Hey, guys, welcome to another episode of Eating While Broke. I'm your host Colleen Witt, and today we have very special guest actress and host Portia Coleman is in the building. Ramona, how are you.
I'm good with just cooking of things, you know, not much.
Yeah, yeah, you already getting started. Why don't you go ahead? I mean you are not wasting any time?
You know what I'm saying.
On this show, we do have a phrase, the broker the dish, the better the story. This dish was definitely under I want to say, or ten bucks probably. Yeah, go ahead and tell our listeners what are you gonna have me eating today?
Listen? So I'm gonna have y'all eating pigs and a blanket. It's the perfect struggle meal because everybody knows a good hot dog. Yeah, but I never loved the hot dog buns as much as I like these biscuits.
Yeah, oh, the biscuits. You didn't even choose the chrismal.
No, not Caissant's. The biscuits is by the time you pack them and you put them in and they get fluffy. Trust me, these pigs in a banket. It fills you up while you're struggling, but at the same time you appreciate it because it cooks. Usually I would always actually heat and cook my wieners first. Okay, okay, so I do that first usually, but they could still cook while in here too. So you take it like this. You take it and you roll it.
So when you cook it, are you putting it in hot?
I put the usually the wieners in fully cooked, but no, you put it in because the biscuit's gonna cook, and then the winner can cook inside it at the same time. Usually it's about fifteen minutes. I like my stuff well done, so I like to leave it in there so it's literally easy. And what I'm gonna do is, I'm actually gonna like put a little butter already in the pan
because you don't want it to stick. You gotta have it be nice and greasy so it can kind of like toast a little bit too, like underneath it.
And then we got you the buster the butter biscuits. If I didn't know you were gonna cook your first, I wasn't too sure on the show.
I always like, I like to cook my wieners first, but it's okay because it can still cooked while inside. It's not a problem. But no, I like to butter this little pan. But see like this little I mean, look how cute.
Yeah it's cute. I didn't know how you were gonna do it.
Yeah, you take it and you roll it up again struggle meal.
So you won't see the you won't see the hot dogs from the outside.
See that's the thing. Sometimes you can take them and cut them up if you want a smaller biscuit. But since these are the wide ones, you can cut them up and just still have it throughout. Because if you take one whole wiener, the whole winer would be extended past the biscuit. Yeah, so you don't want to do that. It's already going to expand, and so will the wiinner itself, so you're gonna actually taste Look the wiinner's on both sides.
See it's already here. So I'm telling you talking about struggle. This right here was my quick go to.
Okay, so the ingredients are.
Butter biscuits, butter biscuits, a little bit of butter and some margarine, and all you need is some some hot dogs. Like it's so simple and so easy. So look, so see you can go this way like this. So see how I'm putting them like this. You take them and you fold it this way, and you do it just like this, and you cover it because you want to make sure they don't open up while you're actually putting them in the Yeah, I'm telling you it looks crazy, but it's gonna be so delicious.
I love it. I'm starving. So you don't ever add cheese or anything.
No, we'll see these are butter biscuits though. Okay, so you can add cheese, but I personally didn't need cheese or like them necessarily in between it because again, we ain't got no cheese. But I never tried it with cheese, but I never I never needed it because again, these busts. Look at these biscuits.
These are already so yet it's gonna be good. It's gonna I'm not gonna mess with your dish. I'm just like getting creative from the sideline.
Listen. I love it. So see this one, I don't let's say, I don't want to make it that long. Take it this way, m hm. You wrap it on. And that's the thing. We have more than enough weianers to work with these biscuits. So we're gonna take this up in here, got it, roll it on down.
And this is what you were doing to get through the hard times, did you not? So take me back to what was going on during these hard times.
You know what? So I'm going all the way back to when I was seven. Okay, So we're gonna talk about a little project, a movie that I'm sure you guys will all know called Friday. Oh yeah, I was a background after at the ice cream truck and Friday. Okay, So just to show how long this process has been, from seven till now, there's nothing overnight about my success at all. So I was seven years old, me and my mom, bugging it out, single mom?
And did you have siblings?
I have an older brother, but he's eighteen years older than me. Oh jeez, So I was technically raised like an only child because my.
Brother had an eighteen years spread.
Yeah, re married God with my dad and why exactly she said that finished line? She was thirty five and was like, I'm starting all over again? What is this? What is going on? Yeah? And she actually did just.
Does she ever when she gets mad at you? Like ever mentioned like I started.
All out over you. Yeah. She used to its me like that ain't my fault. You chose my daddy, and my daddy was ten years her junior. Oh, my pops was twenty she was thirty, and then they got married to have me at thirty five and twenty five, I said, mine, you was you was robbing the credle cridle.
Yeah, yeah, so she know what she was doing.
Still together, No, they're not still together now, Like I said, my dad actually passing twenty nineteen. Oh yeah, it was tough because you know the interesting thing about life. I was with my dad the night before he suddenly passed away. Oh he suddenly just suddenly passed away. My dad was only fifty nine. He was fifty nine years old. So this is just the definition I think, following your intuition. So I'm out in the valley doing my thing, and I had a lot of airan chevon. I was gonna
be a Marina. My dad lives in Compton Wilmington Central in LA. And something just told me go see your dad. And at first I was like, Oh, that's far away, there's traffic, and I don't know if I should go do that. Something told me again. I called my dad. He didn't answer, so I was like, all right, let me just pop up. I'm gonna go surprise my pops. He's probably already off work. I know he gonna be home. Go to his house. He in the garage, hill on
his friends, still in his work outfit. Dotta, what are you doing here? And I'm like, nothing much. I just want to surprise you. What's up? What are we doing today? We loved going to Sizzler, we loved doing our this daddy daughter day and we spent the entire day together, entire day. So I left, probably it was I got there abound four or five, left around midnight. He said, call me tomorrow. You know, your daddy's awesome. Me go with my friend and just call me later. But he
loves to talk. I did to get my dad to text because'd be on set. I'm like, Dad, I can't call you with this text. So the next day that's fine. I didn't hear from him, and no big deal. And then I get a call. I see it's my uncle calling me and he's like, come to the house. Something's wrong with your dad. And I'm like, what are you talking about? Something's wrong with my dad? Like that's just random. I just seen him I say, come to the house, and I'm like, okay, Well, if he's not okay, I
need to go to a hospital. He's like, just come to the house. They're not going to move him. What. And first thing I thought was, if somebody's sick, you got to move them. You gotta transport him. What's going on? So he didn't say that, but I knew in my
mind it's like, something's not right. I was on my way to a premiere with me and my mom and we literally diverted from the one thirty fourth Freeway and went to Compton and I and as soon as we pulled around the corner, I'm talking about cop cars, but people all in the streets. My dad was very popular.
Just you know. My dad had a key to the city at Compton because he saved people out of a plane crash that crashed into his house in twenty probably twenty eleven, and he was on Ellen DeGeneres and got the key to the city for saving people at his house. So my dad was that dude, and I knew something. I was like, I pulled around the corner and I was like what And my dad just had a sudden
heart attack that morning. Wow. So again in my mind when I thought about that, I was like, of course devastated, but I was like that was meant to happen because my intuition told me to go see my father. Yeah, and I did. Yeah, And having that peace was.
Like I was gonna ask you, did it help you?
Kind one thousand percent? And I never and honestly, like, knowing my dad and how vivacious he was, I didn't want to go into the house, like I knew, okay, if he had a sudden heart attack and if his wife had got home and it was all these hours later, I'm like, it's final. I don't need to see that.
Yeah.
People came and I stayed around the corner while I know the coroner came, and I was like, I was with my dad before. And I literally thank God to this day for knowing that I was with him the day before and following that gut intuition that I did because I was with him the night before.
How did your mom respond to it?
Well, of course they had been separated for so long, they've been separated, but my mom of course was there. But it's like, wow, it's like, I mean family at the same time. So Mom was there, I remember she stayed the night at my house that that that same night, and it was just like the process of thinking like I was just with him, but at the same time, that was God giving me that time.
Yeah, yes, that.
Was God giving me the final moment. So to this day, I'm grateful and even everything that I'm doing now, my daughter will always be bragging his friends. Oh my daughter's on TV. You gotta go watch my daughter. And I'm like, I know, I'm making my pops proud. He's writing Inglewood in a mausoleum. Any time on driving by Inglewood, I go right to the mausoleum, go talk to catch him up.
