Tracy Morgan: 20Q

Q1

PLAYBOY: In your new memoir, I Am the New Black, you describe your childhood as being filled with poverty and violence. Was it really as horrible as it sounds?
MORGAN: When you grow up black in Brooklyn, in the ghetto, you see a lot of shit fast. I saw my first murder when I was six or seven years old. His body was laying out there all night, brains splattered on the sidewalk. People just fucking stood around looking at it. Motherfucker was dead, and everybody in the neighborhood knew who did it, but nobody said shit—because you could be next.

Q2

PLAYBOY: You write in the book that your sense of humor was a bulletproof vest. How did being funny keep you out of harm’s way?
MORGAN: Kids in the schoolyard could be cruel. A lot of them were sociopaths. If you had a big brother, you could go get him and he could come out and fuck ’em up. But I couldn’t do that because my older brother had cerebral palsy, so I had to develop a sense of humor, make motherfuckers laugh to keep ’em off my ass. That will protect you, but you gotta make it worthwhile for them.

Q3

PLAYBOY: You also suggest that you briefly sold drugs. Is it wrong to imagine you as the funniest drug dealer ever?
MORGAN: I was, man. As a matter of fact, my dealing partner—my best friend, God bless him—was murdered a month to the day after my son was born. We used to chop that crack, bag that shit up at three o’clock in the morning, and I’d make that motherfucker laugh. And he was like, “Yo, Tray, why the fuck you doin’ this, man? You should be at the fucking Apollo or something.” I’d tell him “Shut the fuck up.” He got killed, and I went into comedy. He’s guiding me right now. He’s probably sitting here next to us, him and my father and my grandmother. All of them are with me every day, every second of the day, leading me in the right direction.

Q4

PLAYBOY: I Am the New Black details some painful memories from your life. Was there anything you were reluctant to share?
MORGAN: I was a little worried talking about my father’s death. That cuts deep. He got AIDS, and he went from about 200 pounds all the way down to maybe 90 pounds. He didn’t even look like my father anymore; he looked like a skeleton. When I was in the 12th grade I came home from football practice one day, and he was sitting outside our building. I said, “Dad, what you doin’ out here?” He looked so fragile, no teeth in his mouth, and he said, “I had to get out of the house, get some sun.” I picked him up, took him upstairs in my arms. We got to the door, and he started crying, blood coming out of his eyes. I said, “Dad, what you crying for?” And he said, “I remember when I carried you up here when you was a baby.” Two, three weeks later, he was dead.

Q5

PLAYBOY: You play a character on 30 Rock named Tracy Jordan who is more than loosely based on you. When Tina Fey pitched the show to you, did you ever wonder, Wait, is she making fun of me?
MORGAN: Tina is my baby girl. She’s my sister from another mother of a different color. I’d do 25 to life for her. She is down like four flat tires. She pitched the show to me like, “Yo, this is your personality. It’s your alter ego.” She always says, “Keep the cameras rolling and let Tracy do what he do.” I love that about her.

Q6

PLAYBOY: Where does Tracy Morgan end and Tracy Jordan begin?
MORGAN: Tracy Jordan is a part of Tracy Morgan, but Tracy Morgan is not a part of Tracy Jordan. Tracy Jordan is a figment of my imagination. He’s a character I do when I go to work. When I’m not at work, Tracy Morgan is much more interesting and far-out than Tracy Jordan could ever be.

Q7

PLAYBOY: You’ve repeatedly insisted that Tracy Jordan isn’t based on Martin Lawrence, yet there are some glaring similarities. Are you sure there isn’t a little of Martin Lawrence in that character?
MORGAN: Martin Lawrence didn’t corner the market on doing crazy shit. You got Dave Chappelle, you got me, you got all kinds of crazy motherfuckers out there. Everybody does something bizarre in his or her life. It’s just that black entertainers stick out. When we do something crazy, they go, “Oh shit!” Mike Tyson ain’t the first motherfucker to put a tattoo on his face.

Q8

PLAYBOY: So when Tracy Jordan stripped down to his underwear on an episode of 30 Rock and ran through traffic, that was pure imagination?
MORGAN: That was based on my uncle Fat Mike. He ran down the street in his underwear with a lightsaber—several times. He was way crazy. He was Tracy Jordan to the fifth power.

Q9

PLAYBOY: Last year you told David Letterman that your hobbies include “doing karate and trying to get females pregnant.” Now that you’re older and wiser, have your hobbies changed?
MORGAN: I’ve got my third-degree black belt and I’ve gotten several women pregnant, so I’ve moved on to other things. These days I’m into bike riding and breaking water. I like breaking women’s water. If you’re pregnant and you need your water broken, you need your labor induced, give me a call and I’ll ride my bike over and take care of it.

Q10

PLAYBOY: You claim you had your first sexual experience when you were eight years old. How is that even possible?
MORGAN: I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t say I was effective. I didn’t knock the bottom out of the pussy or nothing. She was 14, babysitting me and my brother. She was in the tub, and she told us, “Come do it to me.” So we did it to her. I didn’t start getting busy for real until around 15, maybe less than that. There was one time when I was maybe 19 years old, I was selling crack, and I gave this girl five or six cracks for some pussy. She had a fat ass, I mean a fucking bubble-butt Kim Kardashian to the third power ass. But she looked like a mule had kicked in her face, so I made her put a brown paper bag over her head. I cut out holes for the eyes and a smile and put a cigarette in the mouth hole. It was like fucking the Unknown Comic.

Photo: Matthias Clamer, StocklandMartel.com