What is Tyler Perry’s connection to Memphis?
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Today’s column was inspired by a recent celebrity visit:
What is Tyler Perry’s connection to Memphis?
“Madea Rocks Beale.”
“Madea Goes to Graceland.”
“Madea in Germantown.”
“Grizz Granny Madea.”
I’d go see those movies. Unfortunately, tireless multi-hyphenate auteur Tyler Perry has yet to set one of his popular comedies-witha-message in the Bluff City.
However, 54-year-old the writer-director did shoot a few scenes here last week, on Jan. 23, for his upcoming Netflix movie “Joe’s College Road Trip,” in which Perry plays a foxy grandpa who accompanies his campus-bound grandson (Jermaine Harris) on a crosscountry trek.
Perry — topped with a snow-white Afro-style wig — and his traveling crew filmed on Beale Street and outside the National Civil Rights Museum; other locations on this “road trip” include New Mexico, Atlanta and Clarksdale, Mississippi.
If Perry never made a movie here, he nonetheless made an impression on Memphis, one of the cities that boosted him to stardom with its loyal support of the stage productions that made his career, before he made the leap to the screen.
How much does Perry appreciate Memphis?
“Memphis has been better to me than it’s been to Elvis,” Perry joked (or half-joked) in 2016, when he was the speaker during the “Coaches Luncheon” during annual the Southern Heritage Classic.
Four years earlier, just a few blocks west of where Perry shot his “College Trip” movie scenes, a star bearing the actor’s name was unveiled on the “Sidewalk of Stars” outside the Orpheum theater, adding Perry to a constellation that includes such luminaries as Louis Armstrong, Cary Grant, Mae West, Eddie Murphy, Bob Dylan and Houdini.
Perry attended the ceremony. “What people don’t know in Hollywood is that you guys have been with me from the beginning,” he told the crowd. “When nobody would give me a chance or even knew my name, it’s people like you who put me in this situation.
“Please continue to pray for me,” he added. “I’ll pray for you as we travel the country doing what I love to do best, and that’s encourage, uplift, and inspire people.”
Perry’s “Coaches Luncheon” talk was testimony to his longtime friendship and professional association with local promoter Fred Jones, president of Summitt Management Corp. and founder of the Southern Heritage Classic, which since 1990 has brought fans and alumni of historically Black colleges to Memphis for a football game and associated concerts and events.
Working with Perry’s manager, Arthur Primas of Dallas, Jones essentially launched Perry’s association with the Bluff City when he brought Perry’s first touring stage show, “I Know I’ve Been Changed,” to the Orpheum in 1999, seven years after its debut in Atlanta, where Perry is based.
Described as a “contemporary gospel musical,” the play was the first of many that Jones brought to the Orpheum, renting out the theater for Friday-through-sunday performances. Seven months after that first play, Perry donned old-lady drag and introduced Memphis to his signature comedy creation, the gun-toting straight-talking grandma, Madea, when “I Can Do Bad All By Myself ” played the Orpheum.
With or without Madea, Perry proved unstoppable. “Diary of a Mad Black Woman” arrived in 2001. “Madea’s Family Reunion” arrived in 2002. “Madea Goes to Jail” and “Meet the Browns” were in 2005. “What’s Done in the Dark” hit town in 2007. “The Marriage
Counselor” was in 2008. “Hell Hath No Fury Like a Woman Scorned” opened in 2014. “Madea On the Run” was in 2015. And so on.
As Perry’s fame grew, so did his stage. In 2019, Perry left the Orpheum behind, and “Madea’s Farewell Play Tour” played Fedexforum.
Meanwhile, Perry extended his entertainment empire and made Madea a household name with a spate of television series and especially movies, starting with the screen adaptation of “Diary of a Mad Black Woman” in 2005 and continuing with “Madea’s Destination Wedding,” the 13th in the series, to be finished this year in Atlanta.
In 2002, Perry explained this formula mix of melodrama (domestic abuse, drug addiction, infidelity), gospel uplift and comedy to The Commercial Appeal. “You’ve got to know the Black audience,” he said. “It’s like baking a cake. You have to have the right mix. I’m going to hit you with this much seriousness right here. So take the message. But then I’m going to come back and kill you with laughter... The way it works is wonderful.”
Perry’s adaptability has been a key to his success. He first found recognition on the road, traveling the oldschool circuit of “Black” cities; then he moved into cinemas and onto network television; and now, his new movies debut on the streaming platform, Netflix.
Jones said the “new toys” of Netflix and Facebook and so on that push Perry’s products today are no more effective than the methods of the past. He said he originally promoted Perry’s plays in newspapers and on radio, but it was word-of-mouth enthusiasm that brought the crowds.
“Memphis was always really good for Tyler,” said Jones, 76. “Every time he started a tour, it would start in Memphis or maybe New Orleans or somewhere in the South. He always made a connection with his audience. It was organic.
“That was the beauty of Tyler Perry. People gravitated to him from the beginning. You know that old saying, ‘Love at first sight’? It was a love affair between Tyler Perry and Memphis. When he gets in front of a camera or on stage, he lights it up.”