#amos n' andy

[citizenscreen]

June 28, 1951 marked the CBS debut of “The Amos 'n' Andy Show,” Television’s first Black sitcom. #OnThisDay

Pictured are the show’s stars: (1951–53). Spencer Williams (Andy), Tim Moore (Kingfish), and Alvin Childress (Amos)

[oldshowbiz]

The Magic Carpet was a nightclub located on Route 66 - 1353 North E. Street - in San Bernardino in the late 1950s.

[kwebtv]

From the Golden Age of Television

Series Premiere

The Amos 'N Andy Show - Kingfish Gets Drafted - CBS - June 28, 1951

Sitcom

Running Time: 30 minutes

Written by Joe Connelly, Bob Mosher and Bob Ross

Produced by James Fonda

Directed by Charles Barton

Stars:

Alvin Childress as Amos Jones / Narrator

Spencer Williams as Andy Brown

Tim Moore as George "Kingfish" Stevens

Ernestine Wade as Sapphire Stevens

Johnny Lee as Algonquin J. Calhoun

Amanda Randolph as Mama (Ramona Smith)

Nick Stewart  as Lightning (billed as Nick O'Demus)

Jester Hairston as Henry Van Porter

[proverbialschoolmarm]

[positivebeatdigest]

Amos 'n' Andy S1E15 The Kingfish Teaches Andy to Fly -Amos'n' Andy

[readyforevolution]

History They Didn't Teach You In School

Scholars have left him out of the history books and Hollywood couldn’t be bothered to acknowledge his existence either. He was Howard Hughes’ top engineer and lifelong best friend. This is about Frank Mann, the hidden genius behind much of Howard Hughes’ success in the world of aviation and mechanics. Frank Calvin Mann (November 22, 1908 – November 30, 1992) was an African American engineer who was known for his participation in many Howard Hughes's projects including the Spruce Goose. He also starred in the Amos 'n' Andy radio show. Apparently, his lifelong friendship with Hughes was instrumental in opening doors for Mann's exceptional talents.

A native of Houston, Texas, Frank Calvin Mann's parents wanted him to become a schoolteacher, but from childhood, he had a natural ability to fix things. At age 11, he had his own mechanic shop. As a teenager, he worked alongside airplane mechanics, repairing engines. By the ago of 20, he had designed and built several of his own Model-T cars. It was unheard of in the 1920s for a Black man to have anything to do with cars, trains, or airplanes. His life-long friend Howard Hughes was instrumental in opening doors for Mann's exceptional talents.

Mann attended the University of Minnesota and UCLA where he earned a mechanical engineering degree. World War II equipment that revolutionized military weaponry would not exist if not for his involvement. Incredibly, few Americans are aware of Frank Mann. He was the first Black commercial pilot for American Airways. He was also a distinguished military officer. In 1935, following Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia, Frank Mann flew reconnaissance missions for the Ethiopian army.

He served in the World War II Army Air Corps and was the primary civilian instructor of the famous Tuskegee Airmen in 1941. He left Tuskegee after a rift with the U.S. government, which didn't want the Squadron, an all-Black unit, flying the same high caliber of airplanes as their White counterparts. An angry Mann had refused to have his men fly old "World War I biplane crates," because his airmen had proven themselves as equals.

Though they were being given inferior equipment and materials, their squadron never lost a plane, bomber, or pilot, and they were nicknamed the "Red Tails.” After the war, Mann was instrumental in designing the first Buick LeSabre automobile and the first communications satellite launched for commercial use.

His pride and joy was a miniature locomotive enshrined in the Smithsonian Institute, Mann also played a principal role in the Amos ‘N’ Andy radio show. He moved back to his hometown in the 1970s.

Frank Mann died November 30, 1992 in Houston.

[cncowitcher]

💋┊SEMPRE FOI AMOR !!

ᡣ𐭩 ─ andy pruss × leitora.

ᡣ𐭩 ─ gênero: divertido. 🩰

ᡣ𐭩 ─ número de palavras: 1.330.

ᡣ𐭩 ─ notas da autora: oioi meus aneizinhos de saturno, como vão? espero que gostem viu? eu particularmente amei escrever esse cenário sobre o andy 😣😖🤧💞💞 se cuidem e bebam água, um beijo. 😽💌

Desde que conheceu Andy a vida de S/n nunca mais foi a mesma. Eles tiveram o primeiro contato através de uma live que um certo aquele fez na Twitch.

