August112008

Bernie Mac Didn’t Fear Dying (On Stage)

I’ve posted this clip before, but reading up on Bernie Mac this weekend gave me a little bit more context for it. In the clip, Bernie Mac’s first words to the New York crowd are “I ain’t scared of you muthafuckas.” And he sprinkles it pretty liberally throughout his performance, the repetition destroying the audience each time. I always assumed that was just part of the confidence that Mac owned throughout his career.

But it wasn’t. As Bernie Mac describes in the book “Black Comedians on Black Comedy”:

“The reason I said that was because the comic before me got booed of the stage. The audience, all the other comics, assistant directors, grips – everybody back stage was laughing. And I was up next. Martin Lawrence tried to calm the audience down but they didn’t so when I went out there ‘I ain’t scared of you…’ just came out.”

I was always impressed by Mac’s control of the crowd in this clip, but reading that he was tasked with turning the tide of a room that was looking for more blood makes me miss the man even more. Imagine the tension in the room at the beginning when you watch this, and you’ll probably feel the same.

Posted by Todd Jackson at 01:25 PM | Send to Friend
Share:

Digg |

del.icio.us |

Stumble It!

Comments

1 Posted by NYC on 08/11 at 04:25 PM

That is a great clip.

2 Posted by kreisler on 08/11 at 06:43 PM

Hey Todd,
Last night here in Edinburgh at a show called “honorable men of art” - Daniel Kitson, Andy Zaltzman, David O’Dougherty, and Alan Couchraine (if you people haven’t heard of ‘em, look ‘em up - Kitson played that clip and introduced it - without irony - as the greatest 6 minutes of comedy ever.

Gotta say, although the lilly white european audience didn’t agree, I did. Having seen it before and known the circumstances…

Apparently, as the legend grows, he talked to the DJ just before the set and arranged that whole “kick it!” thing, too.

So, basically, in the 5 minutes before his first Def Jam set, he writes a whole new thing just to deal with a murderous crowd… and he kills.

RIP

3 Posted by Rebecca on 08/11 at 08:42 PM

No one gives it to a crowd like that any more. What an amazing stage presence—smart but playful; sexy and in control. (The last two, of course, going naturally together).

And yes the back story only makes it feel more powerful.

Great. Now I’m crying. Thanks.

4 Posted by JackSzwergold on 08/11 at 11:54 PM

Truly sad. And kreisler is right. The world of indie comedy nowadays is just painfully polarized and painfully white as a result. And you know what? The folks who know talent and who know what’s good, knows Bernie Mac was great. And past that, for years I used “The Bernie Mac Show” as my own personal litmus test of who has taste; sadly it works more than you’d believe.

Enough of that. Sad, talented and genius comedian. Summer of 2008 has said goodbye to the greats.