater. And the
Studebaker Theater they had a deal where if you know,
because they did a lot with students too, so they
(09:19):
had a deal where if you came in in a mission,
you could see the second half of the shell. So
I'm a college student. I didn't have much cash, and
I just wanted to, you know, get back with James
and holler at him, you know. Uh. And back then,
you know, it was no thing for people to walk backstage.
(09:41):
You know. So another buddy of mine from school, I
told him about how we could see the second second
half of the shelf, you know, and so you know,
we came in there and beside the second half of
the shell. So then I was really a group bieing
a fan because I was just starting town to act.
And I was like, okay, well, what I want to
(10:02):
do is, uh I'm speaking of y'all. What I want
to do is I like to get an autograph. So
I would go always I would always wait for actors
to come off stage. You did. I would wait for
them to come off and you know, at the stage
door because you could always get an autograph. I have
(10:23):
to tell you my telesabolist story. But anyway, so uh
we me and my boy went back there and we
saw the show. The show was great. The show was great,
and uh uh, well the second half is great because
we didn't see the first half. We was just good.
(10:43):
It was just a great to see James Earl Jones
on stage. You did. And so anyway, after the show
was over, you know, we asked us where the stage door,
like like we knew him right, and surprisingly enough, they
(11:04):
told us where stay's door. Is and we went back there,
no security or anything, and we walked all the way
up to James's dressing room and he was sitting back.
You know, I don't know, I don't know if he
was smoking a cigarette or he was just chilling. He was,
you know, the sell was over. You know, I don't know,
(11:24):
he was killing. But his door was open. So we
walked in there and say, hey, missus Jones blah blah blah.
You know, hey, we loved to sell him blah blah
blah and blase way. You know, we just talking it
up and laughing and they were just really enjoying. Oh,
it's great to meet you. And so we was like,
go get an autograph. He gave us an autograph, and somehow,
(11:48):
you know, he was like, well what you guys into
blah blah blah, And somehow we ended up teaching James
Earl Jones the spank, the spanky. Remember that dance, right, yeah,
the spank. We ended up teaching James Earl Jones the spank.
And so, you know, we back there and he actually
(12:12):
got up and did the spank with us. Shout out
to Brother Israel if he's by chance listened, because he
was a brother with me, and Jame started doing the spank.
You know, he looked like it was like he looked
like Can Claudine time. This is several years ago. But anyway,
(12:33):
so I met James Earl Jones and uncle. Really it
was like early not early in his career, but I
guess it was like the eighties or whatever. But he
was younger, you know, he was stinner. And so second
time I saw James Earl Jones, I went to see
(12:56):
o'fellow at the super and performance, I mean James Earl Jones, yes,
and and I had a I don't know where I
got to take it from, but I got a close
up seat and I'm looking at him and watching him,
and uh he was performing jameson Jones was Othello and
(13:19):
his uh uh his uh let me see if I
turned that out. His uh his iago was Christopher Plumber, Okay,
another great actor. Okay. And anyway, so James O. Jones
(13:39):
and Christopher Plumber on the stage, killing it right, and
I'm watching it. I'm watching it and I'm enjoying it,
and then uh, something happens where mechanical these walls are
supposed to close like this, like they were closing the
room and doors or whatever that whatever it was, it's
supposed to close in midwoo. The doors did like this,
(14:05):
and they didn't close all the way so quickly. These
doors had to close for them to go on, right,
So I saw Christopher Plumber run up and step on
the platform and kind of push the doors closed in
his monologue, you know, and the audience applauded. So, you know,
(14:31):
I was just watching watching the master's work. Those of
you actors understand those who don't, you know. But it
was a moment, right, and I was like that right
there in the front row. I was like, oh, check him. Look,
you know, look how they did that. So the third time,
(14:51):
I was in New York and I was at a
restaurant and I sat down in the booth. This guy
behind me was he was an old guy. He must
have been definitely in his nineties, right, and he looked
(15:12):
like James Earl Jones, but he was too old. And
so finally I asked him, as curious, are you related
to James Earl Jones? And he told me he was
his father. Luke, I am your father. He was James
(15:33):
Earl Jones's father, and his name was Robert Earl Jones.
Y'all better take notes. Okay, I'm gonna give me some history. Okay,
So Robert Robert Earl Jones like James ol Jones. Robert
Earl Jones, and his father was like ninety three. But
(15:53):
check this out. He's an actor too. Yes, oh, James
Earl Jones. And he wasn't rare. He came from a family.
His father was an actor and his father, Paul Clark
fits he was quite old and quite regal. But he
was a black man, but all of this white hair.
(16:16):
So m I met James Earl Jones, Well, met James
Earl Jones once saw him perform, and then I met
his dad. Then I had that. That was pretty much
for me. So uh anyway, so that was great. I
enjoyed that and it was memorable. You know, I got
(16:40):
so many memories I can tell yall when I met
Will Smith, and you know, he gave me the dad
to shake and he didn't have to do that. But
I digressed, So let me get back. So we want
to give a rest in power two the goat James
(17:01):
Earl Jones. I remember him in roots. I mean when
you think the body of work that he has done.
You know, I saw him play Alex Haley and Roots.
That was great because Alex Haley looked just like him.
He looked just like Alix. They made him look just
like so it was just wonderful. Also, we're gonna give
(17:27):
a shout out to well arresting power to another goat
of soap, of some thing called of some sort of music,
the legendary Frankie Beverley. Man, Frankie Beverley, take you back.
(17:47):
You know you remember the songs joy and pain and
like sunshine and rain. That's real, y'all, Joy and payin
all together, you know. Anyway, Anyway, Frankie Beverley did pass away,
(18:09):
and uh you know when you say his name, you
just think of all the songs, you know, the golden
time of day man, songs that make you feel and
make you remember where you were or you know, if
(18:30):
he was in love, if you if he was going
through changes or whatever, joy and pain, you know what
I mean, when he was going through some joy. So
that was good. And also what else, just numerous hits
and but check this out. I was fortunate enough again,
(18:58):
I get lucky like this, right, I was fortunate enough
to uh well, I got, I actually got. I want
tickets to see Frankie Beverly. I want tickets to see
Frankie Beverly at the at the United States. He was
(19:21):
doing his last concert, which turned out to be his
last concert, and uh he uh he he was great,
He was great. His singing was a little bad. But
I knew that that was his last concert. But I
didn't have no idea that he was going to die,
(19:43):
you know, And that's deep. You know. You think people
that die know they're gonna die. You know. They say
people that died today had plans this morning, had plans
to ze, plans for next week. So but God bless Frankie,
(20:07):
Frankie Beverly. And I saw a video or something and
they had all these people were outside on the street,
crowd of people, and they were just playing his music
and people were dancing. And that's the way, you know,
it's really cool to memorialize people because like I remember
(20:29):
when Michael Jackson died and they just played his music.
And music is a healing because it takes you back
to good time, takes you back to bad times, but
it's very healing. It's healing to me, especially when I
get caught up. Sometimes I can just listen to stuff
on the on the radio or YouTube, you know, because
(20:54):
they have a lot of good conscience on YouTube. Man,
I mean two free. You got a whole concert in
your own you know, you ain't got to go nowhere,
and you can listen to some music. Ain't gotta go
out and sit nowhere. But anyway, Frankie Beverly, resting power, brother.
I'm on the air, y'all six or six six zero
(21:16):
zero zero nine eight. He's going to give a shout
out to anybody else say anything about these people. I
also want to give a shout out now this brother,
y'all might not know. I want to rest in power
to brother Terry Colors. Terry Colors, you guys don't know.
(21:42):
He wasn't famous, but he wasn't an actor director here
in Chicago. There's a lot of stuff you might know.
His dad. His father was the great Vince Colors of
Vince Colors Advertising. They were a big advertising firm in
(22:03):
the nineties and early two thousands. But his father had
passed and h and the agency clothes and Terry went
on to be an actor director and it worked quite
a bit. So Resting power to Terry Colors. You guys,
(22:28):
some of y'all in LA you might know his brother,
Jeff Colors. And Jeff Colors is a big voice over artists, right,
big time voiceover artists. So anyway, we want to give
a shout out to them entertainment wise. And that's that's heavy.
(22:52):
And then I saw a picture of James Earl Jones
and another actor but name. He was on like bred
on nine one one and real talented actor, but he
had passed, you did. So I saw a picture of
him and Andre James, James Jose and Andre Brown and
the scene together. He had passed. So just you know,
(23:17):
the grades are going man, you know, making more room
for us tony winners if you're still there. Uh, you know,
because it's our time to take over. Uh been around
a lot of greatness and so forth. Uh let's say
what am I doing? Uh? Uh my pettish, Hey, bro'
(23:38):
I'm on line. Everybody wants to give theself business, you know,
right anyway, so also uh tell me, uh, I'm on
there's a TV TV series called Emperor of Ocean Park,
(24:01):
and Emperor of Oson Park is starring Forrest. Hey, go ahead,
well some ring here, all right, Emperor of Ocean Park
is on the n GM network. Everything's on a damn
app now, man, you know, and it's not as good
as network, but you know it's work. But I was
(24:24):
an actor in episode eight of Emperor of osen Park
with Forrest with a. Yeah, I got scenes with them.
They cut some of my lines and appreciate that. But
it's a good little intricate I'm intricate to the story.
So watch me on Emperor of Ocean Park episode eight. Dan,
(24:47):
this is like you say, Dan, Then I got to
get the business out. So then I'm also starting in
a play. Uh, it's gonna be here. It's a I
go to two days, two day gig October fifth and
six at Diusable African American Museum, and that is here
(25:13):
in Chicago, but they also do a lot of plays there.
So I'm at DuSable October fifth and sixth. And the
name of the place it's called Invitation to a Stranger.
It's like like a murder mystery player, you did Invitation
to a Stranger. Can't tell you nothing about it, but
you just got to be here and just see it.
