Making connections is the name of the game
Don’t we look so thrilled to be on a customized Zoom call?!
First things last things first: My apologies for the delay getting this transcript up. January really knocked me for a seasonal depression loop. I don’t know, in fact, if I’ve ever heard the term “seasonal depression” thrown around quite as much as I have in the past month or so, particularly among my friends and social network in New York City. Seasonal depression might just be more contagious than Omicron? Forget I typed that. Instead, congratulate for knowing the next right thing to do was get my butt on an airplane (with an N95 mask, a legit N95 mask) to a nice sunny beach. So here I sit in my hotel room, now that the sun has gone down and Vitamin D heavily applied, ready to contribute for my fine readers once more. Thank you for your patience and understanding. Now, onto the the transcript!
As a journalist, you learn to live with the good, the bad and the ugly of press conferences. Sure, you get access to the people you need answers from, but you’re also competing with plenty of dummies and others in attendance with their own agendas, and they might not even care nor know to ask the kinds of questions you need answered. When I became an entertainment journalist, I learned about a dastardly variation on the press conference: The Junket.
The Junket provides talent from a given TV show or movie or what-have-you, but only for a limited time, as the production team’s publicists have lined up the press in 15- or 20-minute increments (sometimes pairing the talent and/or the journalists) to bang-bang-bang out all of the promotional interviews in one prolonged sitting. It can make for a tricky interview process, not only because you’re constrained in terms of time, but also because you know the people you’re interviewing are likely saying the same things over and over and over again, and may be weary, frustrated or both by the time you get to them.
For Phat Tuesdays on Prime Video (out Feb. 4, 2022), I was fortunate that Amazon’s contracted PR people for this series granted me solo time with the Guy who launched and hosted Phat Tuesdays at The Comedy Store, and paired him with the docuseries’ director, Reginald Hudlin (whose credits include House Party, Boomerang, Bebe’s Kids, and a stint as president of Black Entertainment Television). Hudlin also executive-produced last year’s Emmy Awards telecast for CBS. I would’ve had a fine time interviewing either of them alone; together, I needed to keep them both interested while asking about things that interested me, and hopefully you.
You can find the audio here, as always:
Please enjoy this slightly edited and condensed transcript of my conversation with Guy Torry and Reginald Hudlin!
ME: I’m glad to see that St. Louis and East St. Louis could work together.
HUDLIN That’s a big deal! It’s a big deal. Actually, we’re pretty confident that this is the greatest collab between St. Louis and East St. Louis, in the history of humanity
TORRY Even bigger than the bridge.
HUDLIN Bigger than the bridge. We’re like, did Miles Davis play with anybody from St. Louis? I don’t think so. I think we’re it, in all mediums.
ME Not even Cedric (The Entertainer) could pull that off.
TORRY If he wasn’t busy as he is, he could.
HUDLIN Yeah. But again, Cedric was a key assist in series. So you know, he gets credit.
ME Yeah, he was a big part. So Reg. I want to start with you. Did you decide to approach Guy about making this docuseries after watching Showtime’s series on The Comedy Store?
HUDLIN No. Actually, Guy called me about it years before that special. He had this idea for a while that, you know, he wanted to document this history. And so I was like, OK, it sounds interesting. That he called me back and he said, ‘Look, no, this is real. Amazon wants to do it? They just want to know if you want to do it.’ I said, that sounds great. Please send me the info. I’m a little crazy this weekend because I’m producing the Emmys. As soon as that’s over. I’ll call you right back. I’m happy to say I did call them right back right after the Emmys and said ‘Oh my God, this is the greatest idea ever. I can’t wait to do it.’
ME But Guy, it must’ve been hard if — did you watch the Showtime docuseries?
TORRY Yes.
ME What did it feel like seeing a distinct lack of Phat Tuesdays in there?
