- Well, let's talk about your time on some of these sets.
- Yeah, let's talk about it!
- 1997.
- Oh, God.
- Good Burger.
- Good year.
- "Welcome to Good Burger, home of the good burger."
- "Can I take your order?"
- Do people like yell that
at you all the time? - All the time.
So, I go to gaming conventions,
and I go to like Comic-Cons and all the stuff like that,
because I'm a gamer, you know what I mean,
and I'm a geek.
So, I mean like, I'm gonna go to Comic-Con anyway.
But, because I do all that,
my newest thing is I'm cosplaying, right, so--
- Ooo!
So, let me tell you,
I just went to my first Comic-Con in a few years.
The first day I went as me,
and I sat at my booth and did what I had to do,
sign my autographs, whatever.
The next day,
I put on my Monique outfit,
from Good Burger, and I cosplayed
as Monique, - Wow!
- And I walked through the crowd and everybody's like,
"Oh my God, that's so good!
"That's so good, spot on!"
- "You look just like her!"
- I know, right, it's crazy; I work really hard.
So, I thought it was badass that I could cosplay as myself,
so I do. - That is fantastic.
I have a new goal in life.
- Yes!
- I wanna be able to cosplay Tracy Clayton.
- Yes! Yes.
- I'm gonna make it work, somehow.
- Make it happen.
- How did this role come about for you,
like how did you hear about it?
- Literally that one was just a regular audition.
It was, my agents were like, "Oh, there's this role.",
and initially when they had me audition,
for some reason it was like a cross in communication,
and my manager had told me something like it was
for like, a Wayans brothers skit or something,
and I was like--
- Well, that's very different.
- Who you tellin'.
So, so I'm like, oh, it's like, a Wayans brother movie,
so this gonna be off the chain!
Right?
So I had one way of playing it in my head,
you know, the script, and then I got there
and it was like "Nickelodeon",
and I said, I might have to revamp all that,
'cause that's not gonna, that's not gonna sit well here.
So, I made some adjustments,
and then booked the role, so.
- Had you...
I don't know what I would have done, I would have went--
- Dude.
Oh my god, no, it was a shock.
I was like, oh yeah I got thi-
Oo, wait a minute.
- A plot twist.
- Okay, put the titty up.
Put 'em up.
- Even though it's just a titty.
- It's just a titty.
- Still gotta put it away.
- Let's put it away.
- Right, right.
Was there a lot of like, breaks in the scene
for laughter and stuff? - We had so much fun.
That was literally the most fun I ever had
on any project, ever,
and like all we did... - Really?
- We were just a bunch of crazy kids,
havin' a good time,
makin' a movie about a burger.
- About a place that loves burgers,
- Yeah.
- That makes burgers.
- Have your kids seen it?
- Oh my God, yeah.
- Do they love it?
- So I have a granddaughter, right,
who's five today.
- Aww, happy birthday baby!
- It's the weirdest thing to even say that.
I don't even know how to fix my mouth to say those words.
She's five today.
She watches that movie constantly.
- Really?
- Constant-, like she took her tablet to the zoo today,
so that she can watch it while she's at the zoo.
- I said it's overkill, baby girl, it's overkill,
and she'd just look at me and say the line,
and I'm like okay, well.
- Did they also see "Moesha"?
- My kids have watched everything.
They watch my stuff; I don't even watch my stuff.
They watch my stuff.
My mom and my kids watch everything.
I get weird sometime
watching my own work.
- Yeah, I feel like--
- It's too critical.
- So like, as you're watching yourself,
you're like ah I should've done this,
I shouldn't have done that.
- Yeah, or I'll be like, damn, she sucks!
(both laugh)
But I definitely will see things, where I'm like,
oh, I could've done, you know, switched that up,
why'd they go with that take, so I don't, I don't watch it.
- Do your kids or anyone in your family ever call you Niecy?
- They will never, no.
- Whoop!
All right.
- No sir, mm mm.
- Well, since we brought "Moesha" up--
- Yes!
- We must discuss it, because
"Moesha", I think is one of the like,
most impactful Black sitcoms--
- Yes, yes.
- Because, like, it addressed and spoke to
a group of people that people weren't really catering to
like young Black girls, you know?
- I'm so proud of that show.
- Everything we did was so groundbreaking,
and I didn't realize it until I became an adult,
you know what I mean,
'cause when we were doing it it just felt like--
- Makin' a show
- This is what we're doin', makin' a show.
To hear, like, the younger kids talk about it,
I'm like,
wow, yeah we did talk about that.
Oo, we did touch on that.
- Y'all were tacklin' issues!
- The Mexican and the Black, racial thing,
we did touch on that!
Oh my god, like!
