That's the biggest thing: be kind and be original.
— Lil Rel Howery
I used to watch 'Last Comic Standing' with my mom before she passed. So when I got that red envelope, I was extremely emotional.
I think Eddie Murphy is the greatest comedian. I do think that Richard Pryor is the Godfather, but Eddie Murphy, in my opinion, has every comedic category in his arsenal. He can roast you. He can freestyle. He can host. He was LeBron James before we even saw LeBron James.
I'm just saying, and I'm going to say it enough times: I want to play Bernie Mac.
I'm all for making a woman-empowering song. I get that, and I think that's dope. I've got a daughter, and I think that's amazing. But when you're specifically picking on guys, that's when it's not right. 'No Scrubs' is the meanest, dumbest song ever made because they need to be specific in certain areas.
I want to do more films - not just comedies, because I really want to show my range.
Let me tell you, there's nothing like pulling up to Fox Studios bumping Jeezy in your Mercedes.
I was a huge Wu-Tang fan, along with Crucial Conflict, along with Do or Die along with Mobb Deep.
The honesty of my material and my being vulnerable was from Richard Pryor. He doesn't mind talking about his life, which is why I think he was one of the dopest to ever do it.
There's a difference between delivering real funny and just silly funny.
I can't wait for the rest of my career to meet these young writers and filmmakers so that I can produce and push a lot of their stories out there.
The biggest thing is we need to stop acting like racism don't exist.
What has kept me focused were my kids. My biggest focus is just making sure I'm good to my babies.
I'm a student of Comedy Central. It launched careers: Wanda Sykes and even Kevin Hart. The first time I was introduced to him, he was on Comedy Central. It puts you on the map... Hollywood knows now.
My kids are really dope. I was just at home in Chicago, and my daughter Brittany was interviewing me. It was like I was on 'Oprah.'
Chicago made me. They can treat me however they want to treat me anywhere else in the country. When I go back home, they treat me like I'm a star.
'No Scrubs' is a mean song for a lot of reasons. If you're 18, 19-year-old guy, or even 17, your friend just got a license. You don't have a real job yet. It's like that song asks you to be an adult way faster than you should.
Some of the scariest movies I've seen are not considered horror movies, like 'Gone Girl.' That movie scared me. I can't watch it again.
I know I'm being biased about Chicago, but I think Chicago got the most talented people in the world.
Not everybody gonna be in front of the camera forever, man. That's impossible. Don't get me wrong, I love doing that. But behind the scenes and the power is what I like. I like being in control. And maybe someday I'd be a showrunner.
I love acting. I was one of those dudes that was always in the plays in the church and at school.
I'm not gonna go steal an airport car and go save someone. That's crazy. But I will do almost anything for any of my friends.
You have these kids trying to make these grown up decisions because nobody is talking to them. We're talking at them, but we're not listening to them.
Not saying that we are realer than most people, but because Chi is so segregated, first of all, we have to be diverse comedians and be able to make a lot of different people laugh. And Chicago comics, we're OK with who we are in our truth. That stems from Bernie Mac and a lot of other greats who came before me.
My comedy grows as I grow as a person.
I think when we grow up watching TV, the stars seem like stars. You don't know what they went through. You don't know how they got it. It almost seems unattainable. With social media, we are able to show people if you work hard, that you can literally do the same thing.
My friends were the class clowns, but I was the one in class doing Michael Jordan or teachers for no reason. I've always been amazing at impersonating real people, too, rather than celebrities.
I thought I would hate New York, but I love New York. I almost hate to say that being from Chicago.
When I started comedy, I was a big Eddie Murphy fan. I thought if you did stand-up, you were supposed to know how to act, write, and host. I thought it was all one thing. That's why it doesn't feel like I'm transitioning to acting: because in my stand-up, I do characters all the time.
I'm a hip-hop head, but hip-hop actually introduced me to other genres of music because I started to wonder where a lot of these samples came from. So I fell in love with Bobby Womack or Willie Hutch because I wanted to know where those samples came from.
Directing is so dope to me, man, 'cause it doesn't necessarily have to be your material. You're making someone else's material come to life. There's something amazing about that.
Everybody makes a decision about where they want their career to go. If I really want something, I put a lot of effort into it. If I don't want something, I won't.
My respect for TSA agents went up a notch. We look at 'em like, 'You can't bother me, I'm gettin' on my flight. Stop wastin' my time.' They're doing it to protect us. Their job is to do everything they're doing. We sometimes don't respect other people's jobs because we're caught up in our world.
So people thought once Obama got into office that racism was over with. But, what we ended up learning was that it just came more into the light.