TORRY It was bittersweet. Part of the thing was like wow, Phat Tuesdays was such a part of the fabric of The Comedy Store in the 90s, which actually ended up keeping The Comedy Store open, and this came from the owners of The Comedy Store. And then it was like, well, you know what, everything happens for a reason. God is in control. God didn’t want us to be mentioned in that comedy series because he wanted us to tell our story our way and break the news our way. As nice as that documentary was, it wouldn’t have told the story the way that Reggie Hudlin was going to tell that story.
ME That is, in essence the story of Phat Tuesdays itself, right? That Black comedians could get spots. Like the late great John Witherspoon who was great in Boomerang could be an OG member of The Comedy Store. But you know, as people say, between him and Paul Mooney at the end there wasn’t a lot else going on there or at the Improv or at the Laugh Factory.
HUDLIN Yeah, you’re right and that’s the moral of Phat Tuesdays. I mean, a long time ago, I stopped complaining about people being blind to talent and opportunities, and started blessing them. Because wow, we got to do our own special with an incredible All-Star lineup, three nights on Phat Tuesdays. You know, that kind of showcase wouldn’t have happened if we had been a little token representation within that special. So ultimately, what was beautiful is that once The Comedy Store saw what we were doing, they embraced Guy, first of all, when he pitched the idea in the first place, and then when we were doing our series, you know, we said hey, we need this and this from you guys. They were 100% supportive of us. So you know, life is long, and sometimes people don’t see an opportunity. But then when you prove your point by doing it all on your own, people say, ‘You know what, you were right. And you know, we’re on board.’ So do for self.
I love Guy, that you talk about how one you didn’t know what you were doing to the point where it didn’t occur to you that you wanted to have an association with the Phat farm clothing line, but it didn’t occur to you that you were doing a show on Tuesdays that could be Phat Tuesdays until someone else pointed it out.
TORRY Well, women are smarter than men. That’s just scientific fact. Women are smarter than men. Black women, black female babies develop quicker than any other human species. So it was fitting that a black woman helped me come up with the name Phat Tuesday, and it was just so simple to her. And I was trying to do all this other stuff and she’s you know, she just I’ll save it for the doc for people to watch it but it was that simple and that quick, and I was like, duh.
Why was the night you were given Tuesday? Was there a legitimate reason for that?
TORRY I’ve never asked, but I think that may have been the one night that was dark for The Comedy Store in the Belly Room. There was nothing going on, and in all fairness to The Comedy Store. They kind of use the Belly Room as their incubator. They have three rooms total. If you have an idea for a show, you start in the Belly Room. And then if it does well, they may move it to the Original Room. And if it does well, then it goes to the Main Room which goes from 90 seats to 200 seats to 400 seats. We went from 90 seats to 400. We didn’t do the Original Room. It was like the Negro Leagues. We went from playing in cotton fields, to you know, Jackie Robinson.
Ebbet’s Field.
TORRY And it’s funny because in one of the early interviews I did with Katt Williams, he says that. He says Phat Tuesdays were the Jackie Robinson of black comedy.
In the series, you say that you felt like nine months was a good time to wait, because it equates to giving birth to the show. But in the moment in 1995, did it feel like nine months was the right amount of time? Or were you itching even from the jump to get to the Main Room?
TORRY Well, what happened was I was doing it in the Belly room for that amount of time. I ended up getting a writing gig on a show called Minor Adjustments. I couldn’t be there every week. It was a UPN show.