(25:34):
October fifth and sixth, and I know I'd be telling
it i'd be telling Tony. I tell Tony what is Yeah,
I'm doing this play blah blah blah. He say, yeah, okay,
tell me about it, but I ain't coming. And I
appreciate that, but I didn't tell them about it anyway. Anyway,
So invitation to a stranger. And that's what's happening October fifth,
(26:00):
to sick see it. My my better half is in
a play too. SE's an actress too. My name is Margo.
Margo is in a play up north called Within a Shadow.
(26:21):
It's a play at the Den Theater. And uh, that's
a good play, y'all said, check that out, and uh
it's interesting. Yeah, anyway, go see that play. Go see
that Den Theater. And also one of my buddies gotta play.
(26:41):
Aaron Reese Boseman. He's the director here. He's with I
think he's Chad with Bozeman's nephews, but he's got to
play uh called Beneath the Willow Tree. Say that that
was serious. So that was good too, all right, So yeah,
that's what's happening. And then it gets better, it gets better.
(27:06):
You know. First of all, I ain't got the politics yet. Yeah,
I ain't got the politics. Maybe that's why y'all want
to call me. But I see y'all listening. But I'm
directing and producing a play of world premiere and musical. Yep,
I'm doing a musical. Okay uh. It's called Maggie Never
(27:31):
Better and it's written by Teresa and Shotwell and Shotwell
Productions out of Florida, and we're producing it here in Chicago.
It's won numerous awards on the written scale and the soundtrack.
(27:54):
There's already been a castle, but they've never stayed it.
It never got hit the stage, and we are adapting
it for the stage. So that's going to take place
the weekend, the weekend before Thanksgiving and Thanksgiving weekend, so
if you don't have any holidays stuff to do, you know,
(28:19):
if you're here with the family. It's in Chicago, also
at Morgan Park Academy on the South Side. So for
six performances, you'll love it. They don't do theater like that.
I don't know why, you know, even the big shows.
Sometimes they'll do a weekend and then you have your
(28:40):
Broadway in Chicago, the Equity Theater that will do, but
they only do like two weeks most of those do.
They don't do six weeks. The regular theaters do about
six weeks okay, but the the the bigger shows, they
do like two weeks in because they're on tour and
(29:00):
they go and come.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
They did.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Soldiers Play. They did us check this out. Okay, so
I've seen soldiers play. That's like a Soldier's story with
the movie with Denzel Well, there was a play called
the Soldiers Play, and they did a Soldier's play and
(29:25):
I did it once. I was in it and I
directed it. Okay, that's how long it's been around. But
they did it this time. They turned the Subldiers Play
into a musical that was kind of rough. That's kind
of sacrilegious. I couldn't really deal with that, but it
(29:47):
was interesting. The guy sing a song like you know,
but it took away. The play is excellent. If you
ever get a chance to see the play, see to play.
Oh oh, I'm sorry, okay, uh six four six to
(30:08):
zero zero zero nine four eight. Now what you have
to do then is you have to push the number one. Okay,
he pushed one, and then I'll pat you in out there.
You go, all right, okay, I see you all right? Man?
(30:31):
About telling you on air. What's up? Man?
Speaker 3 (30:34):
Man, it's Tony Winzers. What's going on? Brother?
Speaker 1 (30:38):
What's up? Pretty Tony.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
Real ain't here pretty tonight, but nobody's looking. So I'm
gonna receive that. Couldn't you hear your boys?
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Don Yeah, man, hear your boys. Man, Hollywood listens you brother, Oh,
thank you, brother. I appreciate that. Uh. In the long haul,
I may be back out there, but I don't know, y'all.
They got so many earthquakes and and and it's so
damn hot out there. I was like, am I missing something?
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Oh? You're keeping up man, because the heat wave just
ended it with two days ago, and and the earthquake
was yesterday. Really it was. It was a pretty good
little shaker, man. I heard I heard a rumble. I
was laying in bed and I heard a rumble, like
like subterranean rumble, And all of a sudden, my my
(31:29):
building started to shake. And I was like, whoa, because
it was you know, nothing was broken to my knowledge,
no one was, no one was hurt or injured, but yeah,
you know, and we all have our stuff and hey,
I got off the plane. I changed planes in Chicago
one year. I just walking down the jetway almost that
frost bitten. So you got your you got your stuff
(31:52):
to deal with there too.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's getting ready to change here. So
uh but the weather is really cool here. And hey, man,
tell me about the Supreme Beach.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
The Supremes at Earls All you Can Eat Stars Finalethan
and Ellis and I'm u Ellis Taylor excuse me, and
Uzzo Aduba spunchy time around with Uzoduba. We did a
film a couple of years ago called National Champions, so
it was it was really cool seeing her own set.
(32:28):
But yeah, it's it's about the three about the friendships
of these three women that take place over the course
of thirty years, you know, from nineteen sixty eight through
nineteen ninety eight, and there's a so we see them
(32:48):
as we meet them as teenagers, and in fact, on
the day that they all get together, they walk into
the restaurant. My character owns I happen to play Earl
Erl and they all walk in and he dubs them
the Supremes because you know, this was nineteen sixty eight,
(33:09):
the height of Diana Ross and the Supremes, and these
three beautiful young women walking into his restaurant. So he
dubs them Supreme, and I always found it kind of
ironic that they cast their brothers from Detroit dubbed the
three main characters of Supreme, So there's a bit of
irony there. But man, it's just a beautiful experience I
(33:31):
had on that project. Directed by Tina Maybury, written and
directed written by I'm Sorry, Gina Bite, Gina Prince Bidenwood
and Tina Maybury, directed by Tina Maybury, produced by Searchlight Pictures,
and it was just a class operation from beginning to end. Man,
(33:55):
just one of the most awesome experiences I had on
a film. And I got to work with the young
cast because each every principal character has a younger counterpart
in the film, a younger person playing their character, and
so most of my scenes are with the younger cast.
(34:18):
And they were just phenomenal. Man, they were. I mean,
I didn't know what to expect because I had worked
with a lot of you know, young people before, and
they were just absolutely phenomenal and professional and just had
a blast with them and and uh and uh yeah.
It's just one of the It's probably the highest profile
(34:40):
role I've ever had down and I say a film
that has has really resonated with certainly with black audiences,
in a way nothing else I've ever done has.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
So so well. We know, you were in Clean Sugar,
you know, and I thought that was too big. I
mean when I saw pictures of you with Oprah at
the premier, I was like, who else?
Speaker 3 (35:12):
He was the producer and she was there, So I
wasn't gonna set opportunity to get get a get a
picture with with the Queen, you know. But you know,
it's interesting, you know, these relationships that were forging this
business man, and even relationships that were forging that we're
unaware of. Like Tina Maybray was a producer writer on
(35:38):
Queen Sugar all my episodes, but I never met her.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Oh wow.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
I never met her on on set or anything. So
I just did my thing, and you know, I was
I'm that guy man, you know, I'm I'm I'm I'm
respectful and pleasant to everyone. I mean, you know, I'm
a pro, you know. And I don't know how much
that had to do with her casting me, but because
(36:07):
I've never asked, even though we've been social many times
since then, I've never asked, you know, why me? But yeah, man,
so you know, these these things that we do along
the way that they're they're all building blocks done.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
George, you know, go ahead, sir, I tell I tell
all my actors. You know, I have a few students too,
and I tell them what when you go in to read,
you know, because you know the processes, you're going to
read for the casting director and sometimes they'll have somebody
(36:44):
read with you, and I tell them all the time,
take the time to thank everybody you can if you're
allowed to, but especially take the time to thank the
person they read, which because if they trying to decide
and we all know I'm casting it, so you know
(37:05):
it could be you could be perfect for it, but
you know the producer's needs, needs, the priet or whatever.
You know, anything can blow you out or sometimes they
shouldn't the wrong and they don't know what to make
a decision. They don't ask the person they read with you, well,
who did you love?
Speaker 3 (37:23):
What do you think right right?
Speaker 1 (37:25):
You know? And if you was rude to that person,
but they're thinking about the person that was polite and
spoke to them, and you know.
Speaker 3 (37:34):
Whatever, because especially on a film like that, you know
where you're going to be with these people day in,
day out. For weeks on end. You want to make
sure somebody that is pleasant to be around, you know,
you know what I mean. And professional knows this stuff
and knows you know, has good hygiene, has good you know,
(38:00):
social skills you don't know. No, I tell you Andrew
with limousine for a lot of years out here, don
and the guy that trained me in the in the profession,
he said, the most important thing a driver has to
know is when to shut up. You know when to
be quiet and just listen. And that is something I
(38:23):
carry with me to this day.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Man.
Speaker 3 (38:24):
You know, you got to you gotta know when when
when to talk and when not to talk. It's probably
more important than when you talk, you know what I mean?
Right right, it's just kind of stand out of people's
way and doing your job being a professional. So yeah,
and you know, listening to your long prologue, man, I
got to tell you that I work with I worked with.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
James el Jones. Okay, you do we have time for that?
Go ahead? Yeah.
Speaker 3 (38:53):
Nineteen ninety two I booked a partner movie called Sneakers
with Robert Redford, Sidney Patier, Dan Ackroyd River, Phoenix men Kingsley,
Mary McDonald David straight there and James Rod Jones. It
was amazing. I only had one line and only one scene,
(39:15):
the climactic scene at the end, but I had a
week on the movie. And you know what it's like
to work on a film, mister monkey hustle. You know,
you're there twelve hours a day, even though you may
not be doing a whole lot, you're there all day.
So I got real familiar with everybody on the set,
(39:37):
including Sidney Partier, and I remember the first day of
the table read, you know, Sidney Partier and James Earl
Jones walking because the only thing I knew when I
got the job was that it was a Robert Redford movie.