Like his presence is literally with me, because I've had two people that had no idea about my dad's passing call me and say, somebody just like I don't even know mediums, like I don't do none of that stuff. And two friends I remember calling me one day when I was on FaceTime with them and they were like, oh, you got to a little day, okay, And I was like, what are you, Like, what are you talking about? Like tripping?
And then like ten minutes later, my friends were like, so when you FACETI behind you was a black guy in a ball head in a blue suit. Oh, my dad's bal head and was buried in a blue suit. And I had just left the mausoleum that day.
Oh my goodness.
And I was like, Okay, I said, that's not scary, that's just my dad's presence.
Wow.
And then somebody else did it before that same day and said somebody would have ball head in a blue suit. Is telling me to tell you, I'm so proud of of you data, And I was like, she said it the same exactly. This woman has never met my dad nothing, she's a publicist and had no idea. So the closure that I had in a sense of knowing that even though my dad has gone from this earthly life, my
dad is with me. So dating back to when I was a kid and starting in all this journey, it's like you want to have your parents of course beside you, but sometimes it doesn't align like that. And my mom and dad had divorced, but my dad was still there watching me on TV, proud and supporting everything you know that I did. So it started when I was seven all the way up until the journey now. So it's
no roses in prettyness over here. Every father's there. I'm saying Happy Father's Day to the men that are no longer here, you know, and the fathers that have have departed. You know what I'm saying. But it's a blessing because I had him in my life and I know he's around. Yeah, so many things happened. I'm like, look at my dad just doing his duties, not a father, because he was protective. He was protected. He'd be like, you're trying to holler my daughter. Uh uh, Like he was that guy and
from Compton. So this is LA's finest.
Yes, So this is official pigs in the blanket going.
There's official pigs and a blanket. And here's the thing. So these biscuits were gonna obviously like expand. And the funny thing is that these business are all gonna be touching, which is fine. So we're gonna cut them and separate them so we can all have our own gift. Kids. I wish I had another biscuits because I got two more wieners. But it's fine, it's fine. We got the pig. Lit come on, now he's on in the blanket, So we're gonna we're gonna stop process. I'm gonna put the
time on put the time. I'm gonna put it about fifteen minutes timer. Let's see here, Okay, I got right now fourteen, Let's do fifteen minute count.
Fifteen and then the package say eight. But you're gonna do.
No, no, no, the package has twelve to fifteen. Ok but we gonna say twelve to fifteen. So no, I like it to go the max. So we can get that little Chris and I'm gonna look at I'm gonna keep my eye on it. Okay, we're gonna talk meat.
So take go ahead and take me back to seven year old. You were gonna go all the way back to Friday. Okay, I didn't mean to take you off. It's all good, but it was. It's a fond memory. I love hearing that story that you got that moment. Now, so you and your mom, you're auditioning, you're doing all of this. You land the Friday movie? Yeah, single mom? Are you guys struggling?
Yeah? But landing the Friday movie in the sense of background. So background acting is how I started. So I didn't come off the gate being principal. So when you have a background agency, they basically send you not even an audition, you don't book it technically. They to see you on a piece of paper and say we need little kids that you know are between seven and ten to be an ice cream scene. Oh that's literally what happened.
So do you get paid for those?
Yeah? Yeah, you definitely get paid, but it's like your background, so it's not a ton. You might get forty something bucks a day, but you get your vouchers and that helps you get to sag later on. So I'm seven. If you remember the scene, Meghan good is right next to me at the ice cream truck. I remember that, and that's what we're standing side by side. I'm one of the little kids at ice Cube. You know, he's
talking from the porch. But Chris Tucker comes up. He hitting kids, Get out the way, get up the way to get the big work. Oh I thought. I was like so bombed when he hit me upside the head like trying to get to the ice cream truck. And I'm like dang, Like it was so funny and so cool because that was my first job and I was like, oh, I love this. I can get paid just to like hang out with some friends and be on camera.
It was like immediate So was it your mom that kind of brought this acting idea to you or were you going to your mom like I think I want to pursue it.
It was both. I was already like, I have video literally at three years old, I was in school plays. I have literally a video with three at the private school that I was at. The song called Daddy, You're My Hero in a play, so like, I literally was already starting.
So she saw it and completely poured into it.
At five YMCA, I'm singing I Miss You much Janet Jackson with a flashlight, two backup dancers that I had doing the running Man the whole time.
Okay, so you were you were already invested already. So what does your mom doing to support y'all while you're on this journey.
Well, my mom had a job. She worked at the LA Unified School District, so she worked in busing and then she was going for a promotion. The promotion didn't work out, and then she was like, well, I can go back to work, or I'll take you to auditions and just figure out the process from here. And at the end of the day, it's like, you need somebody to take you to auditions because as a single. Mom,
how you gonna get there? You can't drive? So my brother, mind you, who's eighteen years like he's telling you older than me. He's already in college. So I'm four or five years old. My brother's at Washington State. And then he had actually got drafted to like he played for the Raiders, the Oilers, the Niners for a bit. So my brother was gone. It was just me and mom's.
Yeah.
So my aunt and my uncle were already doing a lot of background work. So at that time it was like, okay, you might do one or two jobs a week. Yeah, you can take them to set, but a parent always has to be there. So in between that process, my mom was doing it. If my brother was in town, he'd take me. And then I got an agency and I booked three commercials like that. Really it took me like six months to get my SAG vouchers.
But now commercials is more money.
Hello, because at that point you got a join SAG. So when you're in the union, you get more money. So I went from making probably thirty forty a day to where I made thousands at a time. I did a tie commercial with Alberson's commercial and another one was like this purple Moon like doll commercial.
And at that age, they're putting in an account for you.
So you have a Cougan account, so ten percent of it goes to a Coogan account, which is literally.
Only ten percent. Yeah, oh I thought ninety then you get ten percent.
No, it's it's more of a percentage. But the parents are the ones that actually get the full amount of money. Oh so ten percent for sure is going to where the kids are. You know, let's say they want to go to college, and so later on they have that little percentage, but that's still not enough. Being fully transparent, It's like when you think of a household. If a parent is not working, if a parent is taking their child's money to live in the household, you're not making
no money. Yeah, because I remember I had when I looked later, I remember looking probably ten fifteen years ago. By the time I was eighteen, it's about five hundred and some thousand dollars that I had made, but it was only a couple thousand in any account.
Damn.
Now what yeh?
Does that make you feel some type of way towards your parents?
I mean, I mean, if I'm being transparent, yes, because I feel like, at the end of the day, no different than we've had parents. Like look at the Raven Simons, you got Kyla Prass. This is all people that I grew up with, Megan, all of us. I knew their parents had jobs, whether they had one parent or two, they were working. So I was not thinking in the
process at the time. Okay, I'm supporting a household. Yeah, you didn't dawn on me till like I'm eighteen and I'm like, okay, now I'm not moving out right away, but I'm paying for everything. And by the time I'm ready to go go, which was still much later than most people end up leaving home.
You made all this money, but you still couldn't leave because you.
Saying yes, I'm very I'm very much saying that because at the end of the day, if someone is like, right now the business mind that I have now, so many things would have been different. But I didn't know I was a kid. There's no way there should have been a business that my mom set up.
Yeah, Like if you look at the Mary Kay to Nashley Olson's man, the parents, the parents like whooped.
Of course they kicked asked with their investments or a lot of times you see, even like the Raven simone like they had her father always saw with certain auditions. Do I feel like I wish my mom would have took the business mindset that a lot of other parents had. Absolutely, because I remember getting eaten up in taxes as a kid when my mom should have had a company LLC or escort or something.
Oh, the money was going directly to you.
Yes, But therefore, since she didn't work, I'm paying like I'm not her dependent, she's technically mine. Yeah, so in tax is mine, I'm getting eaten up in so many ways. Where someone new business, it would have been different. Now now I have two companies, two businesses, everything runs through es Corps, and I pay personal taxes. Oh yeah, yeah, well now it's like it's next level. But I didn't know nothing.
Do you have yourself on payroll like a salary?
Yeah, depending you have to. Yeah, a lot of times you have yourself on salary because it's like I'm employing myself. So even like right now on the shows that I have, I am employing. My company is employing Porsche to come to work. Yes, and that's how not only is it legal, but it's legit because people don't realize that LLCs they stop and cap you at how much you can write off.
Well, it also helps you too. And I talk about this a lot, yeah on camera, but when you're going to buy real estate, you being an employee allows you to leverage more versus if you're just an independent contract care company.