─ Vem pro Brasil com as las brazucas... ─ Ele lê um comentário da live e encara a câmera. ─ Eu gostaria muito de ir pra lá.

Sorrindo e surtando deitada em sua cama, a brasileira prontamente saiu da transmissão por um momento para mandar algumas mensagens para Andy, que surpreendente respondeu ela minutos depois, e ficaram jogando conversa fora até o alto da madrugada.

Eles ficaram nessa por algumas semanas, até o argentino a convidar para ir em um evento no Chile para a conhecer pessoalmente.

Sem pensar duas vezes, a garota aceitou e, como já havia torrado seu salário do mês inteiro, fez um empréstimo que doeu muito quando ela viu que teria que pagar quase o dobro no próximo mês.

─ Estou muito ansioso pra conhecer você, chiquita linda. Mal posso esperar pro evento acabar pra gente poder conversar finalmente! ─ Andy dizia por videochamada com um sorriso fofo nos lábios, olhando para a garota.

─ Eu também estou ansiosa, Andy. E confesso que você me surpreendeu muito quando começou a conversar em português comigo, do nada.

Rindo um pouco alto fazendo seus olhos se fecharem um pouquinho, Pruss concorda com a cabeça algumas vezes e volta a se enquadrar na câmera do celular.

─ Você disse que meu... Que o meu o que? ─ Ele pergunta mais pra si mesmo do que pra garota fazendo uma carinha estranha, juntando as sobrancelhas. ─ Ah sim! Que o meu sotaque é fofo e afastado, não! Arrastado. Isso! Você disse que o meu sotaque é fofo e arrastado, então vou tentar ao máximo falar em português com a minha menina veneno brasileira. ─ Andy diz e quando olha para a câmera novamente solta um suspiro longo.

S/n que apenas o escutava sorrindo disfarçadamente mas surtando por dentro, também soltou um suspiro longo.

─ Você é muito linda. ─ Fala Andy quebrando o silêncio aconchegante.

─ Você também, Andy. ─ Diz sincera a garota, se sentando na cama.

─ Sério, esse evento podia ser logo amanhã. Eu quero muito te ver. ─ Andy faz um biquinho e vira de lado na cama, se cobrindo com o cobertor e aconchegando sua cabeça melhor no travesseiro.

─ Falando assim parece que você é meu namorado. ─ A moça fala com um sorriso largo no rosto.

Com um sorriso ladino, o homem aproxima mais o celular de seu rosto e sussurra no autofalante:

─ É porque eu quero ser o seu namorado, chiquita linda. É só você aceitar o meu pedido.

Tentando não transparecer felicidade alguma com a fala de Pruss, a garota se faz de desentendida e também aproxima o rosto da câmara, fala do baixinho:

─ Que pedido é esse que eu nunca nem vi ou ouvi, amor? Você tem que ser mais específico.

Mordendo os lábios, o argentino responde anda murmurando:

─ Pensando bem vou deixar o pedido pra fazer quando a gente se conhecer pessoalmente. Boa noite minha futura namorada, vai dormir bem gostosinho que amanhã a gente conversa mais. Um beijo, amor … eu te amo.

Sorrindo, se sentindo completamente apaixonada por aquele garoto que só o conhecia há dois meses, a brasileira acaba respondendo de modo gentil e tímido:

─ Está bem, amor. Eu te amo também.

Depois dessa breve conversa ─ de quase três horas ─ os dois não conseguiram dormir. Passaram quase vinte minutos antes de pegarem no sono pensando nas milhões de coisas que poderiam fazer quando se conhecerem ou quando já estiverem em um relacionamento.

E quando chegou o dia da viagem, S/n, que estava bastante empolgada com tudo, foi uma das primeiras pessoas a chegar no aeroporto na parte da manhã, e como o seu voo era às oito, ficou algumas horas conversando com uma senhora adorável que iria passar uma temporada no Chile também. Seu nome era Ana…

S/n esperava que bastante coisas iriam acontecer assim que o avião pousasse em Santiago. Sua mala se perder entre as demais, o segurança a barrar, ela esquecer de como se fala espanhol e por aí vai… Mas nunca passou na cabeça dela que Andy e mais alguns meninos estavam esperando ela na saída do desembarque.

─ Surpresa! ─ Gritou em uníssono Matías, Simón, Nando Contigiani, Valentino, Felipe Otaño e é claro, o Andy.

