-Our next guest is a Grammy Award-winning
and Tony- and Emmy-nominated actress you know from her work
on "Orange is the New Black"
and "The Color Purple" on Broadway.
She stars in "The Piano Lesson," which is playing on Broadway now
at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre.
Please welcome back to the show
our friend Danielle Brooks, everybody.
[ Cheers and applause ]
♪♪
Whoo! Welcome back, Danielle!
How are you? -I'm so good.
This sistah over here playing the drums.
-Knows what she's doing, right? [ Cheers and applause ]
-How cool. Go ahead, girl.
-Now, a lot has happened since the last time
we were lucky enough to have you here.
You had a baby girl.
-I am a mother. [ Cheers and applause ]
-You got married. -I's married now.
[ Cheers and applause ] Yes.
-Last time we were here, we were talking about
potential names for your daughter.
What did you land on? -Freeya.
-Oh, that's beautiful. -She's free.
That's what I want her to know. -Freeya is beautiful,
because a lot of the ones you were suggesting
three years ago were real bad. -Oh, God.
[ Laughter ]
Tell me you don't have that list.
-No, we got rid of that list.
We're like, "This can't even be written down on paper."
So that's wonderful. Freeya, that's a beautiful name.
-Yes, thank you. -She's 3 now?
-She's 3 now. -Does she have any awareness
of what her mom does for a living?
-I don't think she does. She's starting to.
-Yeah. -Like, I'm on a show called
"Karma's World," too, where I play the mom on that show.
And so every now and then, she's like, "Mommy, mommy?
That's my mommy?" I tried to get her
in "Color Purple," the movie. -Okay.
-That was an epic fail. -Okay.
-Because it was right smack dab during her naptime.
-Uh-huh. -And so it's like a scene
with Fantasia and Ciara.
And all she's supposed to do is go to Fantasia,
and she was like, "No, don't touch me!"
[ Laughter ] "Don't touch me!"
So I don't know if she has a career in acting.
-That's okay. [ Laughter ]
-I don't think it's her calling in life.
-That's all right. It's probably too early to tell,
but that did seem pretty bad that she did that.
-Oh, yeah. -So, this is crazy.
This is a play -- a wonderful August Wilson play --
and you actually did a monologue from this play
when you auditioned for Juilliard.
-Yeah, yeah, yeah. I did a monologue
of the character Bernice,
and I ended up getting into all of the colleges.
But I ended up going on with Juilliard with this monologue,
and it changed my life.
I'm telling you, it changed my life because,
at the time, like, my grandmother passed away,
my godmother passed away, and so -- it just --
I found this play at the right time.
And now this play has found me, however many years later,
and I get to star it in with Sam Jackson --
Samuel L. Jackson. -Yeah.
-And John David Washington,
and LaTanya Richardson Jackson is directing it.
It's like, ♪ "What is going on?" ♪
Just onstage with Sam Jackson every night.
-And now, LaTanya Richardson is an incredibly
accomplished director, but she's also Sam Jackson's wife.
-Yes. -Now, I'm wondering,
because I'm always fascinated by spouses who work together.
-Oh, Lord. -Directors gives notes.
-[ Laughs ] -Like, directors,
one of their jobs is to give performance notes.
Does she do that to Sam in front of others?
-She tried in the beginning. -Uh-huh.
-I think she chose another angle.
Now that I'm married, I understand.
She said, "You know what? I'm just gonna take this home."
And I think she tells him notes and things at home.
-Yeah. -Because it just --
it just wasn't working. [ Laughter ]
But they have a really great relationship.
It's so beautiful. Shout-out to them
for being together for over 40 years.
-Yeah, that's amazing. -They've been married
for so long. [ Cheers and applause ]
Showing us what Black love is and can be.
-I mean, I'm both impressed, with 40 years being married
is one thing, but 40 years being married
and then wanting to go to work together.
-I know. 40-plus years.
-Yeah. -That's crazy.
I ain't even 40 yet. No shade to the 40 people,
but I'm like, "Wow!" -Yeah, me neither.
[ Laughter ]
-What do they say? Black don't crack.
What do they say for y'all? -It's all falling to pieces.
[ Laughter ]
-I can't help you there. Cocoa butter, cocoa butter.
-Yeah, there you go.
You're doing worse than helping. [ Laughter ]
Um, I want to ask you about this, as well.
The play -- one of the themes of this play is, you know, ghosts.
-Yes. Do you believe in ghosts?
-I don't. Do you? -No, not really.
-Okay. But I do believe in spirits.
