Tracy Morgan

30 ROCK'S MOST OUTRAGEOUS

STAR GETS SERIOUS ABOUT HIS

PAINFUL CHILDHOOD AND HIS

DRUG-DEALING PAST...THEN GETS

FUNNY ABOUT ANAL SEX AND

BREAKING PREGNANT WOMEN'S

WATER (HONEST)

PnAYBOY: In your new memoir, / Am the New Black, you describe your childhood as being filled with poverty and violence. Was it really as horrible as it sounds?

MpRGAIV 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 or 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.

PLAYBOV 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

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.

PLAYBOY: You also suggest that you briefly sold drugs. Is it wrong (continued on page 117)

MORGAN

(continued from page 63) to imagine you as the funniest drug dealer ever?

morc;aN: 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.

PI-AVBOV: / Am the New Black details some painful memories from your life. Was there anything you were reluctant to share? mokcan: 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 gel 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 Letter-man 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.

Qll

playboy: Your stand-up includes a lot of jokes about anal sex. Are you talking about it just for shock value, or are you really a butt fiend?

MORGAN: I like fucking ass! Ain't nothin' like the butthole. The ass is a delicacy, god­damn it. I'd put hot sauce on it. When you eat the brown hole, that's when her toes do this, [sticks legs out and curls toes] You got to be willing to do anything to please your woman, to satisfy her. I didn't invent it. You think I was the first one to think of having anal sex with a girl? Hell, no. I'm quite sure Adam fucked Eve in the ass. In the Garden of Eden he tore her ass up, and she was screaming like a motherfucker.

Q12

playboy: In November you're performing at Carnegie Hall as part of the New York Comedy Festival. After so much time on closed studio sets for TV, is it weird to get back in front of a live audience? Morgan. No, it's not weird, because I'm not

funny just when I'm onstage. I'm funny when I'm in the elevator. I'm funny when I'm in the shower, I'm funny when I'm pumping gas, I'm funny in the barbershop. I'm not a motherfucker who needs to be onstage to be funny.

Q13

playboy: You've said you joined Saturday Night Live "as a puppy and left as a man." How does working on a comedy-sketch show turn somebody into a man? MORGAN: I've seen Saturday Night Live break people. If you can survive that, you can sur­vive anything in show business. Anything. SNL makes you fucking tough as steel because when you get your sketch cut, there is no explanation. You just take that loss. There were plenty of nights when I appeared only to say good-bye at the end of the show.

Q14

playboy: Your best SNL characters, such as Brian Fellow and Astronaut Jones, were happy idiots. Do you think ignorance is sometimes bliss?

MORGAN: Ignorance is definitely bliss. It is always better not to know. I take that approach whenever I do stand-up. I think not having too much knowledge keeps you on your toes. I may have an idea of what I'm going to talk about onstage, but I don't plan it out. That's the beauty of it. Some­times I surprise myself.

Q15

PLAYBOY: You frequently refer to SNL pro­ducer Lome Michaels as your Obi-Wan Kenobi. Does he have special powers we don't know about?

MORGAN: Yeah. Motherfucker took me out of the ghetto. That's my dude, man. He's been like a dad to me. I remember when I was on Saturday Night Live my first year and I wasn't getting much. I was down; I was ready to quit. It was three o'clock in the morning, man, I'll never forget. Makes me want to cry sometimes when I think about it. I love that man. I love that man. [long pause; starts to cry] I'm sorry, man. Excuse me. [another long pause] Son of a bitch... motherfucker's good. I remember one time Lome took me to his office, and he said, "Tracy, you are here not because you're black. You're here because you're fucking funny, man." [bursts into tears again; wipes face with shirt] Changed my whole perspective. I wasn't so guarded anymore. I knew white people weren't so fucked-up. I could've fallen into some dark shit, but he wouldn't let me. I left his office, and I was crying for, like, two hours. It made all the difference to me, not just for my career but for my life. They say every Jewish man is supposed to love one black motherfucker in this life. I'm glad Lome Michaels chose me.

Q16

playboy: A lot of SNL alumni try to take their characters to the big screen, not always successfully. Will we ever see Astro­naut Jones: The Movie?

MORGAN: I'd never do a movie about any of the characters I did on SNL. That's just not me. You should see the comedy that's in my head. I'm gonna put Blanket in my

movie, Michael Jackson's son. I want to do a movie about Blanket as an older man. Your father named you Blanket, what the fuck you gonna do? Thai's why motherfuckers grow up and start gangbanging. Mother­fuckers in your neighborhood saying, "Yo, Blanket, what's happening?" He's 17 years old, what's he going to say? "Yo, I told you my name's DerrickV He's got a hard road to climb. Talk about baggage.

Q17

Pl.AVBOY: When 30 Rock won a Golden Globe, you went onstage and called your­self the face of postracial America. Do you really believe in a postracial America? MORGAN: We've come a long way from step-pin' and fetchin', "Here come the judge," that kind of thing. 1 think progress is being made. Who do you think is buying hip-hop? Black kids? That's white kids, man. I see more interracial couples now than ever. But we have a long way to go.

Q18

PLAYBOY: Sometimes the funniest comics are also the most quiet and reserved in their private lives. Do you resent it when fans expect you always to be on? Morgan: Comedians are the monkeys of show business. You go to the zoo, and everybody likes to see the monkeys, right? Because they jerk off, they play with their own shit, that kind of thing. Some people actually believe that when they turn off their TV, I just lie down in the box. The other day it started raining, and this young boy yelled at me, "Tracy Morgan, what you doin' out in the rain?' Motherfucker, life hits me in the face just like it does you.

Q19

piayboY: You're clean and sober after a very public battle with alcoholism. Do you ever worry you won't be as funny or outrageous without the booze?

MORGAN: Never. I've always been funny. Why do I have to be drunk to be funny? Because John Hellish] and (Ihris Farley put that stigma on funny people, that we all gotta be high or drunk to be funny? That's fucked-up.

Q20

PlAVBOY: After two drunk-driving arrests, you received a court order to wear an ankle bracelet that monitored your alcohol intake. Was that enough to scare you straight? mokgan: The bracelet made me feel like a slave. Some days I wanted to cut my foot off just to get rid of that shit. But that wasn't rock bottom for me. Rock bottom came when I was sitting in my house and my oldest son came downstairs, and he looked at my foot like this, [shakes htad\ He was dis­gusted with me. I felt like an asshole. I felt like a jerk. That was the end of my drink­ing. The end of it, right then and there. We're working on our relationship right now. He comes over from time to lime and cooks me dinner. The last time he was here, he said, "Yo, Dad, you know what it feels like? I feel like this is the happy ending we always wanted. It ain't perfect, but it's a happy ending."