And so what I would do was, I let this comedian Buddy Lewis host on the second, third and fourth Tuesday, and I would do a bigger show every first Tuesday in the Main Room. And that show was so successful. Mitzi wanted to do it every week in the Main Room. And I was like, wait a minute, that’s 400 seats every Tuesday on a Tuesday. In Hollywood. There was no social media. I had no money for advertising. I made the flyers myself, going to Kinko’s and passing them out with my comedian friends and family members. And on top of that, I didn’t have the staff to do it every week and so I fought her off for like six months. She said look, I’m going to put another room in there on those other night and I was like no, I didn’t want the people to get Tuesdays confused. So I was like, you know what, let me just level up and let me make this happen. And it happened that way. So it was out of necessity because we were turning people away every week in the Belly Room. The parking lot and the sidewalks were full of Black people who couldn’t get in to the Belly Room, and they’d just wait til after the show. If I was thinking back then I would have done two shows. You know early show and a late show. But you know when you’re in it, you’re just in it. But I knew when I moved to the Main Room, I had to do a better show. I had to do less comics, more comics with names, and tighten up the game a little bit. Because to get, to be given an opportunity for Black people. We have a short leash that they give us, and if it doesn’t work, it could ruin it for anybody coming from behind. So I had to make sure that I pushed all the chips in at the table at one time and come hard or go home.
When you said you were given a one-month trial period. And that month was February. The cynic in me automatically said, Oh yeah, sure they do that for Black History Month, like they’re gonna give you February. Like it’s such a like a marketing ploy.
TORRY You know what’s funny? Because for the first time in my entire life, I just put two and two together, I’ve never thought about. We don’t walk around — I have to get reminded that I’m Black. I love being Black. Don’t get it twisted. But I don’t realize I’m Black until someone does some bullshit that remind me, Oh, that’s what. We don’t walk around like that, we walk around as humans. Same thing with being short. I don’t realize I’m short until someone tall says something. I didn’t realize it was February but I never put two and two together that it was Black History Month. I just wanted to be funny and showcase other comedians.
You know, Guy, you mentioned getting a gig on a UPN show. I’m surprised that in the series, there’s plenty of stuff about Def Jam, but I didn’t hear a lot about UPN and The WB, which launched the same year Phat Tuesdays launched, and I have to feel like that’s some sort of serendipity going on there because just in the moment where you’re bringing the hood to Hollywood, Hollywood has two new TV networks looking to program shows.
TORRY Well, Reggie can really to speak to that.
HUDLIN Yeah, well, you know, what you had was a moment where there was an explosion of Black culture in every media platform. So you have hip-hop music dominating the mainstream. You know, the illusion that Rock n Roll is America’s popular music really crumbled in that era, with the invention of SoundScan. Oh! The Rolling Stones don’t have the number one album, LL Cool J does, right? And then, at the same time, you have Black cinema having this really explosive moment with Spike Lee and myself and John Singleton, you know, making all these movies and suddenly it’s like, oh, these Black stories are mainstream hits in Hollywood. And in the fashion world, the same thing again, so yes. It’s 20 year cycles, essentially. Right? Because you see it in the 70s, then you see it in the 90s. And you kinda see it right now, you know, where there’s an upswing when suddenly Black culture has an explosive moment and becomes a dominant presence.
TORRY And black women behind the scenes…
HUDLIN Ultimately, black culture is driven by black women. So all that being integral. But back to your point, which is UPN. You know, what happens, what has happened, historically, is whatever network is on the bottom ratings wise, deploys a black strategy. In that case, it was UPN and The WB said, oh, wait a minute. We need to do some black programming to build up our viewership the way that FOX did. And FOX had black programming until they got the NFL and they said OK, we’re good. Thank you very much.
See ya Roc.
HUDLIN Exactly. So they both kind of deployed that strategy, and probably would have been more successful — actually, it’s interesting because The WB and UPN had a lot of black comedy shows, but not always with black comedians, right? That can work, that you can have comedic actors, but, you know, my theory is always, I want to be safe and have a brilliant stand-up who can act in those shows, I think tends to be the strongest formula for success, but rules are also made to be broken.
Right. Well, I mean, those networks where were giving Guy jobs. The Jamie Foxx Show, then Good News. Until Guy got too big and he had to do all these movies. And then, I don’t know what to make of it, the fact that Guy, you ended Phat Tuesdays the same year that Reggie ends up going to head BET.