Independent contractors don't get looked at as a good business person to loan money to.
And then and then the banks also get look at you as higher risks because they're like, wait, how do we know your business is even gonna be here.
There's too many people that are entrepreneurs, too many people that are trying to trying to say it, because this entertainment is full of people that are hoping to make it. But at the end of the day, if I'm a bank, I'm not going to give you five hundred thousand dollars
because you got a hope and a dream. I would give you that money if I saw you had a company and you're putting yourself on saling and your company already gross this money and you're paying yourself a salary of eighty or ninety k. It just looks different on paper. So in hindsight, of course, everything that I see now I wish my mom had done. And there's a lot of tension that it came from that once I let her know.
Like when did you let her know? Like what age are you?
Like? Oh, man, I got my license in sixteen. So when I got my license, the first thing I said was, Okay, Mom, I want you to transition from this standpoint of being just my mom that's with me, to being maybe a CPA. Maybe you could be a business manager. Maybe you could do this I'm talking about. I'm like, so big college, like your mom, not your ma mager, correct the ma major. I think a lot of people take that standpoint. But to me, if you're my manager, you bringing jobs to the table.
Yeah, so you're like booking your own jobs. You're dealing with my agent exactly she's doing.
She's dealing with the agents and calling them because obviously that back then it was pages. Let me talk. I'll tell my age is pagers. You get a page, come to the office, you gotta leave, you got an audition, Come because you have a meeting. So she's driving me everywhere. But at the point when I'm able to drive, and I got my diploma when I was sixteen, years old. I was legally emancipated in sixteen. I graduated a year emancipated in sixteen. So here's the thing.
You divorced your mom.
No, no, no, no, no. So let's clarify that, no, emancipation is in the system of schooling. You're technically legally listed as an adult because when people are working on set, actors and kids can only work about like four to six hours. Yeah. So if I'm sixteen, but if I've already got my diploma, that means they don't have to send me to schooling on set, and if I've already legally fulfilled my obligation in the school system, I can work twelve to fifteen hours like an adult.
So you're saying emancipated in this That's what it means to me.
Emancipation is legally in the system of acting.
Okay, because they have emancipation, Like I know in New York, it's like where you you sever that time with your parents, they're no longer legally financially response.
No, no, no, that's for sure. I've definitely seen a lot of kids that are like going through adoption and they're like, hey, okay, I want to mancipate for my parent. You know, in the emancipation of acting world, it's just from the sense of, oh, you're graduating. Because I even remember the first time it really counted was when I remember I was sixteen going on seventeen and the Parkers audition came up, and I remember they wanted somebody like in their twenties. Yeah, so
I was only seventeen. They didn't know that, but my agent I was listed as an adult. By the time I got on set and was working with Monique and all them, they were like, how old are you? And I'm like, I've already graduated. I drive myself to set. Wow, I'm treated like an adult in the system. So therefore, companies want to work with the kids. Even if you see a lot of movies back in the day when we were watching Saved by the Bill, all the kids
weren't high schoolers. They're in their thirties for a reason. Yeah, Power Rangers, all these different shows where you have kids, the actors are of age, they just play younger.
Now, when Monique and those guys found out, like, hey, she's younger, did it cause a little bit.
No, It was totally fun because me and count is vond were not necessarily close in age, but we always had to vibe. Me and ken Elle Countess Parker, like even Monique. I walked on seting the first thing she said was we need to get this bittion food. You too scared? And I was like, here we go, Like no, it was a vibe. It was. It was so fun. But the fact that I already graduated early outside of emancipation. I did all my credits that I needed, and I
already was ahead of my courses and was smart. So I graduated literally a year early.
Did you now were you going to regular schooling or were you doing private?
Yeah? No, I went to Hollywood High School Performing Arts, right, So you're busting.
You really focused, you knew what you wanted to do.
I was a school I loved school and I loved working, So I went to school. I got all my credits, but at the same time, I wanted to be an actress, so I figured, if I can go to school finish early, I can get out and go to set in full time.
So I got my diploma. Then I went to a home school and just took like calculus and just like some math classes to already be over yeah, like I already went over expectation what I needed to do because I was already I looked and as a junior, I was like, wait, I could have graduated, like at the tenth grade. I know not I have so many credits because you get more credits when you're on set. I
was like, I could have been out of school. So I checked out my junior year and I was like, I'm gonna go to a whole school for two three months, and I'm glad I did because I end up getting a Disney movie and I was not even gonna be home for my graduation.
Wow.
So I remember going to another friend's prom and literally celebrating my birthday in Salt Lake City on the set of Pixel Perfect.
Wow.
And I did it Disney with, which is big now on Disney Plus people go watch it all the time. They hit me.
So at sixteen, though, you're starting to say hey mama.
Yeah, cause I'm driving, I'm doing my things. So I'm like, hey, I don't need you in that capacity, so maybe try to shift into this lane. So it's also like trying to adult in a way, because you grow up fast when you're in entertainment.
Mind youuly having a conversation like that with your parents.
You know, it's like you need that, like because I know, like I'm very self sufficient so much in a way where it's like it's scary where I'm like, I have to let other people help me do things because I'm so used to doing it myself. But at sixteen, I'm like, Okay, I got my license, I already had a first car, I got everything, so now let's try to transition into this phase of what you can be for me. But my mom is stuck on like, no, I gotta be there.
I'm I'm gonna be with you and we're gonna be together. And I'm like okay. So it kind of kept going, you know, for a while, and I'm like, Okay, the transition has to happen because why am I going to pay another person to do what I'd rather pay my mom to do. Because if you look at a lot of people that are celebrities, they hire like Jamie. One of my good friends, Jamie Fox, love him so much. His sister is his stylist, His best friend is his
wardrobe stylist. His sister does his heir, He keeps his stuff in the family, and I love that because you trust your family, So it's like you want to do that, but at the same time, if they're not capable of doing it, I'm also not going to be putting myself in a position to not have you doing the proper job when you need to go get get training. If you're gonna be my CPA, I need you to study business. If you're going to be my manager, I need you to go study on how to talk to these agencies.
No, so what is her capacity right now?
To you? Oh that's interesting. Just look at the ball, Look at the biscuit.
It looks so good.
Come on, you think I'm playing.
I'm not gonna get out of this question.
I'm not gonna get out the question. The capacity right now currently.
We probably have to stop that big bad the audio is gonna they're gonna.
Go, oh yeah, okay, so let's let's stop the I got it, I got you. Look how fire it looked though.
It looks good. I'm hungry too.
Oh man, are they getting this because y'all see my biscuits? No to see it right here? Okay?
Oh you know what, It just reminded me to do my job.
Come on, it's okay. Oh brow look at the pigs in the blanket. Wow, the pigs are in the blanket. And that's why I told you.
Now, why do you use the biscuits? Did you answer me before? Why you use the biscuit and not the.
The crsuns are too flaky? Oh really yeah, so crssants are too flaky. So therefore I love flaky. But the things that they're going to fall apart if you're cooking them too long when you're cooking also the winner. So that's the only thing I love flaky. But these biscuits also have a little bit of on tool. So that's why I told you I needed the butter, because see, look when you put the.
Butter, it is curious.
It is it is for sure. I remember we turned it back on. So see you got to get the boy. She turned it back on. When she came back in, you turned it back on. It's all okay, cool, it's sorry, it's okay.
It looks so good.
It's delicious. I'm telling you when you get the little biscuits.
So your your mom, yes, is she at the is she at mom capacity or is she at I'm doing something?
I want her to be at mom capacity. But I think if we're just being transparent, because a lot of people go through this, you know, in the ship and dynamic when it comes to their kids. Sometimes growing up, I had to choose myself over what my mom was kind of stuck on because I think at the point when someone gets angry with you because they're not around in a capacity that they want, when you're telling them
what you need, it can get a little toxic. Yeah, So I kept telling her what I needed and what was important, and for her it would go over her head. She didn't care. So I had to kind of put this position of like, Mom, these people are going to be helping me do it. You at any point can kick in when you want to. But if that's not going to happen, unfortunately, we're going to have to to cause a separation in this relationship.
And then at this point is she working other jobs. I'm so excited about it.
So it's so good. That's why I'm buttering it. That's why I'm doing it, girl, Venus, That's why I'm doing I'm getting you to your biscuits. I'm preparing your biscuits. I think I would hope that she's of course, you know, you know proud, which I think it's that dynamic, but at the same time, it's almost proud of you. They would reach out to you too.
Are you guys not talking?