So it was crazy, 'cause we really touched on things
that were happening in our neighborhoods,
you know what I mean,
and nobody else was doing that,
so yeah it was pretty amazing.
- Nobody else was doin' that.
I heard that you didn't have to audition for it?
Is that true? - I did not.
So--
- What a flex, first of all.
You know, go ahead flex, you know, do it!
- So no, I had done this other show called "South Central".
- I loved "South Central"!
- "South Central" was so good.
- It was so good!
- Fun fact,
did you know that was J. Lo's very first acting role?
- I did not.
Oh my gosh!
- So yeah, we did the show,
and the same producers from that show
are the ones that worked on "Moesha",
so that's why Lamont was there too.
And so, yeah, like, I was workin' on this other show
called "My So-Called Life",
and I just, I had like one more day and I was gonna wrap,
and I got a call from the producers,
and they were like, "Hey Shar, so listen.
"We're in production on this show,
"we shot a couple days,
"but the actress that we have
"isn't really workin' out,
"so we were wondering if you could come in
"and jump into this.
"We've only got like two days left.
"Can you, can you handle it?"
I was like, psh, done with this today,
sure I'll be there tomorrow.
- I'll swing by and save your little show!
- You know what I mean.
I'll save it. - I can do that.
(both laughing)
- I'm getting that on a t-shirt.
That's amazing. - Yes! It'll be great.
- But yeah, so then I just, I showed up,
and luckily just fit right in.
- Yeah, the rest is history.
- Yeah!
- You and Brandy had such amazing best friend chemistry--
- Bran is my girl, man!
Like that's--
- Had you met her before?
- Yeah; I sing, occasionally,
and Bran was always singing,
so we would cross paths a lot in that world.
We were both really good friends with Immature--
- Immature!
- We would always do stuff together as singers,
and blah blah blah blah blah,
so yeah, I'd known her before that,
but I didn't get to know her
until we did the show. - Until the show, yeah.
How did you go about
developing the character of Niecy,
like how much of Niecy was Shar--
- A lot, a lot.
I just, you know I kinda just,
I wanted her to be real.
I wanted her to be
that one chick that nobody ever gets to see.
You know what I mean?
Like, we had Brandy who was the straight,
you know, super educated,
you know, I'm gonna be the good girl.
Then, we had Countess doing the Kim character
which was like the off-the-cuff, crazy,
be gettin' in all the mischief friend.
I was like, well what about that chick
that holds them together?
- Right!
What about the glue?
- I wanna be the glue,
so I became the glue.
Plus, I'm a Virgo, so I'm like natural glue.
- Oh, is that what that means.
- So, I just kind of, just look it up--
- A little birdy told me is that
- Niecy was just supposed to be there for the first season?
- Honey, she was just supposed to be there
for the first episode.
Her name wasn't even Niecy.
Her name was Gail.
- Wow!
- I'm happy they changed that,
'cause I didn't feel like a Gail.
- Gail is like a, it's definitely a--
- It's not a Niecy, ya know.
- [Both] It's not a Niecy.
- So, wow, not even for the first season,
but just for the first show. - First episode.
Just for the pilot,
that's what it was supposed to be,
and then...
- Walk me through this.
- They were just like,
every week, there was a new script on my front door.
It was weird.
- I don't know if you would've been able
to tell me anything after that.
- Oh, no no no.
My mom would have made sure.
She was like don't, hm?
- You still better get your dishes done.
- Yeah my mom didn't...
Wait, have you heard a story about that?
- No, why, you got one?
- Oh my god!
- Tell me!
- So, I had to have been like six or seven, right,
and I remember my mom and I had been filming all day, okay.
And, we get home from work,
and we walk into the house,
and this is my mom, checked me,
in the beginning of life,
and we've never had a problem since.
We get home, and I'm exhausted, right.
So, my mom's like, "Oh, by the way, don't forget.
"It's your night to do the dishes."
And I remember, I stopped, right,
and I liked looked at her,
and I was like, "Dishes?"
- Uh oh!
- "Girl, I'm a star!"
- I'm nervous at this point.
- So, my mom was like, "You're a star?"
I was like, "Yeah!"
She's like, "Okay, okay."
So she walks over to the sink,
and you know that one little light
that's like right over the sink?
She goes and flips that light on,
and she was like, "Well, star as 'Shar Does The Dishes',
"Action!",
and walked out of the room,
and we've never ever in life had another problem,
with uh, with any of that.
- I'm mad she hit you with the action!
- Action!
- Wow, that would keep me humble
for the rest of my days - I was done!
Never had a problem.
- Wow.
Wow! - My mom's a G, yeah.
- I think a reason that,
especially now, like people are like thinkin' about the show
and talkin' about the show so much,
is that like it's just a good time for nostalgia.
- Yeah.
