Tyler Perry Says ‘Most Difficult Part’ of His Success ‘Wasn’t Battling Hollywood, It Was Black People’

Tyler Perry’s incredible journey from childhood abuse and poverty to billionaire entertainment mogul is brought to life by those closest to him in the new documentary Maxine’s Baby: The Tyler Perry Story.

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While the documentary functions mostly as a celebration of Perry’s talents and remarkable self-made success in an often hostile industry, Maxine’s Baby doesn’t totally shy away from the criticism Perry has received — not only from Hollywood but also from corners of the Black community. The latter has stung the most.

“I think the most difficult part in all of the success wasn’t battling Hollywood; it was Black people,” Perry says in the doc. “There’s a certain class of Black people who look down on all things Tyler Perry.”

That class has included scholars like Donald Bogle, journalists like Jamilah Lemieux and industry colleagues like Spike Lee, who famously decried Perry’s work as “coonery buffoonery.” In an open letter to National Public Radio, Lemieux said Perry’s work has been “marked by old stereotypes of buffoonish, emasculated Black men and crass, sassy Black women.” Of Perry’s famous Madea character, who helped form the foundation of his success, she added, “Through her, the country has laughed at one of the most important members of the Black community: Mother Dear, the beloved matriarch. … Our mothers and grandmothers deserve much more than that.”

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Perry has responded to this backlash before, including telling Lee to “go to hell,” but he reflects more deeply on the criticism in the documentary. “When I started to look at the history of what we’ve done to each other as Black people, others who are successful, it’s pretty interesting to see,” he says. “Amos and Andy was the first African Americans on television, and it was the NAACP who boycotted; the first television boycott ever. So the show was yanked off the air in 1953, and there was not another Black cast on television until the late 1960s.”

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“It’s definitely more hurtful when it comes from your own community,” adds Tyler Perry Studios VP Andy Norman. “But his own community, at the same time, is the one who has got him to where he is now. {snip}”

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