I didn't know anybody else in the film, and so
they invited me to come to the table reading. I'm
Sitney at the tayle with my script of my one line,
raring to go, and all of a sudden, all these
(39:58):
big stars at walking the room and I'm like, overly ship,
you know, okay, And in walks Sidney Puny and James
ol Jones together just kind of laughing and chatting like
they're on their way to you know, poor a motor
company for the for the night shift, you know what
I mean. And I was like, holy Toledo, man, you
(40:19):
know this is this is the real deal. But on
the set, I remember after uh, James Garreld played a
character named Abbot, and an Abbot is charged to retrieve
this this black box from reference character from his character
(40:41):
is named Bishop. So after he gets the black box
from Bishop, he kind of gestures for us to leave.
So we're all walking out and as I'm walking out,
you know, my shoes are clunking against the floor, making
a lot of noise on the hardwood floor of the
sound stage. And so the sound guy said, hey, uh,
(41:02):
you know those booties they'll slip over your shoes so
that you can walk without making a lot of noise. Uh.
They're like stockings, but they call them booties on the set.
And the sound guy steed up, Hey can we get
because my shoes are black? He said, can we get
some about black booties over here for Tony? And James
Jill said, black booties? I want some. Man, When I
(41:30):
tell you, everybody on that set fell, the fell the
f our uh, I mean, we laugh, we must to laugh.
We lost it for about a good ten minutes, man,
And finally we got ourselves back together and continue but hearing,
you know, the voice of dos Vader, the voice of
seeing you know, so many great characters throughout his career,
(41:54):
say black bootiespecially Hilaria. Yes, yeah, you know, yeah, yeah,
it was perfectly time. It was quiet after the style man,
you know, as for the booty for me and uh so, yeah,
that was that was my one big moment with James
(42:16):
Arrow as He's.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Like, let's see that's that's that's one of them stories
you got to put in in your book, you know.
You know, I did a lee with Will Smith in
l A and I'm in a scene. Well, I'm playing
a reporter and it's it's a tight box. We're sitting
(42:40):
at the at the coliseum over there and it's like
a little tight box, right, and it's hot as hell
in there, and it's we're in a Lei's uh room.
And to my right it's Jamie Fox you dig and
I got a yeah because brown? Right, And then on
(43:02):
on on my left, I mean, we're in tight like this.
On my left it's Jeffrey right, and I'm like and
I'm I'm like, I'm freaking out, Okay, I'm like and
I know I I just got a day player role.
I got one like one line and tell us about
the story camp or whatever. Right, and there's another two
(43:23):
guys behind me, but I'm the lead reporter, right, So
uh so I look I look over and then Jamie
flocks off and he's playing chess with somebody. They got
a little chest set there while we're waiting to put
him to reverse the camera, right, And so I think
(43:44):
I freaked out, you know, I'm like, okay, And then
you know in l A, you know, when you see stars.
I'm from Chicago, so when I see stars, I'm you know,
and I.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
Have to do that on a movie set. Been around
for what at that point?
Speaker 1 (44:01):
No, No, I was.
Speaker 3 (44:03):
I was.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
I was cool, right, and so but they were standing
next to me, and I'm like, and I'm going over
their resume in my mind, I'm like, oh god, Jeffrey right,
white shaft, blah blah blah blah blah. And I'm just thinking, oh,
I am you know, if my mom could see me now.
So then they broke or they changed the gate, changed
(44:23):
the camera or whatever, and everybody kind of feathered off
and I'm still standing in place, you know, and then
everybody in that room. Will Smith walked over to me
and shook my hand, said, what's something man? I was like, oh,
so I wanted to say something in character. I wanted
(44:44):
to say, oh, how you doing tamp But I was like,
I went totally nerdy. I was like, how were you,
mister Smith? But I was standing in there with all
of this greatness, and I was like I was. I
was talking to my mom. I was like, mom, if
you can see me now, you know, I mean somebody
(45:07):
said that you don't get a picture of you know,
Well now you can get a picture like I got.
I worked with Forrest with a about a month ago,
and after the shoot I had my camera in my
park and I asked him, you know, could we take
a picture and he said yes. So I got a
lovely picture with him. You know, but a lot of
(45:30):
it is memories, man, you know, But so what what's
the process? What's happening? And now, I mean you managed
to get work, bro, you know you and you know
Gillyard moved to Atlanta and uh but even flying back
doing work, you know, and I did alright, Well I
(45:52):
was out there, but you know I was looking up
to you guys, and you know, I would always see
you book something. So I would say in my videos,
I got to catch Tony winners.
Speaker 3 (46:08):
You should, you should, you should aim a little higher,
because you know what I mean, a lot of people,
you know, not like people like yourself, but friends of
mine from outside of the industry or people I've known,
you know, for many years. They'll say to me like, hey, Tony,
you know you followed your dreams and you know you're
(46:30):
you're you're doing it and that's what the thing is.
And I guess that's true. And I didn't even think
about it. And I guess the point I'm trying to
make is at a certain point, I reached that point
of no return, you know what I mean by that?
Speaker 1 (46:47):
Yes, yeah, there's really nothing else I can do.
Speaker 3 (46:50):
This is what the the for better or for worse,
this is what I do. I mean, it's it's too
late to go back and go to med school or
all school or you know, trying to learn another trade.
So for better Ford, So I just hung in there, man,
because there was really nothing else I wanted to do it,
and it really had no idea about anything else, so
(47:14):
I just continue.
Speaker 1 (47:16):
We're inspired, I mean I was inspired by you, you know,
when I was out there, Oh God, bless you. Man. No, really, man,
I mean when I was out there, I was, you know,
like my first job. Carl Gilliard game and I guess
it was Bill dou had an acting class and they
(47:38):
decided to do play at the end of the class. Right.
So my first over on Las Vinaga exactly my first day,
and I called Gilly. I said, hey, man, I'm in La.
You know, I just got an apartment whatever whatever, And
he was like, well, you want to work on the show, right,
(47:58):
So he said, I'm over to the Hudson Theater and
we're working on a little show and you do something.
Do props. Man. When I went and sat in that
audience the first day in Hollywood, I met Taraji, I
met Donald Faison, I met Sam Moore. You know, everybody
(48:25):
was kind of dropping in, right, and.
Speaker 3 (48:27):
Everybody who was connected to that class.
Speaker 1 (48:30):
Yeah, I was. I was a groupie. I mean, I'm
you know, and I'm you know, I'm first day in La.
You know, I wanted to do some acting, you know.
And he called me and I ended up doing props
with Kelly Williams from Family Matters. So all the actors
were really doing jobs around the theater to produce this
(48:52):
play because it was The class Man. So the first
night I freaked the fuck out. I was like, oh
my god, you know my Hollywood dreams that I met
everybody in one day. And then there was a break
and then Anthony Anderson came in. He just happened to
(49:16):
stop live, you know, and I'm like, oh my god,
and I remember him from some little Saturday morning show
and he was kind of fat in but he came
in bragging, yeah, I'm doing this film with Dustin Hoffman,
and I'm doing this film and this build. And then
the whole cast of the Best Man they had just
(49:39):
done that. And then I got a friend, Bernadette Bernadette speaks,
and she was we weren't playing in Chicago, but I
knew her and she was in the class so I
got to see her. So anyway, well, I'm just saying,
the journey is what it is. And I know what
(50:01):
you're saying, because you know, I'm over fifty and this
is it, you know. I yeah, we all had regular jobs,
you know, we all worked every kind of job at
least I did. You know, well I did too, bro, Yeah, yeah,
you know, So I mean I was in corporate limousines.
Speaker 3 (50:21):
I was a tour guide at Universal Studios. I was
a page in DC. I worked jobs for years, you know, everything,
anything that gave me the freedom to walk away when
I needed to, you know what I mean, right right?
So you know, the day job was always a means
(50:43):
to an end. It was never a come up job
because I always figured if I got a job that
really paid well or you know, or was or I
was really central to the operation, I wouldn't have the
freedom to walk away when I because I knew that
they would ultimately come with. You either go into that
audition for for uh you know, uh, Simon and Simon,
(51:08):
or you're gonna stay here and sell those shoes? Which
which are you gonna do? Tony? And it would always
be the Simon and Simon audition, you know.
Speaker 1 (51:17):
I would. I would try to schedule it on my
if I had a lunch hour and I could move
to lunch hour and trade with somebody, you know, I would.
I would have my uh my car right at the
door so I could go run and do these auditions.
Hopefully they would be on time, you know. And for commercials,
you in and out, you know, if it's on time,
(51:38):
and you could do it, you know, because.
Speaker 3 (51:42):
You know l A traffic. You got to get all
the way across town and get that. You ain't gonna
do that in no hour. I'm sorry, bro, It's gonna
take you at least a half hour to get there.
In most instances, you gotta part go inside signing. You
gotta wait, so you will for an hour. Now, I
(52:03):
never knew how to make that work. It never works
for me. Now.
Speaker 1 (52:07):
I had, Uh, I had, like I said, but I've
got these these stories, you know, like I know, I
see Bill Bellamy. He does these stories where he takes
you know, what happened in a certain scene or situation.
And I had, I've worked showing you. I worked on Passions,
the soap opera for like six years. I was an extra,
(52:30):
but you know, they gave me this and uh. And
then one day I used to live in uh like
Echo Park, right, And one day I woke up late
and it was the airline scene. You know, it was
gonna be on the plane and they had already placed
us and everything right, And I woke up late. I
(52:52):
was supposed to be there like at I guess nine,
and I woke up like eight h eight thirty and
I had to go to uh A CBS Ratford out there, right, dude, dude,
I got I jumped out of bed, there was some
(53:16):
clothes on and I got onto one on one. Dude.
I was dead at nine o'clock. I didn't know how wild, dude.
I mean, I was driving crazy because I knew if
this once the stage manager to check me in. I'm
not in my seat, you know, I'm a blowing, you know.
(53:36):
And uh but I got there and I don't know,
you know. So that's that's one of the stories going
in my book, the Will Smith and James Earl Jones,
just little tidbits of you know, as I pressed greatness.
And I also I worked on a series with Oprah
back in It was called Women of Brewster Place. It
(54:00):
was a movie.