No?
Ah, dang no.
And again I feel like it's only a matter of time. But here goes back to but.
How long have you guys not been talking? Is it like a bad month?
It's been No, it's been longer than a month. It's been longer than a month. And I'm only saying this from the standpoint because I think the power of healing is what people need to no one understand. And choosing yourself because sometimes parents' job, I think, is to raise their children to be able to fly off.
And yes, I have this discussion with my husband all the time, like I think our responsibilities to kind of belity.
And your kids to leave you because at the end of the day, you're not going to be around forever and your kids have to be okay without you. I've been so self sufficient for so long, but I realize doing that, I enabled my mother to be self sufficient.
Well, that was going to be one of my questions because it seems like you were very self sufficient book, Yeah, wouldn't your mom who had a role to play. Where did this independence come from?
You know, I think the independence came well in a way, technically from my mom too. If my mom's a single mother, you grow up watching someone do it all alone, right, Yeah, So technically in a way that helped me. See like, okay, I could do things on my own because of course I'm young. It's not like I have a man or need something. I had managers, I had agents, I had
people in my life that were there. But when it came time to do business, when I was like, wait a minute, y'all, look at this though, Look at you. I told you that I'm talking about pigs in a blanket. Grab one. So I'm telling you grab one, take it and put your little ketchup and your little mustard on the plate. Butter and the butter, popp and that's that's what they need. The butter. You gotta get the butter. That's why I put a little extra on there. And
I love butter. That's what I'm saying. You gotta get the butter on a bit.
I'm excited.
Put that. If you want a little Dejon too, I usually just do ketchup and shake up the ketchup because you don't like it to be you know, the watering paratly gonna come out first.
Yeah, So how long have you and your mom not been talking?
So it's it's it's been a second. I think it's been. I mean, I mean I look back and the last sext message was November or something like that.
But even before Sisters is out and you didn't get it. Congratulations. No, but damn that sucks. I mean sorry, no, no, no, you know, you know kids, you're thinking about it in the back of your mind.
We're talking honestly, we're talking honestly. My thing is that I wish that people and this is what anybody And that's when I had to separate the difference between you might need to cut into it. If not, just take a bite. Let let's take our first bide. Do you want to do it?
Want to do it?
Dip it in? Take a bile? Right right? How we like him?
Go to now?
How are we liking him? Make sure you get the winger and they're.
Doing I'm gonna eat this whole thing.
And I'm telling you she likes it, y'all. First of all, she killed her biscuit and her pig and a blanket, so I almost say this is a hit.
It's a definite head noah, you know, I will definitely go home and do this for my time, you know, for your kids.
Like we're making pigs in a blanket today, So you want the more christal. You don't have to put as much butter. But I like the butter because it just seeps it in, right, mm hmm, so good.
This is brilliant, easy, and it's brilliant right to the point. Then it's take less than five bucks.
Five dollars. Get you some biscuits. Pop them open, put them in a blanket. And that's why you see I rolled them like that so they stay tight. So even though it looked like they were mushed, when as soon as the biscuit expands, it still keeps it. So you see the winder on the outside here.
How do you feel about the way you did the hot do say?
Listen, I was fine with the hot dogs, Like I said, I usually cook them before, but the hot dogs are already Like, it's fine, the hot dogs are cooked. That's why I wanted you at least a good fifteen life. So good, I hold up tearing it up. This is my hope and this is what my thoughts.
Well, this is a contribution of your mom. R.
This is a contribution because she used to do pigs in a banket for me, I think for me where I think the separation, of course even started more after me kind of begging and even saying like, hey, ten years ago, I'm like, we need to help our relationship go to the next level because I'm not a parent, but I feel like, as a parent, you should transition from this is my child, this is my young adult, this is my adult. Now we're friends in a capacity.
I'm still the mother, But how do you need me to be there for you?
The guiter from like the.
And that's the thing. It's like, if I'm self sufficient in my business, all I need you to do is just be a mom and be my.
Parent in that way, like listening and just and.
Being that person not combative or not.
But also a cheerleader too, like the boy Sisters is out like cheerleading.
Yeah, and that's great. My mom was always the cheerleader. But I would notice that when I'm trying to work on the depth of our relationship, she was more focused on, Okay, there's a red carpet, Okay, there's something we can go to here, And it was distracting from me because I'm like, listen, I'm your daughter first and foremost before i'm a celebrity on the red carpet. Yeah, And I had to start choosing to notice the boundaries and where no, you're not
going to reap the benefits without doing the work. And I'm the type of person who I'm like, I want to do the work. And that's where it kind of got tricky when I was like, Okay, you're not going to come to this event, You're not going to come to that, Well, what's the problem, Because I told you the problem. We got to work on our relationship and choosing to not want to do that and not wanting to heal and wanting to just.
Has she ever done counseling? And I'm sorry, I.
Remember one time it was Yeah, I've offered over and over. I sent the therapies, I sent all of that, just trying to say, this is what we need to be because I'm willing to be transparent, but I have things that I want to talk about as a child that I feel that this is what would help our mommy daughter relationship but also the business side. But you need
to learn how to separate the two. And that's why you see a lot of kids that are suing parents because their parents didn't necessarily know how to separate that same thing. So do I feel we can get back on track? Yes? But am I in a space right now where I'm like I did all I could, knowing that I put it out there regarding Mom, this is where I'm at, this is what needs to happen for us, and let's go have someone else come in. And I think it's someone with that generation too. My mom is
seventy five. God bust the people that are at the generation prior, you know, or two generations prior, because she had me at thirty five, so there is a big age gap there. So a lot of the beliefs are like therapy, why would you do that?
Well, yeah, I noticed that with the I feel like with that age, not trying to hate on that age where not.
I do see that with even peers like they're stubborn, They're.
Hella stubborn and they're hella. What is it like defensive? It's like almost like.
Defense mechanism, Like crazy, if I can say, hey Mom, this is what I need, can we do this? What about you and I'm like, wait, I'm just having a conversation about hot.
The defensiveness is the tricky part, and I think as their child who loves them, and you're like, man, after a while, it's like I don't even want to address these things because it could set off a nuclear bomb and that's where the break ends up in the sea.
So many parents, I realize, have that sort of mindset, but in that age bracket, it's so crazy, and kids that are my age, there are so many people, like I said, because I haven't even talked about this and like even like put it out there like that only
a couple close friends know. There's so many people that I know that had to separate from their parent because of the healing that needed to be done, that the parent was either choosing to try to live their life for them and be this is how you need to live, this is how you need to do that. And it's like, at what point do you say, this is not your life. I thank you for having me, but now my life
has to be lived. I want you to support and be there for me, like I should be there for you, But why do I have to be just dictated to and when I have something to say you don't want to hear it.
Well, yeah, but I also think it creates some kind of trauma because I now talk to I'm not gonna say who it is, but they felt like, you know, they just kind of got to the point where it's like, my mom loves me, but she just doesn't like me. And I was like, because that's what happens, though, if your parent continually shuts you down, you're just like, you know what, I know this person would take a bullet
for me, but they just don't like me. And I've accepted it, so I no longer come to them with either something amazing or I don't come to them when I'm in a hard That's true because I just feel like this person that I love so much is that I know loves me but just doesn't like me. And I feel like it creates a trauma.
That creates a trauma. And I had to look back when I thought of like when you think of your first your first car, your first apartment, your force wins. I looked back and I was like, my mom hated on all those see I hate that, Like I'm just giving me even more transparent. I was proposed to and the guy went to my brother to ask him. Was like, hey, don't tell her mom. You know, I'm just coming to
you because I know her father's not here. And my mom had the nerve to literally tell me the night before, no, I'm no had I had no idea that sun And I was like, wait, First of all, my brother knew, so I me and my brother disobeyed and went to go tell moms. Moms held it for months and I was like, oh, yeah, me and my guy are going on the trip. Oh, we're going on the trip overseas or something like that. You know he's gonna propose you right, Well, what you think?
And I was like, wait, did she say like, you know he's probably no.
No, you know he's gonna you know he's gonna propose you. Yeah, he already reached out to your brother and he already asked for your head. Oh oh oh oh, oh oh oh. I'm talking about all of that. My first apartment I remember, and I'm gonna just say this too, because again we talking, we even while broke when we're talking about it. I didn't move out, so I was like third thirty really, but again it was at my place, but my mom was living with me, but I was like, it's time for us to separate and go.
Wait. Hated it when you say your mom. So it was like, was it like her place you paying the bills or you're.