HUDLIN Wow! Man, you’re making extraordinary connections that I hadn’t thought about. But actually, that also makes sense, right? The point was Guy got to a point in his career where his manager said, ‘Look, you’re doing five things. You can’t do all five.’ So his argument was Phat Tuesdays are important, but it’s actually the least profitable for you. Guy had to go on and grow in the other aspects of his career. That was the right thing to do for Guy. He had given back. He had created enormous opportunity for the entire black comedy community, and it was time to take care of him.
TORRY But I made sure I passed the torch, though. Made sure that that night went on with someone else. And because we’d already had Chocolate Sundaes (at the Laugh Factory), and Mo Betta Mondays (at the Improv), and Wacked Out Wednesdays (at Flappers in Burbank) going, these other outlets. It was cool. If I had probably still been the only show like that in town. Maybe not. Maybe I would have kept it going, but because I felt it was safe in the hands of these other outlets and that black comedians still had a place in Hollywood to go showcase, and the audience had a place to come to see this wonderful black comedy.
HUDLIN You had succeeded. You had Johnny Appleseeded black comedy, right? And you planted the seeds, they’re blossoming over the city and all over the country. Right? And for me, when I get the call, I was like, whoa, I hadn’t thought about being an executive. But I guess that’s the inevitable next step right you know, it’s one thing for us to have individual success, but we need to build and grow platforms that understand our content. So, you know, I was brought in specifically to get BET into the original content business. Which we did. It was a real sea change there. Doing original programs, moving into descriptive programs, you know, doing the Black Panther animated series, which helped build the path for the Black Panther live-action feature film. That’s the thing you know, once you get on the path of like, how do we expand and grow our platforms, you end up doing this you don’t expect.
You do show how Phat Tuesdays began all of these other shows, not just in LA but across the country. And you also show how now we have all these other platforms like TikTok and Instagram for comedians to do what they want to do and not have to wait for a Mitzi Shore or Jamie Masada or Budd Freidman to give you the OK to do your thing. So what do you think in 2022 and going forward? What do you think is the importance of showcase like Phat Tuesdays today, or is there still a need for those?
TORRY Absolutely. I love the new social comedy platform, but nothing beats live stand-up. Nothing beats getting on that stage and being in the moment and seeing a comedian do their thing live like that? It’s different. And I’ve seen some of these comedians who do the social stuff and they’re killing it. And I seen that some of them onstage and some kill, some are great but some, after seven minutes, that’s it. Then when you got 45 minutes to an hour, to give someone a show someone who paid their hard-earned money out to come see you, took a night out of their schedule to come see you. And you’ve got to deliver. So these showcases are important because what if the internet goes away one day? And you have to do live stand-up. And also just that muscle creating that muscle of live stand-up and being in the moment helps you when you’re a game-show host, or when you’re a radio host. When you’re hosting anything, having those chops and put those reps onstage on comedy clubs every night. That quick reaction in the moment. There are no retakes. It helps you in those other forms of entertainment.
HUDLIN In the same way, if you ask Denzel Washington, or any serious actor like look, you can’t go to the next level until you do live theater. The same is true for comedy. There’s something about standing there. Look. You can put out a funny 30-second video and that’s great. But you know that live moment of like, boom! Here I am. And you know, the terror of dead air, when you tell a joke that does not land. That’s a character builder.
TORRY You can’t read the room on social media. I don’t care how many pictures they’ve got up there in the gallery. You can’t read the room. You can’t feel that energy of the room. What’s going on at the moment. You can’t do that without being onstage and live. Doing it thousands and 1000s and 1000s of hours.
Well, Reg and Guy I’m glad that the Internet still exists, 1) so people can watch Phat Tuesdays, and 2) that I could link up with you guys today. I wish we had more time but I’m getting the hook.
HUDLIN This has been a great conversation. Let’s do it again.
TORRY
Sounds good to me.
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