Speaker 3 (54:01):
But they did I remember it. I remember it, Alfred Woodard,
I think right, And yeah, I remember that one. It
was a big deal, like say eighty six, eighty seven
something like that.
Speaker 1 (54:14):
Yeah, Rubin Cannon, that's how old it was. And uh
so I had got a part as her insurance agent
or whatever. And Harpo Studios was here in Chicago and
we shot it there, right, But what I didn't row
is they put my dressing room right next to hers.
Speaker 3 (54:34):
Right, yes, Oh okay, so you know in.
Speaker 1 (54:43):
Evidently you know, I was a day player. But you
know she would talk to me all the time, right,
So she told me one day she say, ask me
what was for lunch? And she told me she couldn't
walk over there because everybody was looking see what she ate.
(55:04):
So she wanted to know there are you know, true story,
you know, and I just I remember this ship, you know,
but my greatest story. You know, I'm taking over your story.
But and I wanted to interview you anyway, you know,
I wanted to do a you know, I have you
(55:25):
come on and talk about your career and stuff like that,
because Walter had gave me your number.
Speaker 3 (55:31):
You know, I think he mentioned this to me like
several months ago.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
Right right, because yeah, me and we were in our
first movie together twenty thirty years ago, Bad Boys with
Sean pen It was in a reform reformatory schools. Deep.
I remember that movie.
Speaker 3 (55:55):
That was a big deal, man, especially if you were
because Sean Pennis is well, he's my age. I don't
know about you, but you know I'm the same age
as Sean PN always saying Sean Pinn, Eddie Murphy, Nicholas Cage,
Wesley Snipes, you know, Barack Obama. We're all the same age.
We are all sixty two years old at this point.
(56:17):
But at that time, you know, Sean ten was twenty
twenty three, twenty four years old, as was I. So
you know, anything that had young people in it taps.
Speaker 1 (56:29):
You know, remember that one I.
Speaker 3 (56:33):
Was going to see? So, yeah, I was. I was.
That was a big seminal movie of my early years
in Los Angeles. You know, like, how do I and
I remember sitting there in the theater? Was you know
my buddy Tom who he and I used to go
to see movies all the time together at that time,
you know, back in the days of Wessele was popping,
you know, and I would to sit there at dark
(56:57):
movie theater and think, how the fun do I get
out of the share screen? How does that happen?
Speaker 1 (57:04):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 3 (57:05):
How do I get from here to there? Uh? It
took it took a while.
Speaker 1 (57:09):
But I figured it out, well, you know, I I fortunately,
luckily I got monkey hupset when I was sixteen years old,
and that was like the last black exit that's the
last black Exploitasten film that they did. And in that
(57:32):
movie was Jos Toto really rape more rise in Cash,
Gabbie Morgan, Randy Brooks and Thomas Carter and Brooks Wild
Yeah yeah, Thomas Carter Man, oh man, Yeah, I mean
it's old now, but uh that was that was really
(57:53):
uh a great, great time. And so I have been
doing it and I went to college and I've been
just acting all along. So when I got to Hollywood,
I had credits, you know, yeah, and I just quite
a few things there.
Speaker 3 (58:10):
But but oh man, you know, circling back to what
you were saying about working on Passions for six years,
I'm sure you've probably made Christy Ferrits and Rodney Van
Rodney Van Johnson.
Speaker 1 (58:29):
Yeah, yes, I remember Rodney. I remember Rodney, uh uh
because he.
Speaker 3 (58:36):
Was I'm sorry she gonna went away from the part.
I can't hear you that. Well.
Speaker 1 (58:39):
Yeah, I remember Rodney, he was on Passion.
Speaker 3 (58:43):
Yeah. Yeah, Rodney's become a friend of mine. But what
I was gonna say was, you know, for you know,
you you speak to young people just like I do
all the time that are starting in this business. And
and if I could do it all over again, I
would definitely be doing background work on certainly in commercials,
(59:05):
I would be doing standing work. I would be doing
background work on television shows and film union because what
I didn't know then that I know now is that
those earnings count towards your pension and health benefits. So
when you when you reach that age of fifty five
(59:29):
and you're trying to make that decision whether or not
you want to take your pension early or you want
to wait till you're sixty five to get it employed,
what have you? All of those earnings.
Speaker 1 (59:39):
Matter, you know what I mean, and.
Speaker 3 (59:44):
They can really boost your pension. And you know, when
you're twenty two, you're not thinking about that stuff about
you know, retirement. But let me tell you that thirty
years goes by pretty pretty damn fast. You know, it
goes by pretty damn fast, and you will you will
wish that you had been you know, uh more available
(01:00:08):
to the industry because you've got that sad card. You
can do it. You're sag aka rather you can. You
can do this work. You're eligible to do this work,
but your ego won't allow you to uh, you know,
perform background work. Ship if I could do it all
over again. Brother, I would be on somebody set every day.
Speaker 1 (01:00:27):
I heard you know what I mean? And then you
know And it's a funny thing that coming from Chicago
and then living in La. If you want to do
if you do three extras in La, you can get
a sad card. That's it's not like that here. You
have to get a job first before you can get
(01:00:49):
a sad car here. And that's that's crazy. But but listen, Ato,
but the time is that we gotta go. I really appreciate. Okay, man,
we're trap don and we do this every Friday night.
You guys watch out for Tony and the Supreme at Earls.
(01:01:10):
Is it called.
Speaker 3 (01:01:13):
Earls all you can eat?
Speaker 1 (01:01:16):
Okay? And and when when is it air or is
it airing?
Speaker 3 (01:01:20):
It's it's it's now streaming on Hulu only on Hulu. Okay,
please give it a look and and and tell your
friends about it. It's it's really kind of captured the zeitgeist.
I'm really proud to be a part of it.
Speaker 1 (01:01:36):
I'm great. I'm gonna I'm gonna look it up tonight
and you guys watch that. Telly give us a call
back next Friday. Every Friday night.
Speaker 3 (01:01:46):
If you're up you know, well, hear your text men,
text me and let me know and and and I'll
remember to to tune in and uh and we can
chop it up again whenever you whenever you want to doe.
Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Sounds great tone, appreciate it. Hey, guys, brother, we shout
out to Tony winners and thank you guys for listen.
We'll be back next week. Saint Bad Time Singing Bad
channel on Instagram and also live on the show.
Speaker 2 (01:02:39):
I didn't make a true tell you about it. I'm
taking trouble. Can you trouble man, don't let it wait.
(01:03:01):
I'm gonna fight. I'm not a real minute. I'm gonna
give you. I'm gonna go up. I'm gonna get that.
That's gonna get that's shop. Have to get the charm.
(01:03:29):
There's not all. There's not know we'll get us what
this got me? Yeah? Yeah, have a home. I had
(01:04:07):
to fight, took him and then wait over, lad come
talk to I had to win. That's got a little again.
How come a trouble fan don't beginning time with you? Hey?
Speaker 1 (01:04:32):
How on the places? And I've different places?
Speaker 2 (01:04:34):
I got the contention they did min that's just what
people they don't get an't bother me ready to make
it up there with the weather not there, My trouble
then knocked up together. I didn't kind of attention to
sot off. How faith I have a real dab with
(01:04:56):
the trouble bird. Oh that go come ball, I tell
about get that's only dream by anybody. Choo sec rum,
come bo, that's not anybody anything better. They're not home.
(01:05:22):
They were let a fucking base.
Speaker 3 (01:05:37):
O come.
Speaker 1 (01:05:45):
That's good.
Speaker 2 (01:05:48):
It made very everybody.
Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
Who come home.
Speaker 2 (01:05:54):
Now, I'm fine checking trouler choice here z
Love talk radio.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Come far.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
But now.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
I didn't make a shoe pay. I got a hearty
but no violence. I'm checking travel sugar, moving down the
I come a party, but that's a cake trouble me,
don't get in wad I come a far, I go
(00:52):
REALM gonna give you, gonna go down? How about getting down?
That's gonna great. That show help us start the time.
(01:14):
They're not home, they're not nice.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
Here. Well that is what you do.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Got mad for him?
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, what's up? What's up? Y'all? Welcome
to the talk radio Man About Town. My name is
Don Carl and your host. A little bit about this show.
It is a talk radio show. And so even though
(02:04):
you see me on Instagram, we are broadcasting all over
the world right now. We've been doing the show going
into our twelfth year in a couple of weeks, and
we've been doing this show for twelve years about that,
(02:25):
and we have over fifty five thousand listeners now listening tonight,
but on the stream, and we have folks in the Netherlands,
in China, in the UK and Africa and Brazil. Down
(02:48):
in Brazil, San Paolo, Real, decent Airo. They light up
and they tell me what my dashboards. So fifty five
thousand listeners. So this is a top radio show dealing
with entertainment, politics, sports, and life, and we talk about
some of everything for one hour. We do have a
(03:10):
live call in number. It is six four six two
zero zero zero nine for eight, so that six four
six two zero zero zero nine four eight. You can
call in on your phone and I patch you into
the board. Let's you see, there's some callers already there
(03:35):
and we just talked. We chime it up, talking, maybe
listening to a little music. But like I said, we
talked about entertainment, politics and sports and life. You know,
some of your questions that you might have. You may
(03:55):
want to ask a question you can't hear me. Huh, okay,
that's cool. Let me let me uh, let me turn
off my mic. Yeah, so I see in the guest
tonight on that. So also I am broadcasting on Instagram
and uh so those of you see me on Instagram.
(04:18):
And then other people who link in to the computer
to the board is uh the other people that link
in are chiming in from all over the world. So
kind of got the best of the both things. So
this is not a podcast where you will be seen.
