CraveOnline: Do you think it was a bad call for Andre to walk on ahead and meet you later?
J.B. Smoove: No. It is in some sense. It is because I trusted him to actually stay on his course. But, even if he slips up, I have to be there and say, “You need someone.” If somebody you did not know said to you, “What’d I tell you? I told you this would happen.” You would say, “You’re fired. Don’t tell me what to do.” But someone who cares about you and they say, “What’d I tell you? These streets are rough. I told you this would happen.” Then there’s not that sting on it. There’s that, “Damn, I messed up.” Deep down they’re happy that you were there and not somebody else to pick them up and get them back on their feet. They’re really happy that you showed up.
Would Chris play that Kanye West/Jay-Z song “N*ggas in Paris” on the set?
Mm-hmm. You gotta play that song on set, man. Know why? Not just because they’re producers on the show. It’s hype. It’s hype. It has a certain tone to it. It has a flavor to it. It’s going to set the tone for this movie. Sometimes there’s a soundtrack to the world. Sometimes it plays in your head and sometimes it plays out loud, but there’s always some music, there’s always something in your ear trying to set the tone for where the world is in this moment, where you are as a person, as an entertainer.
Every comic in their head, they have a song that they would come on stage to because whether it’s playing out loud or it’s playing in their head, that’s their pace. That’s the pace car. They walk on stage with a certain rhythm. It’s built into you already. So whether you’re playing that song out loud or you’re playing it in your head, it’s your pace. It’s a moment.
“Every comic in their head, they have a song that they would come on stage to…”
You see the trailer on TV, I can’t stop singing that song because you move your shoulders a little bit and you feel the energy of this movie, this movie has a portal with the universe, man. The timing is perfect. The timing is great, even coming from the Toronto Film Festival and this movie getting bought a few months ago to all the screenings, through all these different things that this movie has kicked. Chris is on this amazing journey of being a writer, director, starring in this movie. I think it’s his best movie yet. It’s his best movie yet that he has a direct hand in. Then you have everybody who was in the movie who’s on their own journey. It’s like an intersection of all these journeys and great things are happening to everybody in this movie.
Tracy Morgan is in this movie. He was in a terrible accident but Tracy is so great in this movie, people are going to smile because they see Tracy doing well in the movie. Leslie Jones just got added to the cast of “SNL.” Michael Che is doing Update on “SNL.” Cedric the Entertainer is doing amazing things. Sherri Shepherd’s on Broadway. I’m on my journey. I’m doing some great things. Everybody in this movie is doing amazing, amazing things, all at the same time. Rosario’s in tons of movies. She’s getting calls left and right. She’s a leader. Everybody in this movie is doing their own independent journey and they’re all doing great things.
Now we can take all these great things that everybody else is doing and you attach it to another great project that Chris is doing so all these journeys intersect somehow. Now they’re all part of the same journey, and that’s to put a great film on the screen for the audience to enjoy.
That song though, I haven’t gotten it out of my head since I saw the movie last week. That shit cray.
It’s impossible to. It’s impossible to get that song. You will mumble that song to yourself. It’ll be a situation where something is crazy. You go, “That shit cray.” You can’t help but say it.
Fred Topel is a staff writer at CraveOnline and the man behind Best Episode Ever. Follow him on Twitter at @FredTopel.
