Source: Prince Williams / Getty
Yesterday, writer, director, producer and studio owner, Tyler Perry, shared a video that generated quite a bit of conversation across the Black folk on the internet. It was a video of all the scripts he’d written for television shows that eventually made it to air in 2019. As he scans over the stacks of scripts, Perry narrates the video.
“So, I don’t know if you know this but all shows on television have a writer’s room. Most of the time, they’re 10 people, 12, whatever that write on these television shows. Well, I have no writer’s room. Nobody writes any of my work. I write it all. Why am I telling this? I wrote all of these scripts by myself in 2019. What’s my point? Work ethic!”
No doubt, Tyler Perry’s work ethic is to be commended. He’s that dude and his decades in the industry prove that the consistency of his work and dedication to the vision has paid off one hundred, one thousandfold. The Black community can be overly critical about a lot of things, but so few people had anything negative to say about him opening a studio. It was a power move above reproach.
But this admission wasn’t so well-received.
In fact, it went completely left on social media, on Twitter in particular. People argued that if Tyler Perry had someone to bounce his additional ideas off, there’s a strong likelihood that the content he produces would be so much better. It’s no secret that Perry’s work has been criticized for being one-dimensional, cliche and not fully conceptualized.
Furthermore, Tyler Perry has confidently marketed himself as someone who believes in giving opportunities to other creatives of color. Hiring writers, he could extend his reach and impact beyond actors and crew members.
And Tyler Perry did have a writer’s room in the past. But those people were fired. According to Deadline, in 2008, Perry settled reached a settlement with the Writers Guild Association after his writers for TBS sitcom “House of Payne” complained of unfair labor practices. Perry was accused of firing half of his staff when they began unionizing.
Essentially, folks thought that the situations that caused an empty writer’s room are not ideal.
See what they had to say about it on the following pages.
