AfriPulse
The Oscar-winner pulls no punches in her new Netflix stand-up special My Name Is Mo’Nique.
Lester Fabian Brathwaite
In the roughly 70-minute special, Mo’Nique shares an uncensored and unfiltered journey through her life, though she barely touches on her career struggles since winning the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her magnificent turn in 2009’s Precious, directed by Daniels.
My Name is Mo’Nique. Mo’Nique in My Name is Mo’Nique. Cr. John Washington Jr./Netflix © 2022
Mo’Nique in her new Netflix stand-up special ‘My Name Is Mo’Nique’
| Credit: John Washington Jr./Netflix
In 2015, the comedian told The Hollywood Reporter that she was “blackballed” after her Oscar win, for apparently not playing “the game” — she had refused to do the usual Academy Award campaigning for the film without compensation, which in turn soured some of her relationships in Hollywood.
Two years later, in her viral stand-up routine, Mo’Nique said she had not been “blackballed” but rather “white-balled by some Black dicks who had no balls.” She then proceeded to name names.
“So, thank you, Mr. Lee Daniels. Thank you, Mr. Tyler Perry. Thank you, Ms. Oprah Winfrey. No, baby, I wasn’t blackballed,” the Parkers star said. “It would kill me not to say the real s—. You are not paying me equally. You are not treating me fairly. So y’all can suck my dick if I had one.”
During My Name Is Mo’Nique, the comedian recalls her Uncle Donald, a gay Black man who was not accepted by the rest of their family, though Mo’Nique loved him especially. Her Uncle Donald would go out to a bar every Friday night and get beaten up by the same group of men who would steal most of his money.
Coming home from the bar drunk one night, he fried himself a hot dog, muttering to himself how he was going to get revenge on the men next Friday, until Mo’Nique’s grandmother told him to “shut the f— up.”
At which point, as Mo’Nique skillfully related, “My Uncle Donald walked out that motherf—in’ kitchen and sobered the f— up and stood over top of my grandmother, which is his motherf—in’ mother, and said, ‘Mama, you can kiss my dick!”
She then addressed Daniels, who was sitting in the front row of the audience.
“So Lee Daniels, hear me: That night I said, ‘Y’all can suck my dick if I had one,’ that was in honor of my Uncle Donald, n—-!” she exclaimed. “That was me telling my Uncle Donald, ‘N—-, you still in the house, n—-!’ That’s my Uncle Donald, Lee, that’s my Uncle Donald!”
Daniels stood up and applauded Mo’Nique after that and again at the end of her special, when she declared that all she had been through in her personal life prepared her for when people were discounting her in her professional life.
“When motherf—as told me, ‘You’re no Dave Chappelle.’ ‘You’re no Amy Schumer.’ ‘You’re no Chris Rock.’ Them motherf—as was right,” she concluded. “Because my name is Mo’Nique.”
Related content:
Source: Entertainment Weekly | Read More
