Prompt #37

Tyler Perry has earned notoriety in multiple countries around the world and accumulated vast millions of dollars with his depictions of himself dressed as an overweight mad black woman. While I have never actually seen one of his plays or movies in their entirety I have been subjected to the advertisements and reviews of his brand of entertainment. The shows center around the Black Family genre of PG rated entertainment and are enjoyed by large audiences compromised chiefly of black children and black mothers. This dempgraphic claims to find Tyler Perry and his brand of genius just that; genius. To these audiences nothing is more family entertaining than a 6ft 2in man stuffed into a fat suit and then clothed and made up to appear to be a woman. In the original show that started this craze Tyler played the part as a Mad Black Woman. He has since expanded his repetorie to include a Nice Black Woman as well.

Many others, myself included, Find Tyler Perry and his Christianity based family comedy to be quite frankly ludicrous. Even forgetting the fact that the idea is unoriginal as it was already pulled off by Martin Lawrence in Big Mammas House before Tyler Perry hit the scene. Watching Martin Lawrence bounce around in a fat black woman suit with Paul Giamitti playing the supporting role was slightly humorous because there was no underlying argument for Christianity. When Perry tries the same gag later but is adamant about including those cute little christianityisms in his stories what comes out is not entertaining, it is in a word offensive.