─ Gente, puta que pariu, que isso? ─ Exclamou assustada a brasileira quase fazendo sua mala cair.

─ Viemos acompanhar nosso cowboy Andy para conhecer a namorada dele. ─ Otaño diz indo de encontro a garota, a abraçando. ─ Tudo bem linda? ─ Pergunta o argentino com um sorriso encantador nos lábios e S/n, ainda processando o que estava acontecendo, apenas concordou com a cabeça.

─ Verdade, o cara desde que te conheceu não para de falar de você. ─ Simón fala também indo abraçar a brasileira, pegando as malas das mãos dela, levando.

─ Se fosse só isso... Você acredita que o Andy até começou a fazer mais aulas de português no Duolingo só pra te agradar? ─ Disse Valentino ficando quase nas pontas dos pés para abraçar a garota, que segurou o riso.

─ E graças a minha belíssima pessoa, ele está por dentro dos hits brasileiros. Fala aí Nando, só escuto música de qualidade né? ─ Matías começa a dizer dando uma pequena cotovelada em Contigiani antes de também ir abraçar a garota.

─ Só se for de qualidade duvidosa. E digo mais, a maioria são reggae daquela banda naturalidade, que são até boas… ─ Contigiani diz cruzando os braços.

Matias para de abraçar a mulher, balançando ela de um lado para o outro e se vira rapidamente para Nando.

─ Se diz Natiruts, seu passarinho sem asa. ─ Recalt corrige o amigo e observa ele se aproximar para também abraçar a moça.

─ Olha, a gente vai esperar vocês no carro, tá? ─ Valentino avisa já indo com os meninos para perto dos táxis, deixando S/n e Andy a sós.

Respirando fundo, Andy sorri olhando para S/n. Seus olhos brilhavam e ele sentia seu coração bater mais rápido só de finalmente estar perto dela.

─ Eu te juro que se tivesse um anel comigo agora te pediria em namoro aqui mesmo. ─ Ele diz sem jeito, chegando mais perto da garota, que colocou uma mecha de cabelo atrás da orelha.

─ Não seja por isso. ─ A brasileira diz tirando dois anéis pratas de seu indicador de maneira calma, entregando um para Andy.

Ambos se arrepiaram com o toque e em segundos ele já estava ajoelhado na frente dela.

─ Você aceita namorar comigo? ─ Pergunta Andy tentando não gaguejar e tentando ignorar o olhar de algumas pessoas ao redor.

─ É claro que eu aceito, Andy! ─ S/n sorri emocionada e assim que ele termina de colocar o anel no anelar dela, a mesma coloca o anel que segurava no anelar dele.

Sorrindo um para o outro, é Andy que toma a iniciativa e cola seus lábios em um selinho demorado, fazendo eles se afastarem levemente assustados após escutarem os gritos e aplausos de longe. Eram os meninos, colegas de elenco de Pruss, batendo palma de felicidade para o novo casal latino.

─ Finalmente veio aí, agora oficialmente estou segurando vela! ─ Valentino Alonso fala em voz alta enquanto ainda batia palma, observando S/n e seu namorado se aproximava.

─ Tamanho de uma vela você já tem né Tino? Só falta você se auto segurar. ─ Matías diz como se fosse a coisa mais óbvia possível, arrancando risada do pessoal.

No final de tudo, sempre foi amor desde o primeiro contato que Andy e S/n tiveram. E agora a brasileira tinha certeza: a sua vida nunca mais vai ser a mesma após tudo isso que está acontecendo com ela no bom e maravilhoso sentido, é claro!

[shewhoworshipscarlin]

Ruby Dandridge

Dorothy Dandridge was an American actress from the early 1900s through to the late 1950s. Dandridge is best known for her role on the radio show Amos 'n Andy, in which she played Sadie Blake and Harriet Crawford, and on radio's Judy Canova Show, in which she played Geranium.

Born Ruby Jean Butler in Wichita, Kansas, on March 3, 1900, she was one of four children. Dandridge's parents were Nellie Simon, a maid, and George Butler, who was a janitor, grocer and entertainer. Dandridge's father was also "a famous minstrel man."

On September 30, 1919, she married Cyril Dandridge. Dandridge moved with her husband to Cleveland, Ohio, where her daughter, actress Vivian Dandridge, was born in 1921. Her second daughter, Academy Award-nominated actress Dorothy Dandridge, was born there in 1922, five months after Ruby and Cyril divorced.

