"You close the door on me and tell me I can't, I'm gonna find a way to get in." I had to cut a hole in the window to get in," Perry said. Perry's goal was to turn those shows into movies.
By the late 1990s, the plays were selling out across the country, making big money - more than $75 million. But he kept writing and staging new plays, cultivating his audience. His first production, a Gospel musical staged in Atlanta in 1992, bombed. He got his start in theater, writing, directing and producing plays. Their overwhelming reaction gives you a sense of how passionate they are about him.īut he didn't always get this kind of reaction. You realize what a superstar he is and how strongly the audience connects to him when he appears on stage after a performance of one of his plays. Superstar of the Chitlin' Circuit, I'll take that," Perry replied, laughing. "Tyler Perry, superstar of the Chitlin' Circuit?" Pitts asked. I was able to build and have this amazing career among my own people, but outside of that, you know, not a lotta people knew who I was," Perry explained.
They were huge stars in their own community, you know, and that's pretty much my same story. There's this great thing called the 'Chitlin' Circuit,' which I started my shows on and back in the day when, you know, Ray Charles and Billie Holiday and Duke Ellington, they couldn't get into white establishments, so they went on this circuit and toured. "The average American has no idea who you are. But there is always a fairy tale ending, a happy marriage, a reconciliation - often delivered with a dose of Gospel music.Īlthough Perry's themes are universal, he is not widely known outside of his niche audience. "There's always gonna be a moment of redemption somewhere for someone."Īnd then there are the grittier, darker elements: the violence, especially directed at women and children, sex and child abuse, prostitution and drugs use. Nine times out of ten, it'll be a woman who has problems, who has lost faith or lost her way," Perry explained. "You're always gonna see a person of faith. It's a formula that intentionally targets women. Perry's work is a gumbo of melodrama, social commentary and inspiration. "Come on."īut he acknowledged that Madea has done very well so have his other popular characters, like the flamboyant Leroy Brown.īut it's not just comedy. "They weren't serious when they wrote that. "It's been written that Madea is one of the top ten grossing women actresses in the country," Pitts noted. That's what Perry's work is all about - reflecting a world his audience relates to. And I say that because I'm sure that there are some other parts of the African-American community that may be looking at me now going, 'Who does he think he's speaking of?' But, for me, this woman was very, very visible." In my part of the African-American community. She walked out of the house with her curlers and her muumuu and she watched everybody's kids.
She's the type of grandmother that was on every corner when I was growing up," Perry told correspondent Byron Pitts. "Madea is a cross between my mother and my aunt. Long ignored by Hollywood, they come to see something they can't get anywhere else: inspirational stories about people like themselves, and to laugh at characters like his "Madea," the wise-cracking grandmother played by Perry himself.