- Whether or not it's because media, for a while,
was not as Black as it was in the '90s--
- Right.
- Or if the world is just shit,
and we just wanna go back to a time where it wasn't shit.
- All of the above.
- All of the above, I absolutely believe it.
There were so many Black shows on,
and you have been a part, in some way, of so many--
- Of so many of them, right!
- Girl you be working
- Dude, do you know that Niecy,
the character Niecy actually appeared on:
"Moesha", "The Parkers",
"Girlfriends", "Clueless",
and I feel like it was something else.
I can't think of what the fifth one is,
but that character, alone,
showed up on all those shows.
- Like Niecy as Niecy.
- Yeah.
- Wow.
- It was weird and bizarre,
and it happened.
- I miss those days so much!
- It's crazy.
- So much!
- TV was like, really good then.
Like it was,
it made you feel good, - It was so good, yes--
- You know what I mean,
and now it's so oversaturated with all these things.
I mean I'm not saying it's, like, oversaturated
that I don't wanna work, but...
But I mean like, everybody had their shows.
Like, it was like, "Oh girl, I gotta get home because
"da da da is coming on." - Yeah!
- And it's just not like that anymore, and that's--
- It's not; it's not.
- That's really sad.
- What does it mean,
like looking back as we have this conversation.
What does it mean to have been a part
of such a Black-ass time in media.
- It's pretty badass, man.
It's good to know that I helped girls that look like me
realize they could do this,
and that they're not trapped in whatever little world
or little environment
that society tries to tell them that they're stuck in.
You could step out and do this.
You could be on the cover of this, you can,
you know what I mean, and it wasn't...
I don't know; I just think it's a powerful thing,
like when I really sit back and think about it.
I had this one kid,
this other actor of color.
He's Hispanic, and he came up to me.
He's on a show that I admire, and I love.
I was like, "Oh my god, I love your show!"
And he was like, "No wait, hold on.
"I just wanna tell you, 'thank you'."
And I was, "Huh?"
And he's like, "Because you made it,
"you were part of, you know, paving the way
"for people like me to do what we're doing."
I was like, shut up, I'm gonna cry.
- Oh, who's choppin' onions?
Right?
Who's doing that?
- Who's chopping onions!
But yeah, no no no.
I think it's phenomenal, dude,
and I'm just super proud to have been a part of it.
- You were in Missy Elliot's "One Minute Man" video.
-Yes I was.
- I just wanna hear about it,
'cause Missy is just like,
speaking of icons, I mean. - Yes!
- Also, how did that happen?
- I think she just kinda called me
and was like, "Yo, come do this video."
I was like, "Aight."
I did a lot of videos, like in the '90s, man.
- She had your phone number?
- Yeah, that's my girl!
Missy's my girl!
- See, this is what I'm talkin' about.
I wouldn't be able to just like, ya know--
- Yeah, you could.
I wouldn't be able to breathe
knowin' that Missy Elliot had my phone number
in her phone.
Every day, I'd just be like--
- Well, back then it was like in our,
what do you call it, our two-ways--
- I was like, what, a Rolodex?
That wasn't that long ago--
- No, the two-way pagers, the big, blocky,
"Yeah, this is the first time
"I could ever text."
Like those things, so,
She had me in that, man.
So yeah, I think she just called and was like,
"Yo, come do this video."
And I was like, "Alright, I'm there."
And then I got there and then I saw the wardrobe
and I was like...
Imma wear the tutu with the panties, right?
Tutu and the lace panties? That's the,
and the bustier? - "Am I to understand?"
- That's what that,
oh and the big hat.
That's gonna make me,
so I feel dressed in the hat, okay.
And I was like, I love it.
This is so not Niecy.
And I remember, I was with my kids' dad, too.
Like, we were together,
and I remember him comin' up to the set when we were done,
like as I was wrapping,
and he was like,
"You get to take that home, right?"
- So what you're sayin' is that you stole from Missy Elliot?
- No, I didn't steal it!
- No, I'm joking.
- I asked!
I was like, you guys don't need this, right?
'Cause we do, jus' sayin'.
- Don't ask no questions.
- No questions needed to be asked.
Everybody knew what it was.
- So yeah, she called,
and I did the video, and it was a great time,
and I looked awesomely hot.
I mean, not to like, feel myself like that--
- No, I agree!
--but being Niecy, who was not ever,
like sexually hot, or whatever,
to putting this outfit on and being,
I was like, this is it right here.
- It's like you got to say to everybody, like
you know, Niecy was so cute, - Don't sleep, boo.
- but don't forget.
Get you a girl that can do both.
- Yes!
I loved it; it was awesome.
I'm gonna get back in that outfit.
- I say do it.
-Yeah.
- Do it.
- It's gonna happen.