Terry Crews revealed that Katt Williams wasn’t the only actor facing financial troubles while filming “Friday After Next.”
The third “Friday” movie starred Crews as Damon while Williams played the unforgettable pimp character Money Mike. During his appearance on “Club Shay Shay” on Feb. 28, the “America’s Got Talent” host said he went back to his security guard job after finishing the 2002 film and reiterated a claim that Williams shared about his living arrangement during his appearance on the same podcast last month.
Crews said he was only paid $4,000 for his role in the film, but he told host Shannon Sharpe that he ran into “Friday” writer Ice Cube recently, and he thanked him for launching his career before noting that Williams was living in his trailer during filming.
“What was so crazy is me and Katt, Katt was homeless at the time,” said Crews. “So Katt was living in his trailer, and me and Katt said, ‘Hey, man,’ and I remember talking to Katt, I said, ‘Katt,’ I said, ‘If we never get another opportunity, we got to make sure they remember us.’ I said ‘Because we the two new cats in this whole thing. They know everybody else.’ But I said ‘It’s me and you.'”
Crews went on to say he and Williams became “amazing friends” after working together on the film and that he went back to his old job as a security guard to make ends meet while waiting for the film to come out.
“After ‘Friday After Next,’ I had to go back doing security,” he added. “I had to go back, ’cause I didn’t have nothing else to turn to. But I knew it was coming,” he said.
The former “Everybody Hates Chris” star also said that he enjoyed watching Williams “blow up” with his comedy career after the film.
Fans reacted to the interview on Instagram. One fan replied, “Friday After Next is a classic!!!!” Another fan wrote, “Hands down best and most inspiring episode!” One fan noted that Sharpe has a good thing going with “Club Shay Shay.”
“Unc got the best podcast going,” wrote the fan. “I feel like im actually hearing from people in ‘their voice’ and not just media speak.”
money mike & damon bathroom scene in Friday After Next 😭😭😭😭 https://t.co/qCLsz9ruTC pic.twitter.com/81Bfzw0zsM
— 𝐸🦦 (@ericrobertson0) October 24, 2023
Williams also appeared on “Club Shay Shay” back in January, where he initially confirmed he lived in his trailer while working on the film. The comedian said that he stayed in his trailer to save money for expensive dental work.
“This was my situation. Five months prior to me getting this first audition for ‘Friday After Next,’ I got this baby son,” he said. “I’m holding him up above me, he grabs my little chain, he’s playing with it, and he accidentally drops it it. Breaks out my front two teeth. I’m in a situation now where when I go to the dentist, they telling me this going to cost thousands and thousands of dollars to fix this, right? They’re not telling me what it’s going to look like. I go get an estimate with no money involved to find out what I need to do.”
Williams added that a tumor was found in his upper jaw, but he didn’t have the money to have it removed, so he and his son stayed on the set at night.
“They find out, ‘You got a tumor in your upper jaw, so we’re going to have to do a whole surgery for you.’ It’s going to be 100 bands. I don’t have it. I don’t have it and, um, I’m only going to have this check from this movie, so while I’m doing this movie, we live in this trailer um, this where we live so when they come to work at 5 in the morning, we already there,” he explained.
“When they leave at night, we still there. We just double back, um, because we understood that this is our one opportunity um and we have this opportunity to change our lives like.”
Crews’ and Williams’ interviews are both now streaming on YouTube.
“Friday After Next” is available now on Amazon Prime, also starring Mike Epps, Bishop Don Magic Juan, Anna Maria Horsford, John Witherspoon, Don Curry, Clifton Powell as Pinky and comedian Rickey Smiley, who also auditioned for the role of Money Mike.