(04:43):
The only people to see is me and uh, I
see you. So if you call in, it'll be on
the radio, it'll be here, and it will go out
to the world, but they won't see. That's unique. So
it's like for those of you are on the computer,
(05:04):
it's like listening to a radio from home anyway. So
it's been a long week. First off, I want to
give let me give a shout out to the pretty
Tony Winners. Pretty Tony Winters a talented actor. Okay, a
(05:27):
lot of movies, TV, theater, just what's up town. I
used to I was an actor. I lived in LA
for twenty years and worked and saw some of the
best acts that were there. But then I relocated to
Chicago a while back, and so I haven't seen my
(05:49):
LA group. But Tony Winners is a very, very talented actor.
I know he was in the You Sell Queen Sugar
if y'all remember Queen Sugar Oprah's Shell Queen Sugar, and
he was the owner of the restaurant. And then I
(06:13):
saw him in a couple of plays in LA and
also he did Uh he's got a new TV project
called something about the Supremes, something like that. But anyway,
it's not dealing with the supremes. It's just dealing with
(06:34):
three three black ones and three stars. And I think again,
he's the owner of the restaurant. What's home. You own
the restaurant, You're the man. Okay. Anyway, Telly do actor
thinks he's joining in, and then we have a bunch
of people that are lined up to chat, that are
(06:54):
checking out, checking us out. But shout out to Tony Winners.
Walter tabayo Ya said, maybe we should do a one
on one interview because we do interviews, and uh, we
do a lot of interviews with celebrities. That's how I
started out, just doing this on the local thing. We
(07:17):
started in l a and then we moved to Las Vegas.
We've done shows in Philadelphia and New York, just about
everywhere I travel any anyway. But we're I'm in Chicago.
Uh here la is burning up out there. It's hot weather.
We we're turning into fossil group cool here. It's it's
(07:41):
mellowing out really really good. But uh, it's been a
wild week.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
Man.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
First off, I want to give a shout out to
some newminaries that have have checked out you know, passed on.
We wanted to give us great shout out to the great,
(08:09):
the goat, James Earl Jones. You guys remember James Earl Jones,
don't god you know, when I think of his career, uh,
he was truly the goat. And and I have never
seen anything that James Earl Jones has done that I
(08:33):
didn't like or I didn't learn from my first time
meeting him. Yes, I met him. The first time I
met him, he was doing uh shit, well he was
at the Student Baker Theater. Robinson Robertson, Robinson Robinson, I mean,
(08:56):
do has done so much stuff. So it was uh,
Paul Robinson, and he was a tour and he did
it here in Chicago at the Studebaker Theater. And the
Studebaker Theater they had a deal where if you know,
because they did a lot with students too, so they
(09:19):
had a deal where if you came in in a mission,
you could see the second half of the shell. So
I'm a college student. I didn't have much cash, and
I just wanted to, you know, get back with James
and holler at him, you know. Uh. And back then,
you know, it was no thing for people to walk backstage.
(09:41):
You know. So another buddy of mine from school, I
told him about how we could see the second second
half of the shelf, you know, and so you know,
we came in there and beside the second half of
the shell. So then I was really a group bieing
a fan because I was just starting town to act.
And I was like, okay, well, what I want to
(10:02):
do is, uh I'm speaking of y'all. What I want
to do is I like to get an autograph. So
I would go always I would always wait for actors
to come off stage. You did. I would wait for
them to come off and you know, at the stage
door because you could always get an autograph. I have
(10:23):
to tell you my telesabolist story. But anyway, so uh
we me and my boy went back there and we
saw the show. The show was great. The show was great,
and uh uh, well the second half is great because
we didn't see the first half. We was just good.
(10:43):
It was just a great to see James Earl Jones
on stage. You did. And so anyway, after the show
was over, you know, we asked us where the stage door,
like like we knew him right, and surprisingly enough, they
(11:04):
told us where stay's door. Is and we went back there,
no security or anything, and we walked all the way
up to James's dressing room and he was sitting back.
You know, I don't know, I don't know if he
was smoking a cigarette or he was just chilling. He was,
you know, the sell was over. You know, I don't know,
(11:24):
he was killing. But his door was open. So we
walked in there and say, hey, missus Jones blah blah blah.
You know, hey, we loved to sell him blah blah
blah and blase way. You know, we just talking it
up and laughing and they were just really enjoying. Oh,
it's great to meet you. And so we was like,
go get an autograph. He gave us an autograph, and somehow,
(11:48):
you know, he was like, well what you guys into
blah blah blah, And somehow we ended up teaching James
Earl Jones the spank, the spanky. Remember that dance, right, yeah,
the spank. We ended up teaching James Earl Jones the spank.
And so, you know, we back there and he actually
(12:12):
got up and did the spank with us. Shout out
to Brother Israel if he's by chance listened, because he
was a brother with me, and Jame started doing the spank.
You know, he looked like it was like he looked
like Can Claudine time. This is several years ago. But anyway,
(12:33):
so I met James Earl Jones and uncle. Really it
was like early not early in his career, but I
guess it was like the eighties or whatever. But he
was younger, you know, he was stinner. And so second
time I saw James Earl Jones, I went to see
(12:56):
o'fellow at the super and performance, I mean James Earl Jones, yes,
and and I had a I don't know where I
got to take it from, but I got a close
up seat and I'm looking at him and watching him,
and uh he was performing jameson Jones was Othello and
(13:19):
his uh uh his uh let me see if I
turned that out. His uh his iago was Christopher Plumber, Okay,
another great actor. Okay. And anyway, so James O. Jones
(13:39):
and Christopher Plumber on the stage, killing it right, and
I'm watching it. I'm watching it and I'm enjoying it,
and then uh, something happens where mechanical these walls are
supposed to close like this, like they were closing the
room and doors or whatever that whatever it was, it's
supposed to close in midwoo. The doors did like this,
(14:05):
and they didn't close all the way so quickly. These
doors had to close for them to go on, right,
So I saw Christopher Plumber run up and step on
the platform and kind of push the doors closed in
his monologue, you know, and the audience applauded. So, you know,
(14:31):
I was just watching watching the master's work. Those of
you actors understand those who don't, you know. But it
was a moment, right, and I was like that right
there in the front row. I was like, oh, check him. Look,
you know, look how they did that. So the third time,
(14:51):
I was in New York and I was at a
restaurant and I sat down in the booth. This guy
behind me was he was an old guy. He must
have been definitely in his nineties, right, and he looked
(15:12):
like James Earl Jones, but he was too old. And
so finally I asked him, as curious, are you related
to James Earl Jones? And he told me he was
his father. Luke, I am your father. He was James
(15:33):
Earl Jones's father, and his name was Robert Earl Jones.
Y'all better take notes. Okay, I'm gonna give me some history. Okay,
So Robert Robert Earl Jones like James ol Jones. Robert
Earl Jones, and his father was like ninety three. But
(15:53):
check this out. He's an actor too. Yes, oh, James
Earl Jones. And he wasn't rare. He came from a family.
His father was an actor and his father, Paul Clark
fits he was quite old and quite regal. But he
was a black man, but all of this white hair.
(16:16):
So m I met James Earl Jones, Well, met James
Earl Jones once saw him perform, and then I met
his dad. Then I had that. That was pretty much
for me. So uh anyway, so that was great. I
enjoyed that and it was memorable. You know, I got
(16:40):
so many memories I can tell yall when I met
Will Smith, and you know, he gave me the dad
to shake and he didn't have to do that. But
I digressed, So let me get back. So we want
to give a rest in power two the goat James
(17:01):
Earl Jones. I remember him in roots. I mean when
you think the body of work that he has done.
You know, I saw him play Alex Haley and Roots.
That was great because Alex Haley looked just like him.
He looked just like Alix. They made him look just
like so it was just wonderful. Also, we're gonna give
(17:27):
a shout out to well arresting power to another goat
of soap, of some thing called of some sort of music,
the legendary Frankie Beverley. Man, Frankie Beverley, take you back.
(17:47):
You know you remember the songs joy and pain and
like sunshine and rain. That's real, y'all, Joy and payin
all together, you know. Anyway, Anyway, Frankie Beverley did pass away,
(18:09):
and uh you know when you say his name, you
just think of all the songs, you know, the golden
time of day man, songs that make you feel and
make you remember where you were or you know, if
(18:30):
he was in love, if you if he was going
through changes or whatever, joy and pain, you know what
I mean, when he was going through some joy. So
that was good. And also what else, just numerous hits
and but check this out. I was fortunate enough again,
(18:58):
I get lucky like this, right, I was fortunate enough
to uh well, I got, I actually got. I want
tickets to see Frankie Beverly. I want tickets to see
Frankie Beverly at the at the United States. He was
(19:21):
doing his last concert, which turned out to be his
last concert, and uh he uh he he was great,
He was great. His singing was a little bad. But
I knew that that was his last concert. But I
didn't have no idea that he was going to die,
(19:43):
you know, And that's deep. You know. You think people
that die know they're gonna die. You know. They say
people that died today had plans this morning, had plans
to ze, plans for next week. So but God bless Frankie,
(20:07):
Frankie Beverly. And I saw a video or something and
they had all these people were outside on the street,
crowd of people, and they were just playing his music
and people were dancing. And that's the way, you know,
it's really cool to memorialize people because like I remember
(20:29):
when Michael Jackson died and they just played his music.
And music is a healing because it takes you back
to good time, takes you back to bad times, but
it's very healing. It's healing to me, especially when I
get caught up. Sometimes I can just listen to stuff
on the on the radio or YouTube, you know, because
(20:54):
they have a lot of good conscience on YouTube. Man,
I mean two free. You got a whole concert in
your own you know, you ain't got to go nowhere,
and you can listen to some music. Ain't gotta go
out and sit nowhere. But anyway, Frankie Beverly, resting power, brother.
I'm on the air, y'all six or six six zero
(21:16):
zero zero nine eight. He's going to give a shout
out to anybody else say anything about these people. I
also want to give a shout out now this brother,
y'all might not know. I want to rest in power
to brother Terry Colors. Terry Colors, you guys don't know.
(21:42):
He wasn't famous, but he wasn't an actor director here
in Chicago. There's a lot of stuff you might know.