Now, I don't know --
-Now, that seems like the same to me.
[ Laughter ]
-One would say so. -Yeah, so sell me how you
perceive the difference between ghosts and spirits?
-I-I haven't really come up with a definition.
-Okay. -But ghosts, to me, seems like,
"Ooh, it's a ghost." Like, it's just B.S., really.
-Yeah. -But spirits, that's like,
when somebody dies, their spirit --
I believe their spirit is still with us.
-Gotcha. -You know, like, I think about
when you go to a funeral, and after that funeral, like,
you still can feel them, or you, like, sense them
in a butterfly or something cheesy.
Might seem cheesy, but I really do believe that, like,
when we move on to the next life,
our spirits are still here.
-Now, is part of it that it's the rest of us that are
keeping your spirit alive by thinking about you?
-I agree, I agree. And that's why I think
storytelling is so important
because that's how we keep each other alive.
You know, those memories that we share with one another,
that we do through everything, whether that's telling a story
to a baby when they're, you know, young and 3 years old,
and you're telling a story, or you're getting married,
and the brother-in-law is telling the story.
This is how we transfer that energy
and keep each other's spirit alive.
I mean -- Yeah, I could go on and on about this but --
-Now, what about this as a distinction?
The difference would be, a ghost tries to talk to you.
Like, a spirit's just in the world,
and you need to, like, pull your own message,
but a ghost is like, "Get out of my house!"
-I think that one might be -- Well, it's crazy
'cause the other day, I think I saw one.
I know I'm all over the place. -You are all over the place.
-I know it. -Where did you see a ghost?
-We just put the nanny cams up. -Uh-huh.
-And the light -- you know, the light
starts doing different things. -Yeah.
-And I'm like, "I think I saw something go across the room."
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
-But I don't know. -You know what?
You got something worse than a ghost.
You have moths. [ Laughter ]
-That -- -You for real have moths,
'cause I once said to my wife when I was looking at
the Nest camera, "[Bleep],"
I was like, "I think we got a ghost,"
and she was like, "We got [bleep] moths."
-Moths. I think you're right. Okay, yes.
So my theory is still the same. -So you're good.
But here's the thing. I believe that every moth
is the spirit of a dead person. -Oh, my gosh.
[ Laughter ] -Oh, what?
I'm not allowed to be all over the place?
Just you? -No. Go ahead.
Live your life. Go ahead, live your life.
-I think that when we die, two things happen.
We become moths. -Moths, okay.
-And we want to eat sweaters.
-That's what keeps our spirit alive.
-Because our whole life as people -- I don't know
if you feel this, as well, right?
I want to eat a sweater every day,
but I know as a human person -- -Every day.
-As a human person, that would be frowned upon.
-I get an urge every day, Seth.
-You know how delicious your sweater looks?
-I get an urge every day, Seth. [ Laughter ]
-You get away from me! [ Laughter ]
Hey, we were talking backstage about how wonderful
the first season of "Peacemaker" was.
-Oh! -And just a fantastic --
You know, I love DC comics.
And he was not a well-known character,
and James Gunn did an incredible job.
Did you enjoy your time making that?
-I freakin' loved my time making that.
James Gunn is that dude. I loved working with him.
I can't wait to see what he does with DC Universe.
I think he's gonna do an incredible job,
and I'm super excited that I'm still hanging in there...
-Yeah. -...for season two.
-Yeah, if you can stay alive in a superhero movie,
you're doing a good job. -Oh, my goodness.
I made it in life. [ Laughter ]
-More importantly, you got your first wedding anniversary.
This weekend? -Yes.
-So what are you gonna do? Do you have plans,
or is it sort of incumbent upon him?
-I'm going to be secretive so I don't spill it.
-All right. -Because this is the first year.
I just -- I have plans. But I don't want him to know
'cause he gonna be watching. -Yeah, oh.
-Yeah. -So you're sort of popping
more surprises on him? -That's just my vibe.
-Yeah. -What about you?
Your first anniversary, what did you do?
-Uh, I have no memory. -Work?
-Yeah, yeah. [ Laughter ]
Literally no memory of it, yeah.
-Dang, yo. Yeah, that's how life is.
-No, because every day is a celebration.
[ Laughter ]
-He loves you. [ Applause ]
-You guys, this is the always lovely Danielle Brooks.
[ Cheers and applause ] -Thank you.
-"The Piano Lesson" is playing now
at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre through January 29th.
For tickets, please visit pianolessonplay.com.
we'll be right back with more "Late Night."