In 1937, Dandridge played one of the witches in what an article in The Pittsburgh Courier called a "sepia representation" of Macbeth in Los Angeles. California. The production began on July 8 at the Mayan Theater. Five years later, she appeared in a production of Hit the Deck at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco, California. One of Dandridge's earliest appearances, thought uncredited, was as a native dancer in King Kong in 1933. Dandridge was also in Junior Miss (1945), Tap Roots (1948), Three Little Girls in Blue (1946), Cabin in the Sky (1943), and Tish (1942). Lillian Randolph, Ernest Whitman, and Ruby Dandridge of the radio cast of The Beulah Show from 1952–1953.

In 1955, Dandridge and her business partner Dorothy Foster bought land in Twentynine Palms, California, with plans to construct a subdivision of 250 homes. Also in the 1950s, Dandridge formed a nightclub act that played in clubs around Los Angeles. A review of her act cited her "flashes of effervescent showmanship" and stated "What Ruby lacks in her voice, she invariably makes up for it with her winsome personality."

Dandridge attended her daughter Dorothy's funeral in 1965.

On October 17, 1987, Dandridge died of a heart attack at a nursing home in Los Angeles, California. She was interred next to Dorothy at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. In the 1999 film Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, Ruby is portrayed by Loretta Devine.

[mimi-0007]

Ruby Jean Dandridge (née Butler; March 3, 1900[1] – October 17, 1987) was an American actress from the early 1900s through to the late 1950s. Dandridge is best known for her role on the radio show Amos 'n Andy, in which she played Sadie Blake and Harriet Crawford, and on radio's Judy Canova Show, in which she played Geranium. She is recognized for her role in the 1959 movie A Hole in the Head as Sally. Dandridge played Oriole on both radio and TV versions of The Beulah Show, and Geranium in The Judy Canova Show,  182  and was a regular cast member on Tonight at Hoagy's. : 337  She is heard as Raindrop on Gene Autry's Melody Ranch (August 1949 - April 1951). For one season (1961-1962), Dandridge played the maid on the television version of Father Knows Best. Dorothy Dandridge mother.

[queer-cinephile]

30 Days of Classic Queer Hollywood

Day 24: Ruby Dandridge (1900 - 1987)

Ruby Dandridge was an African American actress best known for her roles on the radio shows Amos 'n' Andy and Judy Canova Show. She is recognizable for her performance in the films Dead Reckoning (1947) and A Hole in the Head (1959).

She was the mother of actresses Vivian Dandridge and Dorothy Dandridge, the latter of whom was an Academy Award nominee.

Dandridge was a bisexual woman. After her divorce from her daughters' father, she entered a relationship with a female companion, Geneva Williams. Dorothy Dandridge later revealed that Williams was a harsh disciplinarian and rather abusive towards the children.

[citizenscreen]

On January 12, 1926, comedy series “Sam ‘n’ Henry” debuted on Chicago’s WGN radio station. Two years later, after changing its name to “Amos ‘n’ Andy,” the show became one of the most popular radio programs in history. Pictured: Creators/stars Freeman Gosden & Charles Correl, 1930. #OnThisDay

[oldshowbiz]

August 1933.

Amos n' Andy received a hero's welcome in Toronto, Ontario. They did a live broadcast from Shea's Hippodrome on Yonge Street.

[lboogie1906]

Maidie Norman (October 16, 1912 - May 2, 1998) who appeared in more than 200 Hollywood films, was born in Georgia to Louis and Lila Gamble. Her father was an engineer and her mother was a homemaker. She received a BA in Literature and Theatre Arts from Bennett College and obtained an MA in Theater Arts from Columbia University. She met and married real estate broker McHenry Norman and they relocated to Los Angeles, where she began training at the Actors Laboratory in Hollywood.

She appeared on several radio shows, including The Jack Benny Show and Amos n’ Andy, before gaining a bit role in the film The Burning Cross (1948). She was regularly cast as a domestic in several film roles but refused to deliver her lines using stereotypical speech patterns. She brought her background in theatricality to the studios where directors often empowered her to rewrite her film lines, infusing the character with more dignity and less broken English.

During the era of the 1950s, when African American women were subjected to portraying maids, she transitioned into more pivotal roles in films such as the psychological drama The Well (1951) and Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962). She maneuvered into sitcoms, television movies, and daytime soap operas. She focused on her theatrical interests, performing in plays by William Shakespeare and Jean-Paul Sartre.