His dad. His father was the great Vince Colors of
Vince Colors Advertising. They were a big advertising firm in
(22:03):
the nineties and early two thousands. But his father had
passed and h and the agency clothes and Terry went
on to be an actor director and it worked quite
a bit. So Resting power to Terry Colors. You guys,
(22:28):
some of y'all in LA you might know his brother,
Jeff Colors. And Jeff Colors is a big voice over artists, right,
big time voiceover artists. So anyway, we want to give
a shout out to them entertainment wise. And that's that's heavy.
(22:52):
And then I saw a picture of James Earl Jones
and another actor but name. He was on like bred
on nine one one and real talented actor, but he
had passed, you did. So I saw a picture of
him and Andre James, James Jose and Andre Brown and
the scene together. He had passed. So just you know,
(23:17):
the grades are going man, you know, making more room
for us tony winners if you're still there. Uh, you know,
because it's our time to take over. Uh been around
a lot of greatness and so forth. Uh let's say
what am I doing? Uh? Uh my pettish, Hey, bro'
(23:38):
I'm on line. Everybody wants to give theself business, you know,
right anyway, so also uh tell me, uh, I'm on
there's a TV TV series called Emperor of Ocean Park,
(24:01):
and Emperor of Oson Park is starring Forrest. Hey, go ahead,
well some ring here, all right, Emperor of Ocean Park
is on the n GM network. Everything's on a damn
app now, man, you know, and it's not as good
as network, but you know it's work. But I was
(24:24):
an actor in episode eight of Emperor of osen Park
with Forrest with a. Yeah, I got scenes with them.
They cut some of my lines and appreciate that. But
it's a good little intricate I'm intricate to the story.
So watch me on Emperor of Ocean Park episode eight. Dan,
(24:47):
this is like you say, Dan, Then I got to
get the business out. So then I'm also starting in
a play. Uh, it's gonna be here. It's a I
go to two days, two day gig October fifth and
six at Diusable African American Museum, and that is here
(25:13):
in Chicago, but they also do a lot of plays there.
So I'm at DuSable October fifth and sixth. And the
name of the place it's called Invitation to a Stranger.
It's like like a murder mystery player, you did Invitation
to a Stranger. Can't tell you nothing about it, but
you just got to be here and just see it.
(25:34):
October fifth and sixth, and I know I'd be telling
it i'd be telling Tony. I tell Tony what is Yeah,
I'm doing this play blah blah blah. He say, yeah, okay,
tell me about it, but I ain't coming. And I
appreciate that, but I didn't tell them about it anyway. Anyway,
So invitation to a stranger. And that's what's happening October fifth,
(26:00):
to sick see it. My my better half is in
a play too. SE's an actress too. My name is Margo.
Margo is in a play up north called Within a Shadow.
(26:21):
It's a play at the Den Theater. And uh, that's
a good play, y'all said, check that out, and uh
it's interesting. Yeah, anyway, go see that play. Go see
that Den Theater. And also one of my buddies gotta play.
(26:41):
Aaron Reese Boseman. He's the director here. He's with I
think he's Chad with Bozeman's nephews, but he's got to
play uh called Beneath the Willow Tree. Say that that
was serious. So that was good too, all right, So yeah,
that's what's happening. And then it gets better, it gets better.
(27:06):
You know. First of all, I ain't got the politics yet. Yeah,
I ain't got the politics. Maybe that's why y'all want
to call me. But I see y'all listening. But I'm
directing and producing a play of world premiere and musical. Yep,
I'm doing a musical. Okay uh. It's called Maggie Never
(27:31):
Better and it's written by Teresa and Shotwell and Shotwell
Productions out of Florida, and we're producing it here in Chicago.
It's won numerous awards on the written scale and the soundtrack.
(27:54):
There's already been a castle, but they've never stayed it.
It never got hit the stage, and we are adapting
it for the stage. So that's going to take place
the weekend, the weekend before Thanksgiving and Thanksgiving weekend, so
if you don't have any holidays stuff to do, you know,
(28:19):
if you're here with the family. It's in Chicago, also
at Morgan Park Academy on the South Side. So for
six performances, you'll love it. They don't do theater like that.
I don't know why, you know, even the big shows.
Sometimes they'll do a weekend and then you have your
(28:40):
Broadway in Chicago, the Equity Theater that will do, but
they only do like two weeks most of those do.
They don't do six weeks. The regular theaters do about
six weeks okay, but the the the bigger shows, they
do like two weeks in because they're on tour and
(29:00):
they go and come.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
They did.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Soldiers Play. They did us check this out. Okay, so
I've seen soldiers play. That's like a Soldier's story with
the movie with Denzel Well, there was a play called
the Soldiers Play, and they did a Soldier's play and
(29:25):
I did it once. I was in it and I
directed it. Okay, that's how long it's been around. But
they did it this time. They turned the Subldiers Play
into a musical that was kind of rough. That's kind
of sacrilegious. I couldn't really deal with that, but it
(29:47):
was interesting. The guy sing a song like you know,
but it took away. The play is excellent. If you
ever get a chance to see the play, see to play.
Oh oh, I'm sorry, okay, uh six four six to
(30:08):
zero zero zero nine four eight. Now what you have
to do then is you have to push the number one. Okay,
he pushed one, and then I'll pat you in out there.
You go, all right, okay, I see you all right? Man?
(30:31):
About telling you on air. What's up? Man?
Speaker 3 (30:34):
Man, it's Tony Winzers. What's going on? Brother?
Speaker 1 (30:38):
What's up? Pretty Tony.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
Real ain't here pretty tonight, but nobody's looking. So I'm
gonna receive that. Couldn't you hear your boys?
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Don Yeah, man, hear your boys. Man, Hollywood listens you brother, Oh,
thank you, brother. I appreciate that. Uh. In the long haul,
I may be back out there, but I don't know, y'all.
They got so many earthquakes and and and it's so
damn hot out there. I was like, am I missing something?
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Oh? You're keeping up man, because the heat wave just
ended it with two days ago, and and the earthquake
was yesterday. Really it was. It was a pretty good
little shaker, man. I heard I heard a rumble. I
was laying in bed and I heard a rumble, like
like subterranean rumble, And all of a sudden, my my
(31:29):
building started to shake. And I was like, whoa, because
it was you know, nothing was broken to my knowledge,
no one was, no one was hurt or injured, but yeah,
you know, and we all have our stuff and hey,
I got off the plane. I changed planes in Chicago
one year. I just walking down the jetway almost that
frost bitten. So you got your you got your stuff
(31:52):
to deal with there too.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's getting ready to change here. So
uh but the weather is really cool here. And hey, man,
tell me about the Supreme Beach.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
The Supremes at Earls All you Can Eat Stars Finalethan
and Ellis and I'm u Ellis Taylor excuse me, and
Uzzo Aduba spunchy time around with Uzoduba. We did a
film a couple of years ago called National Champions, so
it was it was really cool seeing her own set.
(32:28):
But yeah, it's it's about the three about the friendships
of these three women that take place over the course
of thirty years, you know, from nineteen sixty eight through
nineteen ninety eight, and there's a so we see them
(32:48):
as we meet them as teenagers, and in fact, on
the day that they all get together, they walk into
the restaurant. My character owns I happen to play Earl
Erl and they all walk in and he dubs them
the Supremes because you know, this was nineteen sixty eight,
(33:09):
the height of Diana Ross and the Supremes, and these
three beautiful young women walking into his restaurant. So he
dubs them Supreme, and I always found it kind of
ironic that they cast their brothers from Detroit dubbed the
three main characters of Supreme, So there's a bit of
irony there. But man, it's just a beautiful experience I
(33:31):
had on that project. Directed by Tina Maybury, written and
directed written by I'm Sorry, Gina Bite, Gina Prince Bidenwood
and Tina Maybury, directed by Tina Maybury, produced by Searchlight Pictures,
and it was just a class operation from beginning to end. Man,
(33:55):
just one of the most awesome experiences I had on
a film. And I got to work with the young
cast because each every principal character has a younger counterpart
in the film, a younger person playing their character, and
so most of my scenes are with the younger cast.
(34:18):
And they were just phenomenal. Man, they were. I mean,
I didn't know what to expect because I had worked
with a lot of you know, young people before, and
they were just absolutely phenomenal and professional and just had
a blast with them and and uh and uh yeah.
It's just one of the It's probably the highest profile
(34:40):
role I've ever had down and I say a film
that has has really resonated with certainly with black audiences,
in a way nothing else I've ever done has.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
So so well. We know, you were in Clean Sugar,
you know, and I thought that was too big. I
mean when I saw pictures of you with Oprah at
the premier, I was like, who else?
Speaker 3 (35:12):
He was the producer and she was there, So I
wasn't gonna set opportunity to get get a get a
picture with with the Queen, you know. But you know,
it's interesting, you know, these relationships that were forging this
business man, and even relationships that were forging that we're
unaware of. Like Tina Maybray was a producer writer on
(35:38):
Queen Sugar all my episodes, but I never met her.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Oh wow.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
I never met her on on set or anything. So
I just did my thing, and you know, I was
I'm that guy man, you know, I'm I'm I'm I'm
respectful and pleasant to everyone. I mean, you know, I'm
a pro, you know. And I don't know how much
that had to do with her casting me, but because
(36:07):
I've never asked, even though we've been social many times
since then, I've never asked, you know, why me? But yeah, man,
so you know, these these things that we do along
the way that they're they're all building blocks done.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
George, you know, go ahead, sir, I tell I tell
all my actors. You know, I have a few students too,
and I tell them what when you go in to read,
you know, because you know the processes, you're going to
read for the casting director and sometimes they'll have somebody
(36:44):
read with you, and I tell them all the time,
take the time to thank everybody you can if you're
allowed to, but especially take the time to thank the
person they read, which because if they trying to decide
and we all know I'm casting it, so you know
(37:05):
it could be you could be perfect for it, but
you know the producer's needs, needs, the priet or whatever.
