The real villain here is the African American community who flood the box office every time Mr. Perry releases his buffoonery. Unlike Stepin Fetchit, Amos and Andy and JJ from Good Times, which were Hollywood creations that made a mockery of Black people for the entertainment of white people, Tyler Perry was not on the Hollywood radar. He built an economic infrastructure based on the success of the "chittlin circuit"plays in which he starred as Mudea. As late as last year many non-African Americans had not even heard of Tyler Perry. While we are hating, yes hating, on Tyler Perry's choices we need to recognize that WE made him and others like him and WE perpetuate the ignorance and defamation that he purveys by our patronage. Even in his catalog of films his most successful are those that have Madea and those around "her" acting a fool, so we are just as much to blame. Until we actually go see the minuscule amount of few and far between movies that feature images of us that we can be proud of in droves like Akeela and the Bee, Rosewood, Malcom X, Finding Forester to name a few and even Tyler's Daddy's Little Girls then we will continue to see buffoonery perpetuated unchecked and not just by Tyler Perry's hands. If we continue to support garbage in overwhelming numbers why would any business person (studio/distributor/exhibitor) believe that we truly want to see anything else in large numbers?
I will actually give some of the aforementioned "buffoons" like Stepin Fetchet who's real name is Lincoln Theodore Monroe Andrew Perry (no relation to Tyler...I think) a slight pass because as "Negroes" in the 1930's they did not have many options available to them in life PERIOD - let alone an opportunity to make that kind of money. I'll even give Tyler a pass for the material he did early in his career to get it off the ground and build an infrastructure for his "empire" but he does not have to do that type of material anymore. I hear people ask, "do all images of Black people on the screen have to be positive?" No, all images of African Americans or people of the African diaspora in media do not have to be positive. We need antagonists also. But a character can be stupid without being a buffoon; they can be a villain without being a thug; and a slut without being a neck rolling "around the way girl". This is art and it is very subjective but, as funny as it may be, we know buffoonery when we see it. Mr. Perry may not have the sophistication to recognize the difference but I doubt that. One does not need to be a genius to see it even my 12 year old described his genre of filmmaking as "ghetto gospel"
The films that Tyler does that have comedic elements without the buffoonery have not done as well comparatively but they are profitable so unlike Stepin Fetchit he doesn't "have" to do buffoonery to make a dollar, or even millions, anymore (does one ever?). By the same token WE don't have to patronize buffoonery and allow it to be the crown jewel in our body of work that overshadows the brilliant work that is being done by other African Diasporic artists as producers, directors, writers, and performers. You can hate on Tyler Perry all you like but Tyler will continue to make the garbage he makes until we stop feeding the monster WE created.