No, no, no, I was thirteen, we moved. I'm on the lease at thirteen years old. I'm on the lease. You're on the lease because we move in together. But the place that we got, my friend is the one who gave it to us, like it was a it was a nice apartment complex, two bedroom, two bathroom, Like I'm on the least. The reason why I'm saying if it's my place is because if I'm seven making checks and then i'm thirteen, forteen to fifty, all the way I'm paying.
Yeah, you're paying the rent.
So it's like and I wasn't tripping, mind you. Me and my mom had a good relationship, but I started noticing the more that I started trying to be independent, the more it's like, you can't do that. Why are you doing that? You shouldn't be doing that, And I'm like, that's weird. Like getting a car is a big deal. You didn't like that getting.
Now you got the car yourself.
Yes, okay of course I got the car myself.
But then I don't know if she like set it up in a way where it felt like it was coming from her, or was it just very open, like no, it never came.
No, it never came from her. I got a car on my own. I went to a lot and was like, oh, okay, I want to go get a car. So I called my friend and was like, Hey, what are they about this car? It's like literally like this this mind you. It was already a used car, but it was still on a couple thousand miles. I'm like, this is a great steal, and I'm like, I don't know how my mom's gonna take it. I started realizing, like you started realizing early. I started having a watch things that I
was sharing. I'm like, Dan, that's not fair to me. You have to watch what I have to say.
That kind of goes back to what I'm saying where you kind of set that tone of the trauma, that the.
Tone of your trauma, so your defense mechanism is stronger than it even should be.
Your survival and that goes back also why you were so independent.
Yes, And I'm like, mantimes, it's not a good thing.
Dependent. Yeah, you're independent, came from lack.
Of Sometimes your independence comes from the mentality of I gotta do this because I have to to fight for myself and my own right to speak up if I'm a kid supposed to grow up and be happy and supported in that regard. But I'm being tugged like, no, you can't do that, No you shouldn't do this. No, no, no, And I'm like, I'm not a no person. I'm always gonna think something is going to be the grass of the greeners other side, the glass is half full, not
half empty. But someone is pulling at you. You're like, now, is it them that has a problem with what you're doing or are you just not being allowed to flow?
You can see it. You can see it. Even when you tell the story, it's like, I won't think about this car. Instead of calling your mom, You're like, I'm calling the friend. And then I'm still concerned on how she gonna take the news.
And I'm still concerned, and even at the point when I'm.
So, when you go home with the car, how does she handle it?
So here's the thing. I didn't even go home with the car, the car that she was already driving was a car that again that I got through a business dal and we had from a friend. I called her and like, oh, hey, come take a look at it. I called her to the location, had her show up. My friend is already there. She's there, and I'm like, guess what this is. I'm gonna get this car. But why we already got a car. I'm like, we have one car. We need two cars.
So if you're had a license, mom, let's I need my my.
That's just that makes control because if you have one car, you can't go without me going, yeah, you can't go unless I tell you. So. Again, it was that control factor, so kind of like being a child actor and wanting to flourish do that but someone is not letting you do that. It creates a power struggle.
Yeh.
And at some point you have to realize, Okay, if I'm giving you my first car moment, the first apartment moment, Like I moved out and my mom didn't talk to me for a whole year and I paid her rent in mind didn't.
Talk that whole year, entire year.
Yeah, that's a lot, and I'm like, I'm not supposed to be paying your.
Now is there a part of you that were hoping to like, maybe at some point she'll go, man, I have a good daughter, and I'll just you know, I'm just saying that.
At some point I was like, that should kick in. But what I did was and I said, Mom, you need to go take your chances and do this career as well, because I feel that's what you want. I feel you want to go act. So I got my mom with my agency. My mom booked a stand in role for Sisily Tyson and got her vouchers like this. So I'm thinking saying the first thing I say is like, Okay, I used to do background work. I don't want my
mom in seventy I can do that. I paid thirty four hundred for her to get her SAD card.
So you're like, yeah, but I so, I think that was an interesting plot twist right there to say maybe you want to do this too. It sounds like the daughter is the mom and the mom is the daughter.
That's what started happening, and I'm like, okay, I can take that role, but I shouldn't have to take that role. So I me giving and providing in that kind of way. I kept feeling like I was getting shut out. In so many different ways shut out by it. It's like, but you should be happy for my wins. Why is it not this support factor that I should be having from you. So let me let you do it so
you don't feel like you're missing out on something. I go do that during COVID, and then it's still like I'm not getting phone calls, you're not talking to me, you're still not trying to go to therapy. It got to the point where I was like, well, I'm not paying a phone bill no more. You're gonna have yours, gonna have mine. Period. If you're not calling texting me, we're not gonna be talking unless you call me directly on my phone line that I paid for, You're gonna
pay for your own. So I just had to start pulling away from certain things.
How did.
Anger Yeah, of course again, if someone's.
At this point it's now it's entitlement, I would imagine.
Yes, I think it's entitlement, but also like, you're supposed to take care of me, You're supposed to do this, you're supposed to do that. I'm like, I didn't know that was the role of your children is to just take care of their parent, not if their parent is not sick, not their parent is not unable to do stuff.
Now is she working at all during any of this?
My mom is like she did a job in fashion, which I remember my brother got her. She worked at a fashion designers. But we were Me and my brother were always providing for my mother. She did little things here and there, but it was never anything full time.
Because when your brother was you said, like right after eighteen he started going.
My brother was gone out of college. But my brother did well. He was in real estate. He was I mean, that's when real estate was kicking all before the crash. He had money. He'd be like, y'all run his five six hundred dollars, do it. Because we were under rent control. This was twenty five years ago. Rent was cheaper then. Yeah, so we were always in control of that. But we both always were trying to find ways for my mom to Yeah, Mom, you can't leatch you all on to
my brother. No more, you can't let youall to me. Let's get your own independent. So my mom, that's her unhealing self in her situation where she doesn't want to let go of her daught her because she's afraid of what that looks like for her and I.
Had and then me and her identity could be wrapped up in it two.
Right, one thousand percent. Everything was Porsch, Porsch Porsche. And I realized, my mom doesn't mean any harm, but she has to understand that, Mom, you have to have your own identity. Yeah. You need to walk in the room and say I'm this person, yeah, not Porsha's mom.
Yeah.
And that's where I started having to realize we do need our own identities, because I'm like, I need to have you realize this fairly early.
Too early, I think another thing that must have been tough to accept this. And I learned this very late in life. I would say, like thirty six, around that age where I was like, there's there's a I like to put people on and I no longer want to change people. I put them in their proper categories. So I'm like, if you are, I have friends that are like ride or Die, that are like happy for me
when I'm up, kill anybody when I'm down. We'll be sitting Girl will fly in, watch Pretty Women Get the Rocky Road, and We're gonna sit and watch these movies while we go through this breakup. And then when you win, they over the moon like they want the lottery. But then you have another You got another side, which is I'm down for you when you're down, but I'm not
excited when you're up. And that one, I think is the hardest one to understand, because you know this person is down for you and they would kill for you, but they just not happy when you're up. And that's one of those things where you're kind of put into the position of dimming your light to make someone else.
Come, to make someone else comfortable. And I love what you said about putting people in categories and letting people be who they are. I think the healing for me happened even not even a couple of years ago, when I realized my mother who is who she is, my brother is who he is, I am who I am. Just because you come from your parents doesn't mean that you are supposed to spend the rest of your lives under them and being best friends. And I think that is what I had to realize, is that my mom
is who she's gonna be. My mom has been this way since for seventy five years. Yeah, I can't change her. I can love her from a distance. But I can also choose my piece and knowing what I need out of this relationship is you to be mother, not the lady who wants to come to the red carpets. Not the lady that wants to come and oh look at me, Like I got tired of that because I would go places and I would hear the conversations not about my daughter.
My daughter's doing this, but guess what I used to be doing this and this is what I used to do. And guess what. You can catch me on this background show doing that and I'm like, but if you're here for me, that should be your focus and you're happy doing that for me. If I'm coming into your space, I'm not gonna sit here and make the moment about well, yeah, her show cool, but see but guess what, but guess
what this is? And then you know you got those kind of friends, like you said, that are happy for you, but that are also get away competing with you.
Yeah. I think that's one of the most painful things you can that you could actually learn because for a multitude of reasons. Yeah, but past that, I think the difficulty with being someone's child and I only know this I have a daughter I don't I have a daughter. I have a daughter. It's so new to me. It's weird because I feel me and my husband both try to do whatever what happened to us. We want to do everything in our power to not do it to her.