You know, anything can blow you out or sometimes they
shouldn't the wrong and they don't know what to make
a decision. They don't ask the person they read with you, well,
who did you love?
Speaker 3 (37:23):
What do you think right right?
Speaker 1 (37:25):
You know? And if you was rude to that person,
but they're thinking about the person that was polite and
spoke to them, and you know.
Speaker 3 (37:34):
Whatever, because especially on a film like that, you know
where you're going to be with these people day in,
day out. For weeks on end. You want to make
sure somebody that is pleasant to be around, you know,
you know what I mean. And professional knows this stuff
and knows you know, has good hygiene, has good you know,
(38:00):
social skills you don't know. No, I tell you Andrew
with limousine for a lot of years out here, don
and the guy that trained me in the in the profession,
he said, the most important thing a driver has to
know is when to shut up. You know when to
be quiet and just listen. And that is something I
(38:23):
carry with me to this day.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Man.
Speaker 3 (38:24):
You know, you got to you gotta know when when
when to talk and when not to talk. It's probably
more important than when you talk, you know what I mean?
Right right, it's just kind of stand out of people's
way and doing your job being a professional. So yeah,
and you know, listening to your long prologue, man, I
got to tell you that I work with I worked with.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
James el Jones. Okay, you do we have time for that?
Go ahead? Yeah.
Speaker 3 (38:53):
Nineteen ninety two I booked a partner movie called Sneakers
with Robert Redford, Sidney Patier, Dan Ackroyd River, Phoenix men Kingsley,
Mary McDonald David straight there and James Rod Jones. It
was amazing. I only had one line and only one scene,
(39:15):
the climactic scene at the end, but I had a
week on the movie. And you know what it's like
to work on a film, mister monkey hustle. You know,
you're there twelve hours a day, even though you may
not be doing a whole lot, you're there all day.
So I got real familiar with everybody on the set,
(39:37):
including Sidney Partier, and I remember the first day of
the table read, you know, Sidney Partier and James Earl
Jones walking because the only thing I knew when I
got the job was that it was a Robert Redford movie.
I didn't know anybody else in the film, and so
they invited me to come to the table reading. I'm
Sitney at the tayle with my script of my one line,
raring to go, and all of a sudden, all these
(39:58):
big stars at walking the room and I'm like, overly ship,
you know, okay, And in walks Sidney Puny and James
ol Jones together just kind of laughing and chatting like
they're on their way to you know, poor a motor
company for the for the night shift, you know what
I mean. And I was like, holy Toledo, man, you
(40:19):
know this is this is the real deal. But on
the set, I remember after uh, James Garreld played a
character named Abbot, and an Abbot is charged to retrieve
this this black box from reference character from his character
(40:41):
is named Bishop. So after he gets the black box
from Bishop, he kind of gestures for us to leave.
So we're all walking out and as I'm walking out,
you know, my shoes are clunking against the floor, making
a lot of noise on the hardwood floor of the
sound stage. And so the sound guy said, hey, uh,
(41:02):
you know those booties they'll slip over your shoes so
that you can walk without making a lot of noise. Uh.
They're like stockings, but they call them booties on the set.
And the sound guy steed up, Hey can we get
because my shoes are black? He said, can we get
some about black booties over here for Tony? And James
Jill said, black booties? I want some. Man, When I
(41:30):
tell you, everybody on that set fell, the fell the
f our uh, I mean, we laugh, we must to laugh.
We lost it for about a good ten minutes, man,
And finally we got ourselves back together and continue but hearing,
you know, the voice of dos Vader, the voice of
seeing you know, so many great characters throughout his career,
(41:54):
say black bootiespecially Hilaria. Yes, yeah, you know, yeah, yeah,
it was perfectly time. It was quiet after the style man,
you know, as for the booty for me and uh so, yeah,
that was that was my one big moment with James
(42:16):
Arrow as He's.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Like, let's see that's that's that's one of them stories
you got to put in in your book, you know.
You know, I did a lee with Will Smith in
l A and I'm in a scene. Well, I'm playing
a reporter and it's it's a tight box. We're sitting
(42:40):
at the at the coliseum over there and it's like
a little tight box, right, and it's hot as hell
in there, and it's we're in a Lei's uh room.
And to my right it's Jamie Fox you dig and
I got a yeah because brown? Right, And then on
(43:02):
on on my left, I mean, we're in tight like this.
On my left it's Jeffrey right, and I'm like and
I'm I'm like, I'm freaking out, Okay, I'm like and
I know I I just got a day player role.
I got one like one line and tell us about
the story camp or whatever. Right, and there's another two
(43:23):
guys behind me, but I'm the lead reporter, right, So
uh so I look I look over and then Jamie
flocks off and he's playing chess with somebody. They got
a little chest set there while we're waiting to put
him to reverse the camera, right, And so I think
(43:44):
I freaked out, you know, I'm like, okay, And then
you know in l A, you know, when you see stars.
I'm from Chicago, so when I see stars, I'm you know,
and I.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
Have to do that on a movie set. Been around
for what at that point?
Speaker 1 (44:01):
No, No, I was.
Speaker 3 (44:03):
I was.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
I was cool, right, and so but they were standing
next to me, and I'm like, and I'm going over
their resume in my mind, I'm like, oh god, Jeffrey right,
white shaft, blah blah blah blah blah. And I'm just thinking, oh,
I am you know, if my mom could see me now.
So then they broke or they changed the gate, changed
(44:23):
the camera or whatever, and everybody kind of feathered off
and I'm still standing in place, you know, and then
everybody in that room. Will Smith walked over to me
and shook my hand, said, what's something man? I was like, oh,
so I wanted to say something in character. I wanted
(44:44):
to say, oh, how you doing tamp But I was like,
I went totally nerdy. I was like, how were you,
mister Smith? But I was standing in there with all
of this greatness, and I was like I was. I
was talking to my mom. I was like, mom, if
you can see me now, you know, I mean somebody
(45:07):
said that you don't get a picture of you know,
Well now you can get a picture like I got.
I worked with Forrest with a about a month ago,
and after the shoot I had my camera in my
park and I asked him, you know, could we take
a picture and he said yes. So I got a
lovely picture with him. You know, but a lot of
(45:30):
it is memories, man, you know, But so what what's
the process? What's happening? And now, I mean you managed
to get work, bro, you know you and you know
Gillyard moved to Atlanta and uh but even flying back
doing work, you know, and I did alright, Well I
(45:52):
was out there, but you know I was looking up
to you guys, and you know, I would always see
you book something. So I would say in my videos,
I got to catch Tony winners.
Speaker 3 (46:08):
You should, you should, you should aim a little higher,
because you know what I mean, a lot of people,
you know, not like people like yourself, but friends of
mine from outside of the industry or people I've known,
you know, for many years. They'll say to me like, hey, Tony,
you know you followed your dreams and you know you're
(46:30):
you're you're doing it and that's what the thing is.
And I guess that's true. And I didn't even think
about it. And I guess the point I'm trying to
make is at a certain point, I reached that point
of no return, you know what I mean by that?
Speaker 1 (46:47):
Yes, yeah, there's really nothing else I can do.
Speaker 3 (46:50):
This is what the the for better or for worse,
this is what I do. I mean, it's it's too
late to go back and go to med school or
all school or you know, trying to learn another trade.
So for better Ford, So I just hung in there, man,
because there was really nothing else I wanted to do it,
and it really had no idea about anything else, so
(47:14):
I just continue.
Speaker 1 (47:16):
We're inspired, I mean I was inspired by you, you know,
when I was out there, Oh God, bless you. Man. No, really, man,
I mean when I was out there, I was, you know,
like my first job. Carl Gilliard game and I guess
it was Bill dou had an acting class and they
(47:38):
decided to do play at the end of the class. Right.
So my first over on Las Vinaga exactly my first day,
and I called Gilly. I said, hey, man, I'm in La.
You know, I just got an apartment whatever whatever, And
he was like, well, you want to work on the show, right,
(47:58):
So he said, I'm over to the Hudson Theater and
we're working on a little show and you do something.
Do props. Man. When I went and sat in that
audience the first day in Hollywood, I met Taraji, I
met Donald Faison, I met Sam Moore. You know, everybody
(48:25):
was kind of dropping in, right, and.
Speaker 3 (48:27):
Everybody who was connected to that class.
Speaker 1 (48:30):
Yeah, I was. I was a groupie. I mean, I'm
you know, and I'm you know, I'm first day in La.
You know, I wanted to do some acting, you know.
And he called me and I ended up doing props
with Kelly Williams from Family Matters. So all the actors
were really doing jobs around the theater to produce this
(48:52):
play because it was The class Man. So the first
night I freaked the fuck out. I was like, oh
my god, you know my Hollywood dreams that I met
everybody in one day. And then there was a break
and then Anthony Anderson came in. He just happened to
(49:16):
stop live, you know, and I'm like, oh my god,
and I remember him from some little Saturday morning show
and he was kind of fat in but he came
in bragging, yeah, I'm doing this film with Dustin Hoffman,
and I'm doing this film and this build. And then
the whole cast of the Best Man they had just
(49:39):
done that. And then I got a friend, Bernadette Bernadette speaks,
and she was we weren't playing in Chicago, but I
knew her and she was in the class so I
got to see her. So anyway, well, I'm just saying,
the journey is what it is. And I know what
(50:01):
you're saying, because you know, I'm over fifty and this
is it, you know. I yeah, we all had regular jobs,
you know, we all worked every kind of job at
least I did. You know, well I did too, bro, Yeah, yeah,
you know, So I mean I was in corporate limousines.
Speaker 3 (50:21):
I was a tour guide at Universal Studios. I was
a page in DC. I worked jobs for years, you know, everything,
anything that gave me the freedom to walk away when
I needed to, you know what I mean, right right?
