Todd Williamson
Tyler Perry is dishing on his new legal thriller “Duplicity.”
“Extra’s” Mona Kosar Abdi sat down with Tyler, who is always an outspoken advocate on real-life issues.
Perry recently called out the music industry at Angie Stone’s funeral. He stressed, “I’m tired of seeing people in this industry, especially Black people mistreated, misused, not paid. I’m tired of paying for funerals for people because they don’t have the money to pay for the funeral.”
He went on, “I’m tired of seeing 60-, 70-, 80-year-old women out onstage performing and they’ve been in a business with all these number one hits, and I had one that said to me, ‘Well, one day I’ll be a millionaire,’ and had been in the business all of those years. It’s heartbreaking for me. That’s why I took care of Cicely Tyson the last 15 years of her life. I’m an empath and I cannot stand to see people mistreated, misused, abused, when it’s so easy to just do the right thing. Do the right thing, it’s easy. There’s a contract that says you’re supposed to do this, this and this.”
He added, “There’s a line in ‘Six Triple Eight’ that speaks to what all of that means to me: ‘For once, let’s just have an even playing field with no tricks.’ That’s what I’m hoping will happen. So, when you see me helping, that’s what I’m trying to do.”
With “Tyler Perry’s Duplicity,” Perry is tackling themes of police brutality.
When asked if there were any reservations about making the movie about such a heavy topic, Tyler said he’s used to making waves. He noted, “I will be trending, misunderstood, horrible, terrible — it happens with everything. They all go to number one. This what my audience loves. They all go to number one. It is what it is.”
In the film, a high-powered attorney, played by Kat Graham, faces her most personal case yet when she’s tasked with uncovering the truth behind the shooting of her best friend’s husband.
Tyler said of Kat’s character, “I think she’s more of like most of us in America, like, we get angry about it, but she’s also very much someone who not only got angry, but also someone who wanted to get to the truth. Because there’s a difference, you can get angry and never want to hear the truth, just hear one side, but she wanted to get to the truth. So I think seeing it through her eyes, you’re looking at the way that most people, reasonable people, see it in the world.”
As for the message of the movie, Perry wants people to “look a little deeper at everything you read and see.” He emphasized, “I’m tired of people hijacking these messages, these important messages, these important moments, and turning them into something nefarious that they can use for themselves, for both sides.”
Opening up on the inspiration behind the movie, Tyler shared, “I loved all those stupid silly twist and turns of what’s going to happen next and my mother was a big soap opera fan, so I got a lot of that stuff in in this movie.”
Tyler also reflected on how he’s built a relationship with his audience over his decades in the industry.
He commented, “This is 30 years of building this rapport live onstage with them, back and forth, telling these kind of stories, hearing the oohs and aahs when I throw in some crazy twist onstage.”
He went on, “Knowing that and understanding that and also understanding that people just want escapism… When you have a life that the world, all this madness is going on, you just want to watch something that just takes your mind off of it, and that’s why true crime is such a huge genre.”
In terms of what motivates him to keep creating, he shared that it’s about giving opportunities to others now.
“It’s a reason to keep going at this point,” he shared, “To be 55 years old, have done it all, and, you know, asked if there’s anything on my bucket list. Like, no. I’ve done everything I wanted to do. So, to be at this point in my life and just be still going this hard, it’s got to be about everybody else, making sure they get opportunities and chances.”
“Tyler Perry’s Duplicity” premieres March 20 on Prime Video.