She taught Drama at Texas College during the summers of 1955 and 1956. From 1968 to 1969, she served as artist-in-residence at Stanford University where she became a pioneer of directing plays by African American authors. She became instrumental in establishing one of the first courses on the history of African Americans in American theater at UCLA. She taught at UCLA until retiring in 1977, though she continued to promote Afro-American arts and education at universities across the country. #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence

[omegaremix]

Omega Radio for September 3, 2018; #173.

D&D Allstars “1, 2 Pass It” (INS)

Funkdoobiest “The Funkiest”

Smif ‘N Wessun “Bucktown”

Grand Daddy IU “Something New”

Digital Underground “The Return Of The Crazy One”

Prime Minister Pete Nice & Daddy Rich “Outta My Way Baby”

Geto Boys “Mind Playing Tricks On Me”

Ice-T “Hustler”

Grand Puba “360* (What Goes Around)”

Digable Planets “Rebirth Of Slick”

Paris “Days Of Old”

Kurious Jorge “I’m Kurious”

Crooklyn Dodgers “Crooklyn” (INS)

Pharcyde “Otha’ Fish”

Gravediggaz “1-800 Suicide”

Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy “…Famous And Dandy Just Like Amos & Andy”

Fu-Schnickens “True Fu-Schnick”

Ice Cube & Yo-Yo “The Bonnie & Clyde Theme”

Naughty By Nature “O.P.P.”

LL Cool J “Rampage”

D-Nice “Time To Flow”

EPMD “Give The People”

Black Moon “How Many MCs”

Outkast “Git Up, Git Out”

Pete Rock & CL Smooth “Mecca & The Soul Brother”

Boogiemonsters “R.T.N.S. (Recognized Thresholds Of Negative Stress)” (INS)

Goats, The “Typical American”

Common (Sense) “I Used To Love H.E.R.”

Eric B & Rakim “Don’t Sweat The Technique”

Roots, The “Distortion To Static”

Showbiz & AG “Medicine”

Stop The Violence Movement “Self Destruction”

2Pac & Digital Underground “I Get Around”

Crooklyn Dodgers ‘95 “Return Of The Crooklyn Dodgers”

Doug E. Fresh “A’ight (Allstar)”

Sam Sneed ft. Dr. Dre “Recognize”

Onyx “Slam”

LL Cool J “Mama Said Knock You Out”

Bonus golden-era hip-hop / rap broadcast.

[kojoty]

grabbed a new book for my pile of books (working at a library is terrible for Wanting To Read But Not Having Time To) called "Outrageous" (Goodreads link) and it's basically going in depth from the 1800s to now talking about how society and culture has pushed back, and been sensitive towards comedy and portrayals of 'sensitive' information.

"In Outrageous, celebrated cultural historian Kliph Nesteroff demonstrates that Americans have been objecting to entertainment for nearly two hundred years, sometimes rationally, often irrationally. Likewise, powerful political interests have sought to circumvent the arts using censorship, legal harassment, and outright propaganda. From Mae West through Johnny Carson, Amos ’n’ Andy through Beavis and Butt-Head , Outrageous chronicles the controversies of American show business and the ongoing attempts to change what we watch, read, and hear."

kind of into this! I'll pull snippets I find interesting :)

[tani-b-art]

Maxine’s Baby: The Tyler Perry Story

Perry’s legacy in film, in Black American culture is imprinted. Generationally. What he’s done in the industry is groundbreaking. His non-traditional approach and method to all he’s accomplished is a testament to what we’ve always done as Black Americans when it comes to everything — having a seat at our own table we built. He broke the mold and shattered the glass ceiling. He truly has the Black American, ancestral lineage of perseverance running through his blood!

I also learned so much more about him and his relationship with his mother and his mother in general that I hadn’t known. Also, parts of him speaking about his mother connected a lot of why he has certain perspectives on life and relationships. The Black women in his life (his mother and aunt who is hero-like in my opinion for the type of action of love) truly played the biggest roles in his shaping as a young boy to becoming a man. We got an inside view of his mind and the journey of him becoming who he is.

Seeing the enormity of his success just is positively moving and stirring. I found myself super proud with the scenes of the grand opening of his ultimate studio! Those parts of the docu had me feeling like I could conquer anything. All of the studio grand opening touched my heart and made me smile tears of joy in the simple fact that he is the embodiment of our ancestors’ love, hope and courage. He built on what they started and I can feel them saying, “Well done.”