And what I noticed with myself and I think with other people, is like you have this like unreal amount of I just want to know my parent loves me, right, And I think when you're facing those positions of you know, are they envious, is their jealousy or are they happy for me? Or are they not? Like I know they love me clearly, they got me to where I'm at, they fall for me. That that question, how do you navigate or do you ever navigate that question of like
is this real love? Especially when they can go a long time without calling.
Yeah, I think everybody loves different. For one, let's just say, like you said, you and your husband are trying not to do maybe what your parents did to you because you want a different whether it's a different life, a different outlook. You know, you go through things and you're like, Okay, I want to prevent somebody else from doing it. And also when people do that, they can stop their kids
from really living or experiencing certain things. So my mom is that person like, wait, no, no, don't do that, because don't do that, And it's like, but I need to experience this. If I'm trying to be let's be real, Tyler Perry is a billionaire. If I want to be rich, if I want to be in rooms where I'm walking in and getting respected, I'm gonna talk to Tyler. I'm not gonna go to my mom. No, I'm not gonna
go here to the homegirl. And if you have to be around the people that you're trying to be, like, if you want to do better, you have to put yourself around people that are gonna help you get to that level. So I think she started thinking that something was disrespectful when I started saying, you can't be my plus one today because I'm gonna have my publicis coming because I need that next job. My agent's gonna come because they can talk to the producer and talk about giving me my next job.
And yeah, if you went to school and got the training or whatever, you started mastered, but.
Don't take it personally. I'm taking somebody else like you think it's a slight to you, Like I don't like you like it has nothing to do with not liking you. I need that next gig because everybody knows actors can sit here all day long and talk, oh, look at the flash yourself offline, But everybody a lot of times is check to check in this business. When it comes to that one job that hits, it may be six months and you have nothing. So you got to sustain
yourself in between that. So if I'm gonna be at premiere, if I'm at a red carpet, I need to be with somebody that can walk up to a producer and be like, hey, this is my talent Portia Coleman. You can see her on this and this and that. Let's talk. Let's talk about you getting her in your next project. Yeah, I need that. Or just my mom coming to hang out and just smile at people and there's no disrespect to her. I know what she likes, and I realized
that's what she's happy doing. But I realized that it was costing me financially by just bringing her as a guest to hang out versus somebody that could read.
You need to maximize this.
You got to maximize the time because this window can be so fast and so quick. So I think it was a.
Good business move, good business, and it's not to take personally. Nothing but speaking of good business moves, hello, let's go closer to some of the bigger, bigger, big biggest. Come on now, biggest move. Let's get close to your newest BT plus with Tyler Perry. I want to know how wind where? How did it all come about. I've had a couple people on the show that have worked with Tyler ive heard nothing but rave reviews and surprising paychecks
that lives. Hello, it's not on the thing. He likes to just surprise people with paychecks at yeah point, I know that story you're talking about too.
You do which one the one story where he surprised people with bonuses? Oh? He was s well, I know a couple of stories.
Well, I know we haven't released this one. But the guy, this particular actor had said, well, I guess by the time your episode, but he had said that, you know, he went in at a five thousand dollars pay rate.
Wow, and it.
Was like the lowest he had ever made whatever mm hmm. And then I was like, damn, he's gonna in my head, I was like, he's going to edit this out. He's definitely going to edit it out, and he didn't you know why, because his surprise was that Tyler Perry ended up giving him six figures at the end.
Come on, and I was like, dang, listen, I think for sure that shows what dedication looks like. Because I love my career so much. I've only been singing, acting, dancing since the day I was born and came out. I would do this for free because I love it. I love that I would do it for free. So to know that I can look and cut a check and be like what officer all I could do for free? To work like ten hustles is a beautiful thing. And I can honestly say I've never had a nine to five.
I've never clocked in a job. I've never done that. I sing, I act, I dance, I host, I do voiceovers, video going and I've been working a whole life. And that's again, I'm not gonna say that's a trauma response. That's just me. I learned that I love to do what I do. I don't drink, I don't smoke. I'm I'm out here. Yeah, So I love what I do. But when you cross pass with someone like a Tyler Perry.
If I can look at your story from sleeping in your car to get in your play, to getting your play financed, to get in your play on tour, to where now you have a network who gives you astronomical amounts to put our people in position to be starring on shows when twenty years ago there was not really all black lead shows. You had the Cosby's, then you started remember when UPN popped up? Do y'all really remember UPN?
That's when The Parkers was on, but you got one on one the Parkers school Boys in Outer Space, Moesha, We at one point did not have all black lead shows by other period. Right now is literally doing something incredible, Like he said to the BT was we're all sitting there watching he said, I have made more millionaires black
millionaires on TV than anybody. Because he's right. If you're gonna sit there and take a five thousand dollar check knowing that you've gotten paid more, but you're willing to come to work and bust your ass, Tyler is gonna bless you and do that. Because I remember just thinking like I've never auditioned for Tyler, I'd never been in front of him. I was like, dang, if I get that opportunity, I just hope it's it. The first time I was in front of Tyler Perry, I got it.
Tell me about it, tell me how you got this. It's I'm me a whole backstory.
It's crazy. I mean, it's fast. If anybody knows about self tapes twenty twenty COVID, everything shuts down, so nobody's really in rooms anymore. So they say, hey, here's the audition, here's a size, put yourself on tape, find a reader. Mind you got to find a reader, set your camera up, set your lighting up, and do all of this stuff by yourself in your house. Okay, So mind you. It gets overwhelming a lot of times because you got to find people that's available to do that when you got
an audition in twenty four hours self taped. Remember Clearsday, I got to shout my girl out. I love her to death. Doctor Schammel Bell very accomplished. She helped start the Black Lives Matter movement. She used to be a she said doctor. She does everything. But she was out and about in LA. I said, girl, you got a second can you come cel tape for me? And she was like, yeah, sure, whatever you need. I got the
audition for Tiffany. So if you guys watching the show, the girl Tiffany has the big curly the real name is our girl Brianna, and I auditioned for that. I put it on tape. Forty eight hours later, my agent called and was like, hey, you got a call back and I was like, oh great. They say they're gonna send us the details and I'm like, oh, mind you. I'm thinking Tyler's in Atlanta because I sell tape.
And Tyler Perry.
Yeah, okay, it clearly said. The reason why I knew is because it clearly came out as Divorced Sisters. Mind you, I'm like, bt. Plus, I watched Sisters. They're nine seasons in Divorce Sisters. I'm like, not a new franchise. Oh So I told my agent, push for this. I said, I know the casting director shout out to Kim Coleman, love you too. I called her like cousins. We have the same last name. I said, please push for this because I think I'd be great for this and this
is the role of Tiffany. Go in. Send the cell tape. Two days later, Tyler Perry's going to be at the audition nine in the morning off a sunset boulevard. I'm like, I'm waking up at six in the morning. This this is doing no, this was this was at the top of the year. Right now we're only in July. We've shot this show in March.
But I'm saying, you send in yourself.
But I'm talking about during COVID is when they don't go an audition way. So that's why when you said the process that the process wasn't seeing Tyler first. It was me putting my cameras, my lightnings up, looking at the scene and reading with my friend off camera and just sending in and hoping I get a call. Forty eight hours later, I got that call. H Tyler Perry's going to be at the space off a sunset in person, and I'm like, so mind job. I'm like, okay, I
already got my size memorized what to expect. I'm like, let's go walk in the room. There's like one hundred people in the waiting room.
I'm like, how do you feel in those moments?
And that's what actors again, you know, you walk in the room and you're like, oh, back to these days when you're seeing every girl in the room, I'm seeing guys. I'm like, I don't know who's audition for this part, but you have to tune it out.
Yeah, I'm the girl. You guys ever become buddies in those scenarios.
Oh No. When I walked in, I literally saw four girls I knew. Okay, I knew him. I was like, oh, this is the girl. I played a sister with her on a movie. I knew my homegirl from Bee Valley. I knew people in the room, but at that point, honestly, just with me, it's like, you're not friends in that moment. Yeah, because I can walk up to you, but ha's your mom? How's all this? We got a job to do. So the first thing I do is I went to sign
in make sure they knew I was there. I went out to the hallway and I literally was in the elevator because I'm like the chatter sometimes people like you talk in all the rooms. I need to be trying to focus. I'm trying to be focused. I'm like, I got an audition to be with Tyler Perry in front of a series regular. I need to be focused. So I remember being a hallway. It was like nine o'clock, nine thirty. They said, oh, portion, you're on deck, and I'm like, okay, I'm on deck.