So you know, the day job was always a means
(50:43):
to an end. It was never a come up job
because I always figured if I got a job that
really paid well or you know, or was or I
was really central to the operation, I wouldn't have the
freedom to walk away when I because I knew that
they would ultimately come with. You either go into that
audition for for uh you know, uh, Simon and Simon,
(51:08):
or you're gonna stay here and sell those shoes? Which
which are you gonna do? Tony? And it would always
be the Simon and Simon audition, you know.
Speaker 1 (51:17):
I would. I would try to schedule it on my
if I had a lunch hour and I could move
to lunch hour and trade with somebody, you know, I would.
I would have my uh my car right at the
door so I could go run and do these auditions.
Hopefully they would be on time, you know. And for commercials,
you in and out, you know, if it's on time,
(51:38):
and you could do it, you know, because.
Speaker 3 (51:42):
You know l A traffic. You got to get all
the way across town and get that. You ain't gonna
do that in no hour. I'm sorry, bro, It's gonna
take you at least a half hour to get there.
In most instances, you gotta part go inside signing. You
gotta wait, so you will for an hour. Now, I
(52:03):
never knew how to make that work. It never works
for me. Now.
Speaker 1 (52:07):
I had, Uh, I had, like I said, but I've
got these these stories, you know, like I know, I
see Bill Bellamy. He does these stories where he takes
you know, what happened in a certain scene or situation.
And I had, I've worked showing you. I worked on Passions,
the soap opera for like six years. I was an extra,
(52:30):
but you know, they gave me this and uh. And
then one day I used to live in uh like
Echo Park, right, And one day I woke up late
and it was the airline scene. You know, it was
gonna be on the plane and they had already placed
us and everything right, And I woke up late. I
(52:52):
was supposed to be there like at I guess nine,
and I woke up like eight h eight thirty and
I had to go to uh A CBS Ratford out there, right, dude, dude,
I got I jumped out of bed, there was some
(53:16):
clothes on and I got onto one on one. Dude.
I was dead at nine o'clock. I didn't know how wild, dude.
I mean, I was driving crazy because I knew if
this once the stage manager to check me in. I'm
not in my seat, you know, I'm a blowing, you know.
(53:36):
And uh but I got there and I don't know,
you know. So that's that's one of the stories going
in my book, the Will Smith and James Earl Jones,
just little tidbits of you know, as I pressed greatness.
And I also I worked on a series with Oprah
back in It was called Women of Brewster Place. It
(54:00):
was a movie.
Speaker 3 (54:01):
But they did I remember it. I remember it, Alfred Woodard,
I think right, And yeah, I remember that one. It
was a big deal, like say eighty six, eighty seven
something like that.
Speaker 1 (54:14):
Yeah, Rubin Cannon, that's how old it was. And uh
so I had got a part as her insurance agent
or whatever. And Harpo Studios was here in Chicago and
we shot it there, right, But what I didn't row
is they put my dressing room right next to hers.
Speaker 3 (54:34):
Right, yes, Oh okay, so you know in.
Speaker 1 (54:43):
Evidently you know, I was a day player. But you
know she would talk to me all the time, right,
So she told me one day she say, ask me
what was for lunch? And she told me she couldn't
walk over there because everybody was looking see what she ate.
(55:04):
So she wanted to know there are you know, true story,
you know, and I just I remember this ship, you know,
but my greatest story. You know, I'm taking over your story.
But and I wanted to interview you anyway, you know,
I wanted to do a you know, I have you
(55:25):
come on and talk about your career and stuff like that,
because Walter had gave me your number.
Speaker 3 (55:31):
You know, I think he mentioned this to me like
several months ago.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
Right right, because yeah, me and we were in our
first movie together twenty thirty years ago, Bad Boys with
Sean pen It was in a reform reformatory schools. Deep.
I remember that movie.
Speaker 3 (55:55):
That was a big deal, man, especially if you were
because Sean Pennis is well, he's my age. I don't
know about you, but you know I'm the same age
as Sean PN always saying Sean Pinn, Eddie Murphy, Nicholas Cage,
Wesley Snipes, you know, Barack Obama. We're all the same age.
We are all sixty two years old at this point.
(56:17):
But at that time, you know, Sean ten was twenty
twenty three, twenty four years old, as was I. So
you know, anything that had young people in it taps.
Speaker 1 (56:29):
You know, remember that one I.
Speaker 3 (56:33):
Was going to see? So, yeah, I was. I was.
That was a big seminal movie of my early years
in Los Angeles. You know, like, how do I and
I remember sitting there in the theater? Was you know
my buddy Tom who he and I used to go
to see movies all the time together at that time,
you know, back in the days of Wessele was popping,
you know, and I would to sit there at dark
(56:57):
movie theater and think, how the fun do I get
out of the share screen? How does that happen?
Speaker 1 (57:04):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 3 (57:05):
How do I get from here to there? Uh? It
took it took a while.
Speaker 1 (57:09):
But I figured it out, well, you know, I I fortunately,
luckily I got monkey hupset when I was sixteen years old,
and that was like the last black exit that's the
last black Exploitasten film that they did. And in that
(57:32):
movie was Jos Toto really rape more rise in Cash,
Gabbie Morgan, Randy Brooks and Thomas Carter and Brooks Wild
Yeah yeah, Thomas Carter Man, oh man, Yeah, I mean
it's old now, but uh that was that was really
(57:53):
uh a great, great time. And so I have been
doing it and I went to college and I've been
just acting all along. So when I got to Hollywood,
I had credits, you know, yeah, and I just quite
a few things there.
Speaker 3 (58:10):
But but oh man, you know, circling back to what
you were saying about working on Passions for six years,
I'm sure you've probably made Christy Ferrits and Rodney Van
Rodney Van Johnson.
Speaker 1 (58:29):
Yeah, yes, I remember Rodney. I remember Rodney, uh uh
because he.
Speaker 3 (58:36):
Was I'm sorry she gonna went away from the part.
I can't hear you that. Well.
Speaker 1 (58:39):
Yeah, I remember Rodney, he was on Passion.
Speaker 3 (58:43):
Yeah. Yeah, Rodney's become a friend of mine. But what
I was gonna say was, you know, for you know,
you you speak to young people just like I do
all the time that are starting in this business. And
and if I could do it all over again, I
would definitely be doing background work on certainly in commercials,
(59:05):
I would be doing standing work. I would be doing
background work on television shows and film union because what
I didn't know then that I know now is that
those earnings count towards your pension and health benefits. So
when you when you reach that age of fifty five
(59:29):
and you're trying to make that decision whether or not
you want to take your pension early or you want
to wait till you're sixty five to get it employed,
what have you? All of those earnings.
Speaker 1 (59:39):
Matter, you know what I mean, and.
Speaker 3 (59:44):
They can really boost your pension. And you know, when
you're twenty two, you're not thinking about that stuff about
you know, retirement. But let me tell you that thirty
years goes by pretty pretty damn fast. You know, it
goes by pretty damn fast, and you will you will
wish that you had been you know, uh more available
(01:00:08):
to the industry because you've got that sad card. You
can do it. You're sag aka rather you can. You
can do this work. You're eligible to do this work,
but your ego won't allow you to uh, you know,
perform background work. Ship if I could do it all
over again. Brother, I would be on somebody set every day.
Speaker 1 (01:00:27):
I heard you know what I mean? And then you
know And it's a funny thing that coming from Chicago
and then living in La. If you want to do
if you do three extras in La, you can get
a sad card. That's it's not like that here. You
have to get a job first before you can get
(01:00:49):
a sad car here. And that's that's crazy. But but listen, Ato,
but the time is that we gotta go. I really appreciate. Okay, man,
we're trap don and we do this every Friday night.
You guys watch out for Tony and the Supreme at Earls.
(01:01:10):
Is it called.
Speaker 3 (01:01:13):
Earls all you can eat?
Speaker 1 (01:01:16):
Okay? And and when when is it air or is
it airing?
Speaker 3 (01:01:20):
It's it's it's now streaming on Hulu only on Hulu. Okay,
please give it a look and and and tell your
friends about it. It's it's really kind of captured the zeitgeist.
I'm really proud to be a part of it.
Speaker 1 (01:01:36):
I'm great. I'm gonna I'm gonna look it up tonight
and you guys watch that. Telly give us a call
back next Friday. Every Friday night.
Speaker 3 (01:01:46):
If you're up you know, well, hear your text men,
text me and let me know and and and I'll
remember to to tune in and uh and we can
chop it up again whenever you whenever you want to doe.
Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Sounds great tone, appreciate it. Hey, guys, brother, we shout
out to Tony winners and thank you guys for listen.
We'll be back next week. Saint Bad Time Singing Bad
channel on Instagram and also live on the show.
Speaker 2 (01:02:39):
I didn't make a true tell you about it. I'm
taking trouble. Can you trouble man, don't let it wait.
(01:03:01):
I'm gonna fight. I'm not a real minute. I'm gonna
give you. I'm gonna go up. I'm gonna get that.
That's gonna get that's shop. Have to get the charm.
(01:03:29):
There's not all. There's not know we'll get us what
this got me? Yeah? Yeah, have a home. I had
(01:04:07):
to fight, took him and then wait over, lad come
talk to I had to win. That's got a little again.
How come a trouble fan don't beginning time with you? Hey?
Speaker 1 (01:04:32):
How on the places? And I've different places?
Speaker 2 (01:04:34):
I got the contention they did min that's just what
people they don't get an't bother me ready to make
it up there with the weather not there, My trouble
then knocked up together. I didn't kind of attention to
sot off. How faith I have a real dab with
(01:04:56):
the trouble bird. Oh that go come ball, I tell
about get that's only dream by anybody. Choo sec rum,
come bo, that's not anybody anything better. They're not home.
(01:05:22):
They were let a fucking base.
Speaker 3 (01:05:37):
O come.
Speaker 1 (01:05:45):
That's good.
Speaker 2 (01:05:48):
It made very everybody.
Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
Who come home.
Speaker 2 (01:05:54):
Now, I'm fine checking trouler choice here z
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