mike as i said to you earlier
i love the way you phrase the top item
in your feed
you say queen mother cicely tyson i have
the strength of cicely tyson
all things are true what you say is true
what i say uh is true what everybody
is saying about cicely tyson is
absolutely spot on assistant tyson 96
years old
we lost her and what an example of
talent what an uh an example of i love
the new york times saying they're
shattering stereotypes that was very
intentional by the way on her part
didn't want to take certain roles and
refuse to
she said if i need to starve again
i'll starve but i'm not playing these
roles that don't need to be played that
don't bring
any kind of pride any kind of dignity
any kind of humanity
to the person i'm supposed to be
portraying i'm not doing it anymore
so her integrity speaks for itself her
talent speaks for
for itself her beauty her
her energy on the stage and uh it's
interesting
were talking about age uh a few minutes
ago
she was on broadway along with james
earl
jones she was in her 90s
on broadway with james earl jones in his
80s
performing a play cicely tyson
you cannot look at her without
saying respect before she even opens her
mouth she commanded and she continues to
command
respect what a loss but also
what an inspiration i'm so glad that
you know i'm living in a time where i
was able to uh witness
uh the best of cicely tyson across
so many platforms uh so many things
stand out to me
about sicily including getting the uh
presidential medal of medical freedom
freedom from
from barack obama you know what else she
got she got her flowers
um and oftentimes we lose people and
and we wish we'd given him to her uh
this queen mother she got her flowers
uh she she knew how much
we appreciated her she was celebrated
she was honored
uh she was uh uplifted
uh and glorified as she deserved to be
um we lost we lost family we lost family
man like like
that was she might as well have been my
grandmother
she might have been my grandmother
because i i literally was raised on
sicily tyson like when i think of cicely
tyson
you know the role i think of because
you know my uncle kenneth actually
had a lot of mannerisms and even
appearance that resembled richard pryor
i told you i you know i'm a grandson of
a baptist
pastor and first lady uh
reverend thomas nelson washington so
there was a there were certain types of
television we could consume in my
household in
my grandparents household nope none of
that cussing stuff
good good wholesome comedy right at
least at least while my grandmother was
still awake at least while they were
awake
late at night maybe we could get that we
could sneak in that eddie murphy raw if
we if we kept the sound down
there richard pryor live on the sunset
strip but in the daytime it was sinbad
you know it was it was it was busting
loose
yeah like i i remember i remember
watching busting loose
with richard pryor and cicely tyson as a
kid that was my introduction to cecilia
tyson i was you know
sounder preceded me and uh miss jane
pittman
uh you know miss james you know what i
mean
so so um that was a that's a piece of my
of my childhood but not just my
childhood
about her she was still relevant
roots i mean just name it man this is
maya angelou
she played harriet tubman she played
miss jane pittman she played rosa parks
did she not i mean like
she was just everywhere i mean so but
she but she never stopped
it was crazy she she never to your point
receded from the spotlight she was she's
she wasn't just an icon
she was an institution she was relevant
all the way until the end he she had a
career renaissance with tyler perry on
this
land i mean when she spoke on screen
people stopped listening and gave her
the attention
the undivided attention she deserved
even at home like she still captivated
you
even at 96. she was an institution and
she
she she didn't change with the time so
much as the ch the times just changed
with her
i mean you know externally and
internally you wanna talk about black
don't crack this woman never cracked and
she kicked
her during her thing all the way until
the end
just released her autobiography i
believe and and just what a what a life
what a career what a what a legacy what
an impact
uh she was everybody's uh idol
you know and and and and she was she was
incredible man it was it was literally
like
like a family member passed away but at
96
man i'm just glad that she got all the
accolades that she deserved
and uh just wish her a peaceful
transition but man oh man like
yeah that that would hit home because i
was raised on this woman
yeah you hit it you hit it right you
know what's so funny uh you talk about
you know being the grandson of a baptist
preacher same
same thing uh the grandson and great
grandson
same thing too you know good wholesome
and look uh all you know all that
cussing turn that down
turn all the way turn that customer all
you preachers kids
and preachers grandkids out there you
know
y'all some we are some of the best
sneaks out there
okay come on i'm gonna tell you i'm
gonna tell the truth
if you won't tell the truth i'll tell
the truth for you because there's some
things
happening that you couldn't do uh when
you gotta label that tape just something
different that's all you gotta put you
gotta
get a label in something else you know
that's all you can do can't just have it
say eddie murphy raw
you know i like this is what i liked
about um sicily many things
yeah many things you know
so some some artists they i'm talking
about any artists like visual artists
you look at some of the some of their
paintings and paintings and you say
how do they come up with that or whether
a novelist or musicians
there's a line there's there's something
there there's a lick
there's something they play there's
something they say then you say
wow that's just a different that's a
different
view of it and it kind of changes your
perspective
because of what they created
artistically with cicely tyson
she did that with her standards
she did that with her standards and so
that's why she was so important
that the impact of saying i'm not
going to do it because the easy thing to
do
especially when you don't know the
unknown like we can look back at it now
at 96 and say oh yeah she could do that
she's sicily tyson
she did that before she was cicely tyson
yeah she was consistent i'm not doing
this oh yeah you want somebody to play
uh that role no no no we got enough of
that and if i
if if it's gonna keep me out of your
movie well i don't need to be in your
movie
and i think more of us that's one of the
takeaways
from a life well lived that she had more
of us
have to say on her on her terms i'm
not doing it right now the excuses
i got you know elsa that was uh you know
what else was cut from that cloth was
chadwick bozeman
he was cut from that same claw yes um i
i think i think
radiance i think dignity i think um
like you said standards um
you know just just black excellence just
pride
uh mike we took a lot of pride by the
way don't don't forget madam queen from
uh from hoodlum there's another one that
uh that comes to mind
oh she was a she was in she was in a
bunch of she's in everything
she did everything she was possible
because i know i know maya was in it
was in um poetic justice was she talking
to
sicily in that scene where they probably
went by the
anytime there was like a a a gathering
probably she was always like holding
court and i'm excited just like offering
was
probably probably i would go ahead and
guess yes because i know i know
i know john singleton had much respect
for for for dr
maya because i remember seeing when she
was talking
to somebody and saying hey you know that
she's not a member of this family
but i wonder if she's talking to cicely
tyson but you mentioned
the radiance i wonder if the rate part
of the radiance
that we see is from that thing
in you it says this is what i'm about
i'm about
doing good art i'm going to do it with
integrity
and i'm going to be true and i'm going
to be authentic uh to myself i'm going
to get into it
i'm not doing it for i'm not doing it
just because
it makes money i'm not doing it for
recognition i'm doing it because this is
what i was
put here to do and they're so few people
like that in a
in a high profile position when you see
it
you're attracted to it because it's so
rare