Wait before you get into there. When you say focused, now, is that when you do? I mean I see a lot of actors do this or like the bigger ones than be like I was in that whole role during the whole taping.
No no, no, no no no, that's one by the time you get it. But I'm talking about the time when you're in the audition room. You gotta book it before you can get to set. I'm not thinking about working on set. I'm thinking Tyler Perrent.
I'm saying, when you're doing that focus, are you in yeahfter or are you just memorizing my line?
My mind? What I do and this is a hack for me, I put my ear pods in, okay, and I play music because again, if someone's in the hallway talking and right now, if I'm trying to study, to go knock out this scene where I got to mind you the scene is eight pages. Eight page is long? You got to memorize in front of Tyler Perry. I don't want to hear old girl talking about Oh my god, girl so good to see you. Guess, well, how's your I don't want to hear that air pods are in.
I'm down the hallway by the elevator, so I don't got to hear that. That's my process. So by the time they said you're on deck, I'm like, okay, I gotta come close, gotta come close. Take out the ear pods, put it in, put my purse to aside, be like, okay, go on in the room. Go on in the room. I see like five people in their cameras. Tyler's right there. I'm talking about you. He's right at the head of the table. His head is down. He's not even looking at me though, and I'm like, okay, I walk in.
His head is down, he looks up. He says, okay, you ready, all right, let's go. That was it, and I was like, okay, cool, mind you no conversation. What's your name? I'm like, okay, cool. He wanted to go right into it. We go write into it. Next thing you know, I started delivering the scene. Okay, thirty second ten he does this like stop and I'm like, oh shit, girl, exactly what I said. Oh shit. He was like, thank you,
thank you. He said that was really good, by the way, but I need to read for the role in Naomi. I was like, oh okay. He was like yeah, so they'll give you the sides outside and just come back in the room once you've taken a look at it.
I was like, okay, sure, wait a minute, so you have like less than a couple of minutes to what I.
Was like, Yes, at that point, it's cold reading because mind you, I already had the other scene for over a week. I had a chance to look at it. I knew it. They handed me some new scenes, a whole new character, and I'm like, what's her backstory? Wait? New scenes, so I'm a whole different person.
But I'm saying like, you couldn't use the scenes, that.
Know, because the scene that I auditioned for is Tiffany. Naomi was not in Jesus, I'm looking at this and this is one acting Yet when your bag kicks in, when I'm my training since seven, eight, nine, ten kicks in, you gotta look at a scene and deliver it like you are this person in this scenario right in that moment. So first thing they come out and say, as I said, who's Naomi? Who is she? Well, she's got thirty seven million dollars, she just got divorced from her ex husband.
She hates him, and now she's mad that her her lawyer homegirl, is not helping her sue him. That's all he said to me. And I was like, okay, okay. So the first scene that you see that I walk in on scene one is a scene that I auditioned that where I'm standing by the car, like, what's up? Did you look at this lawsuit? What's going on? Yeah? And I remember after all of that fifteen twenty minutes walking back in the room and he said the same thing. Okay,
you ready, Like it was no conversation, mind you. I have a great memory. So what I usually do is when I looked at it, I said, I'll be damn if I'm being in front of Tyler Perry glued to the sides. Hell no, ma'am. I said, I'm gonna look at it. I'm gonna know some calling responses, but he gonna get a lot of ad lib and just me feeling this carriage, okay, had to still respect that game. Rolled it up, and he was right to the side of me soon as it started. She's supposed to be
hot that her lawyer's out there. So I said, what's up. You talk to your lawyer, Geneva, what is going on? Tell me? No, hi the baby. She's like, the baby's right here. I'm like, I don't care, Hey, baby, what's up with my lawsuit? Like, and I'm seeing Tyler and other people in the room like locked in, but I'm tuning it out because I'm not looking at none of the side. I'm just delivering it. After it was over, Tyler was like that was amazing. He's like, yeah, wait
in the lobby said don't go anywhere. And I was like okay, And I was like and I just went for it. And I was like, holy yeah, Like that was yeah.
And what are you thinking when he's like waiting the lobby? I want to know what is your emotions?
Like, here's the thing. The reason why I'm okay with that is because by this point, it went from a hundred people in the lobby to twenty five. Okay, so the lobby was getting empty do so I'm like, Okay, he didn't ask me to come back in, so he's not mixing and matching. I'm still waiting ten people in the lobby and I'm like, Okay, that girl was auditioning for this part, but she's not here for Naomi. Who's
she here for? Next thing? I know? It's like ten of us, rob Riley, myself, Breonna Price, Me, DeVaughn, and Kadeen. He's like, everybody, come.
In, sorry for Kurt.
No, you're good, You're good. We walk in the room and he's like, this looks great. He said, this is the cast right here. This looks amazing. He said, all right, guys, well congratulations and get ready to work your ass off. We'll be doing about two three weeks in Atlanta, and get ready. Our agents and Lawy's will be in contact. And I was like, mind you. We was from nine am to like three hours at this point, I'm like, holy holy what And just like that.
Were y'all all like high five and each other hugging.
Of course because he because here's the thing and this is what Tyler said. He was like, y'all can relax now you're not auditioning no more. And we were all like, oh thank you God. We were all like standing there in a lineup, like what do we do like and Tyler was like, y'all can relax, Like y'all good, And I was like, mister Perry, You're like it was like a moment where we were all like we made the cut.
Wow.
And it was in person. So I always had oh my gosh, like the story I was never.
Had you told anyone else's story?
No good, because like telling these stories is like it helps actors understand or people that are not even actors to know the processes that we go through. And why I talked about, let's say, the traumas and stuff that happened before, because yeah, I was dealing with all kinds of stuff, but when you walk in that audition room or when you're walking in to do your job, all that has to go out the door in the window that morning stuff was going on. I was like, do
I feel okay? Like you're nervous, you're like thinking about your personal life, but then you're also thinking about what I got to go do. If I'm over here worried about what's going on with my personal life, I got to make sure my next job is landed. Which is why I said, sometimes you have to know where to place people, whether it's also your family, because your family could be just as toxic as people that aren't you got to place that in a box and still be
able to perform and do your job. Because that's what mattered when I walked in that room. I booked a job and I literally cried. Once I got into the car, I was like, Oh my god.
And who is the first person you called?
Again? It wasn't. I didn't even talk to my family. The first person I called was my aunt And the second person I called was my friend who helped me do the cel tape. Wow, and I called. And that's the thing. It's like, your friends can become your family. And I have a great family. I have a huge family. Like, don't get me wrong, I'm really close to it to several members of my family. It's just at this time
it's just my mother and my brother. I'm not because I needed the support in a different way, and the way they wanted to have me support them, it wasn't going to happen.
Well that and in that moment, you need all positive energy. And if you know your people and you put them in their proper place, you know who to call.
You know, you know what I'm saying, like, if I know I need to get hyped, if I'm going to the gym, I'm putting all my ying yang, I'm putting on some CARDI I know the vibe I want to you know what I'm saying. Yeah, anybody know me knows I will be some checking like assault, shaker, whistle while and a heartbeat because their and they get you. They get you right. But if I know I'm trying to wind down on the night where I had a long day, Baby,
I need someone, need a baker. Okay, I need some card up in the rapture, I need some Oh my god, I love her like she's one of my favorite artists ever. So I have moments and vibes that I go through. But you know where people you want to talk to, You know when a moment happens, like who do I want to call? Who do I want to be there for me? So I'm so glad that, like I said, I have amazing support systems, and I keep a small circle, and I do hope at some point my mom and
my brother and all of us can talk. But I knew that for me to do the job that I needed to do, and this is even prior to this one, I had to create the space in the distance. If I told you what I need. If it just takes going to a therapy session that's really talking out what happens, and you guys are refusing to do that, that's fine. I can't force you, but I can also remove my presence and know that my piece has to be maintained
because I need to be hurt. And being the younger the two, I was never getting hurt.
Now are you in a place? And this is something I've been kind of self discovering a little bit too. I like everyone in my circle to feel safe to advocate for themselves. Oh, I love that, you know what I'm saying, Like if we disagree, you should still feel comfortable to advocate for yourself, Like you shouldn't feel like i'mly gonna shut it down or yeah, I'm gonna shut it down, like we're gonna disagree. But and I feel like you're at that place of like I'm gonna continue to advocate for myself.
