Gospel singer Tamela Mann shared a story about working with Tyler Perry on the set of his stage play “Meet the Browns.”
Mann starred in the 2004 play as Cora with her husband, gospel singer David Mann, who played her father, Leroy. During a preview clip for the next episode of TV One’s “Uncensored,” the singer recalled an incident on the set with Perry, the “Madea” director who “was just tripping” on set.
After noting that their characters resonated well with the audience, Mann shared some behind-the-scenes drama that went down.
“No one’s heard this. Y’all, this is the tea,” said Mann. “We were on stage, and I don’t know this day Tyler was just tripping. He was just tripping with me, Cora, the character. So he just went to messing with me and I fell … He had — my legs went up on the bed and I was like, and I pushed him, like with my legs. They’re like ‘quit. People is up here in America and they can see me.’ So we spatting — basically we spatting but it wasn’t it — I don’t know where it came from.”
Mann went on to say that Perry told the sound guy to cut her microphone off.
“I went back downstairs and he was kind of going off on me right? And he told the sound guy to cut my mic off,” she continued, adding that the sound guy didn’t turn off her mic. “We going back and forth high side while talking about each other on stage.”
“We go to the next scene, I come back, and I had seen his mother earlier that day, say ‘hi’ and she had on these goggles, right? We had some backstage on the prop table. Terrell Carter dared me — he wasn’t even in this scene. He led me back outside like he was my seeing-eye person. I had on the shades, he took me, walked me out there and sat me right in the middle of the stage.”
David Mann interjected to note that Perry was “pissed” while Tamela said the director was “furious.”
“He was like, ‘Cora, what you doing? Why you got them glasses on, Cora?’ And I was like ‘What? I just had surgery on my eye.’ Lying! Lying! I did not. I was being funny because he was like, ‘Y’all, she is mocking my mama and my mama just had cataract surgery.’ I said ‘Y’all, he was talking about my mama and my mama has Alzheimer’s.'”
“They doing all of this in the middle of a show and the people are just laughing, but they don’t know that they really mad at each other,” added David.
“I really wasn’t mad. I just was clowning, you know,” said Tamela. “I think I was being a comedian that day.”
“I came off stage and I tell you I let Tam and Terrell have it,” noted David. “I said, ‘Why would y’all do that?'”
You are looking good Ms. Cora! 😉 #MadeasFarewellTour #Madea #MsCora pic.twitter.com/XG9rEKZWPl
— Madea (@madea) February 6, 2020
Tamela added that the entire cast got sent home the next day for a week. “We got sent home. Not just me. Everybody,” she joked. “Tyler, I love you. Terrell, I love you too.”
She and Perry have been together for years starting with “Madea’s Family Reunion” in 2002, and leading to the play and series “Meet the Browns, as well as his classic, “Diary of a Mad Black Woman.” Mann most recently starred in “Tyler Perry’s “Assisted Living” for the last three years, followed by “Tyler Perry’s A Madea Homecoming.”
Mann’s full interview will air on March 31.