It’s moving and emotionally charging.

He also allowed us into the parts of his life as a father to his son. You can tell all that he does and is doing is to be able to give out the love he wished he could’ve gotten from the father-figure now, in life. His relationship with his son is so beautiful.

The intimate portrait, bio styled documentary was a great watch. I definitely recommend.

Now….I must speak on the issues that I took with aspects of his footprint on the landscape of film.

Perry loses me when he says things like, “…what we’ve done to each other as Black people who are successful…”. He referenced the boycotting Amos ‘N’ Andy had received in its time along with Alice Walker’s The Color Purple. Amos ‘N’ Andy’s controversy: this show (was a TV adaptation of the radio sitcom of two white men who “adopted stereotypical dialect, intonations, and character traits that had been established in the blackface minstrel tradition in the 1800s”) came out in the midst of the Jim Crow era. An era we all know served to present imagery of Black Americans in racist propaganda replete with racist stereotypes and tropes. And the actors weren’t white men in blackface but actual Black men in these roles. Which is also the similar criticisms Perry’s Madea character receives.

The two shouldn’t be paralleled. Amos ‘N’ Andy was clearly stereotypical mockery (and no condemning the actors at the time) while Walker’s book is “inspired, in part, by a story that Walker's sister told her, about a love triangle involving their grandfather.” It is an account of real life experiences—a real depiction of what Black people, specifically Black women, were going through in the early 1900s in the Deep South. On the heels of freedom (this is post American slavery with the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation) yet still facing the aftershocks of “ending” slavery (racism has never ended), Black women still faced slave-like treatment from former plantation & slave owners and now sexism & patriarchal treatment from their partners (I say now not in a sense of this being completely new). All while gaining more freedom in their outspokenness for the domestic plights they faced with their significant others and demanding equal rights.

Walker’s book and the following film adaptation received backlash on account of the increasing fracture between Black women and Black men in a post “free” society.

Perry also mentioned the not so pleasant views Langston Hughes had with Zora Neale Hurston and her usage of the Black Southern dialect in her writings. That too is incomparable because again, she conveyed real life. These were not caricatures she fictionalized for comic relief.

(please leave Alice Walker and Zora Neale Hurston’s works alone in correlation to yours)

Or in an appearance from Killer Mike (in Perry’s documentary) alluding to the fact that other groups of people don’t take issue with the negative depictions of their people in film.

One — yes they have and do. Has he spoken to any other ethnic group to ask?

Two — yes, your core demographic, who is Black, will have the most dialogue regarding your work. Who else would? White people? No, because you don’t make art for them. Your work is rooted through the lens of Black Americans. Of course the biggest critique will come from us.

We have a very different relationship with our own country and the world at large. Centuries of ridicule in minstrel shows with not Black (because yes, it wasn’t only white people performing in blackface to mock us) people donning blackface or in film with dangerous propaganda that single-handedly created a racist, terrorist group (k k k). We are still dealing with the aftermath of these harmful depictions and are in constant corrective mode. It’s a continual action.

He spoke about intention as well. And while I don’t believe Perry’s intention of the Madea character (or any of his characters in his films, shows or plays—that’s a different conversation…among other talking points surrounding him can be discussed in an entirely separate talk) was to be problematic it is very damaging to the representation of Black American women — two things can exist. Especially considering all the negative portrayals and images of us over the many, many, many years in all forms of media that the character fits into (again no condemnation on any of the actresses at the time).

But with everything I’ve said, Madea will just always have a kindred connection with me.

I was first introduced to Tyler Perry years ago from a cousin who lent me a VHS of both “Madea’s Family Reunion: The Play” and “Diary of a Mad Black Woman: The Play”. And when Madea came across my screen in that loud shiny red funeral squirt suit, there was an instant likability! I laughed more than I had from anything scripted — in fact, his plays were the first time I had ever watched a stage play. And from then, I have always had a special place in my heart for his plays and for Madea! I purchased 6 DVDs of his plays afterwards and the “Diary” film while I was in my freshman year in college and those plays got me through my first year.

I am glad he’s since retired the character and opened a new chapter of the work he’s putting out but I can acknowledge that Madea and the work pre-Madea’s retirement has been and is a source of joy for me.

And I think that’s what Tyler wants to do with all that he does.

Bring us joy.