Right without question. Yeah, you have to self advocate for someone to respect you. And that's the difference I had to learn, Like, of course, if my mom is thirty five, my brother's fifty six, and here I am eighteen years younger than them. I was already the little young one of the bunch. Yeah, young siblings never get respect.
Let's be real, they I wrong. I know my little brother gets you know what I'm saying. He started advocating firm you have to and let me tell you something. I shout out to a little bit of work. It worked because we definitely know, like when he talks, we have to listen.
No don'ing's wrong is gonna let You're gonna let older siblings have that inside. But like I'm a older sibling, like you whatever when I tell you, my brother always told me that you ain't been through shit, And I'm like, okay, but I'm trying to tell you from my perspective what.
I feel and what does he also advocate for your mom to like you know, I understand her kind of it was.
It was a standpoint of like them right in the fence of like you know again, I was always the middle person. My mom is like oil and my my brother's like the water, and then when you put them together, just don't always mix it. I was always that middle person that's creating the peace between their disagreements. So the moment I started had my own voice and saying this is how I feel that. It's like, but you're not on my side. I t I hated hearing if I
would disagree about something. She said, No, you're supposed to stay with me. I'm your mother. Yeah, but that doesn't mean that I have to agree with you. That old school mindset, and I I've done so much healing on it and studying of what it is. People are fixing their own ways a lot of times, so where they can't break that the idea ideology of what they feel. So I'm not going to debate her on what she feels.
But I'm also not going to get downplayed and like, f you you don't know what you're talking about yet, But you call me for everything. You call me to take care of you. You call me because you know I know everything about the computers, I know everything about technology. But you need my help all the time. So don't act like you need my help but you don't want to listen to me.
Yeah. Now with the Bore sisters, Yes, you guys all have a very nice chemistry going. Yes, which you don't you know, you don't see that a lot in the industry. It looks like it definitely carries off camera.
Yes, let's thousand percent, we ally was out there. Like I said, three weeks. The first week, we all just bombed. We all got together, We went to bars, we went to eat, we hung out. And I already knew LaToya because we did a BT plus movie we played best friends. LaToya had already knew several of the girls, like Geneva and Latoy already knew each other, Kadeen and Breonna, like everybody had kind of somehow knew each other in a way.
So it was perfect. And when we locked in, if we're looking at the story saying we got to be friends for twenty years, we really got to come like and had little things. So even as a scene in like episode two, I think that I love with me and Brianna in the kitchen, and I'm telling it like it is, like, girl, you need to love again. When's the last time you let a nigga to be with you? Excuse me, but when's the last time you've been with
a man in a kind of way? Because you'll be here judging me because I'm stuck on my ex husband. But you ain't even had a chance to be willing to go date somebody because your trauma and she has a moment where she's like, you're right, I haven't been able to let go. And in that moment me and her, I was like, we need to have a thing. Are we gonna do this? We're gonna pump? What is gonna
be our little thing? So every one of us have a thing that we ended up doing on camera organically that we thought about to be like how wore me and you interact what we do? Me and her are both dancers, so we were always gonna do like some dance stuff like that's our connection. So the connection that you see on camera is very real. The support is there. We have a group chat. It's called Divorced and we said that like people ask, so we chat each other.
We're always like saying, girl, that scene you did was so powerful.
Now have you guys ever rallied against Tyler?
Hilarious?
Never never guess, never talked back nothing, no, no.
Like I no, because honestly, Tyler is like and you never know is when you have somebody like Tyler, you write direct produce, you thinking you gotta be every line must be perfect. When I tell you Tyler, lets you go, Tyler, let you go. Like there's one time I remember one word and I'll say this. Okay, we're just pointing. I was like, ooh, did I tear it? I said, like, because this character cusses a lot, she will say and this is this is literally in the script, so it's
like she is that expressive type of person. Will she'll say certain words, and I remember I put God in front of one of the words, so let's just say this God damn. I didn't know that that was going to be a problem because I'm like goddamn and that kind of way. He's like, no, we don't come byd God in a curse word. No. I was like, sorry, mister Perry, Okay, we'll go back and do that one line again. And that's I'm like, okay, cool. Because Tyler is a god fearing man, I'm a godfair a woman.
I was like, okay, my bad, I'm in the scene so much. I'm over saying yeah there. He's like, no, no, So we've never banned against someone that knows what he's doing. Again, if you look at.
All, then nothing set him up said it up.
I would listen. Tyler took us to his house. Baby. When I tell you, first of all, we were all having too much pun over there. It's a brunch. How about just getting to the house, sweetie? When I said, I.
Would have done it in front of him though, you know, Justler's so fun.
Tyler's a guy who'd be like, I want to hurt him. Get done so I can go drink later. Like Tyler's mad cool. But when I tell you when we all got the invite, I'm talking about the Sunday before we started working on a Monday, Tyler's like, so you're going to be getting a call about coming to my house for brunch. And we were like, you're kidding. Right When I tell you, they sent personal cars to come pick us up. The ride from his gate to get to his house was like four miles.
No way.
How big was the house?
Was that dcastle?
Okay? This is the best O times ten. The best way I could say it is there's a scene in one of my favorite movies, john Wick, one of the last John Wick movies, when they have this big fight on the staircase. When they're fighting. The house that you see in john Wick literally looks like the house that we were at with Tyler. It's it's not even it's it looks like a stage It's like, what is this freak out helicopter plane?
It's helicopter plane and plane.
He has a plane?
Yo, just shout up. I'm gonna tell you this. I'm gonna speak this into existence. Eating while broke will do a Tyler Perry MTV Cribs version of eating while broo. Wouldn't it be fun to go into his mansion with his planes.
And somebody see it. I'm just saying he has a plane. To know that you can chart a plane just to go eat with your friends, because I know other friends that really don't.
See a plane like a helicopter plane or like a treaty, like a plane that's sitting.
United Airlines Southwest. That's a plane.
Get the freak out? Did you at least did you at least say hey, can I go check it out?
God? No, that's that's doing too much, you know, eating while broke. I would have been like, let me get you a plane ride to first day before filming? Oh yeah, yeah, to get fired before first day. I'm not trying to be too personal like that, but the fact that he has a plane in his house again, I'm thinking of what was he eating while he was broke? Because he was sleeping in his car.
Yeah, he went before he.
Even had a chance to have these plays. And again an opportunity where he's giving us money to come to set, which his studio is like nothing you've ever seen either.
Yeah, I heard it.
It's incredible. It's incredible. Just so, just so you know, he has an exit off the freeway. Why are you driving in Atlanta, it says Tyler Perry Studios. That's the exit you get off.
As like, so, when you're working with him, do you feel extremely motivated that the sky's the limit now after experiencing all.
That, absolutely, so you okay, And just so people know, we shot sixteen episodes in eight days.
Yeah, I heard, I heard a shoot schedule.
I heard.
I've heard a lot. Let me tell you something. People I've been saying, like they shoot in a week or two weeks or under two weeks.
That's real. It was supposed to be ten days and we ended up losing a day because of one location issue, and then the other day we finished the day early. We shot eight days, sixteen whole episodes. Imagine how many paid a day you had to do.
And you guys got paid a lot too.
I mean you get paid well, yeah, very well. But at the end of the day, it's like, even if you didn't get paid for three weeks of your time, yeah, that's all I know to do other things. No, let me be real, it was great. What I'm saying is that how quick it is to make what you make in those three weeks with Tyler Perry, someone would have to work a whole year. Oh wow, yeah, yeah, more well more than that.
That.
The the salary and the minimum wage is is what it is. You would have to be working several years to get what you can get in three weeks from him, because he expects you to come prepared. He expects you to do the work.
Obviously, you're not late.
No one's late, girl, Tyler Perris never late. That's one thing.
Anyone late to say.
Ever, yeah what somebody was sick one of the days, But again that's that's that's sick. But no, I mean, stuff happens by the end of the day. Tyler's such a professional. He's like, we're gonna move this scene to the end of the day. We're gonna move this scene over here. He's not gonna lose no time. I like, he's not gonna lose no time.
I like him, so we got to close this interview out. I have so much fun with you. I love that you opened up the way he did. I feel like we're sisters.
I love it.
Thank you, Thank you for feeding me. Come on, you know I'm gonna finish.
Just lasting bits that we're gonna put our bite together, all right, Let's put together, all right? Why tuning in Eating all Broke?
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