It’s not just another punch line. Always the irreverent funnyman, Chappelle may joke about inking a $50 million deal with Comedy Central to continue his highly successful Chappelle’s Show for another two seasons, but it’s no laughing matter.
Is Chappelle worth that much money? You bet. The second season of his show produced record ratings for Comedy Central, averaging 3.1 million viewers per episode. The show, which earned three Emmy nominations, scored high with both the network’s predominantly white viewers and gave the network a black audience for the first time. It has turned out to be a huge crossover hit, according to Lou Wallach, Comedy Central’s vice president of original programming and development. “[Chappelle] was really able to bring to the channel a much larger black audience than we had in the past without alienating — actually growing — the kind of traditional, core white audience that we had,” he says. “To me, that’s a huge testament.”
Have you heard the one about the DVD sales? The strength of side-splitting skits such as the “Playa Hater’s Ball” and an over-the-top portrayal of funk icon Rick James fueled DVD sales of Chappelle’s Show. Approximately 2 million units sold grossed more than $40 million. As DVD sales become an increasingly lucrative revenue stream for networks and studios, it’s taking a spot next to syndication as a crucial deal-making point for profit participants.
Ask Jeff Clanagan, president of Urban Works Entertainment, a black-owned DVD distribution and film production company based in Thousand Oaks, California. He maintains that back-end deals, like Chappelle’s, can produce more dough than a cookie factory. Here’s how it works: A DVD that retails for $19.99 costs roughly $10 to manufacture and distribute. Standard distribution fees are about 25%, or $2.50. Manufacturing and marketing costs average around $1. Total costs can add up to as much as $5. If a comedian has a back-end deal in place, he or she stands to make up to $5 from every DVD sold.
Among the hottest sellers for Urban Works, which grossed some $25 million last year, is the Def Comedy Jam series and, you guessed it, the Dave Chappelle Platinum Series, a video of the comedian’s funniest performances. Says Clanagan: “Comedy is the No. 1 selling genre for us.”
Chappelle is tapping into the business side of entertainment, and he’s not the only comedian doing so. African American entertainers are the driving force behind comedy.
Chappelle and Chris Rock have produced some of the highest–grossing comedy concerts. Damon Wayans’ My Wife and Kids is the one of the highest-rated shows on ABC, while The Bernie Mac Show, which airs on FOX, is slated for syndication. Chris Tucker of Rush Hour fame is among the highest-paid comedians in Hollywood, earning $20 million per film.
There’s little doubt that comedy is big business. Twenty-two of the top 100 highest-grossing movies in U.S. history are comedies — totaling nearly $5 billion. Many of today’s entertainers have learned from the mistakes of their predecessors and take a hands-on approach to directing their careers. They understand there’s big money in making people laugh. Just like corporate executives, they’re forming joint ventures, hammering out lucrative deals, and identifying multiple revenue streams. By becoming crossover success stories, they’re able to leverage their name recognition into profitable branding tools and use them to land lucrative endorsement deals. Many have established careers in television and film and, in some cases, launched their own companies. Part of their success is their ability to reach audiences, black and white, through a variety of platforms, including cable and network television, DVDs, feature films, comedy albums, and stand-up acts.
Black comedians have come a long way since the days of vaudeville and the old “chitlin circuit,” which gave birth to legendary comics such as Redd Foxx and Jackie “Moms” Mabley. For the most part, they were relegated to performing at black nightclubs and theaters. Over the past few decades, however, there have been some notable exceptions. Among them are Bill Cosby and Flip Wilson (1960s), Richard Pryor (1970s), and Eddie Murphy (1980s). Wilson, for example, starred in The Flip Wilson Show, a variety show that lasted four seasons on NBC and brought his outrageous brand of burlesque humor to the mainstream. He was the first African American to gain major popularity as host of his own variety hour. He even appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1972. In the 1980s, Murphy broke through to mainstream television, reviving a tired Saturday Night Live with memorable skits such as James Brown in the hot tub, Buckwheat, and the pimp Velvet Jones. He’d soon go on to become one of the highest-grossing stars in Hollywood history.
But for every Wilson and Murphy, there were dozens of others who would end up strapped for cash. Redd Foxx filed for bankruptcy in 1989, and the IRS wasted no time seizing all of his possessions. At one point in his career, he owned several homes, a TV production company, a theatrical management firm, a Los Angeles nightclub, and a Hollywood beauty parlor. His financial woes continued until his death in 1991. When Redd Foxx suffered a fatal heart attack, Murphy, who’d always been inspired by the comedic legend, paid for his funeral.
Cosby was perhaps the first stand-up comedian to successfully brand himself and capitalize on his image through endorsement deals with Coca-Cola and Jell-O pudding. He knew the value of ownership as well and secured the rights to his animated series, Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. In fact, Cosby will continue to profit from the 30-year-old property later this month when the live-action remake of the hit cartoon is slated to reach the big screen. Cosby also produced The Cosby Show, which aired on NBC from 1984–1992. Among other things, it brought the stand-up comedian’s family-friendly humor to the mainstream. “If you want to talk about black comedians [who are] having the biggest impact on prime time [television, one of them] is obviously Bill Cosby,” says Marc Berman, senior editor at Mediaweek, noting that there was only one sitcom in the top 10 ratings when The Cosby Show premiered. “It completely rejuvenated the comedy genre. It was the No. 1 show for five years in a row. The only other time [that occurred] in the history of television [was with] All in the Family.”
Cosby wasn’t the last to make a mark on the small screen. Russell Simmons and HBO partnered in the early 1990s to produce Def Comedy Jam. The show took then-unknown black comedians, such as Martin Lawrence, Tucker, and Rock, and turned them into household names with both white and black audiences. FOX’s In Living Color, the brainchild of Keenan Ivory Wayans, catapulted the careers of his siblings and of funnyman Jim Carrey.
Another comedian who shot into the mainstream as a result of the show is Jamie Foxx. Now a leading man in Hollywood, Foxx starred opposite big names such as Al Pacino, Tom Cruise, and Will Smith and took the lead in Ray, the Ray Charles biopic released by Universal Pictures in late October. Foxx credits much of his mainstream success to the exposure he received on In Living Color. “Anybody who was on In Living Color — that was the
best TV you could have had. It was black folks doing smart black things. Keenan Ivory Wayans was an African American man with African American people running the show. I learned from him that a black man can be successful, but I also learned from him that we have to be the best at what we do. If you’re mediocre, they won’t buy it.” Foxx subsequently created Laffapalooza!, a comedy showcase for the Showtime cable network.One of the most significant comedic events occurred in the mid-90s, when entertainment entrepreneur Walter Latham created The Original Kings of Comedy tour. Featuring Steve Harvey, Bernie Mac, Cedric The E
ntertainer, and D.L. Hughley, the tour itself would generate more than $40 million in profits, making it the highest-grossing comedy tour in history. The subsequent Spike Lee-directed film and DVD grossed $41 million and $80 million, respectively. Just as important, it was accepted by the masses, regardless of race. “Def Comedy Jam had already done what it had done in the early ’90s, and those [comedians] were able to go on to theaters and sell out because of the exposure they had gotten from [the show.] But that was as big as it had gotten,” says Latham. “So my idea was to see how much further we could take it. The idea was to take three or four guys into basketball arenas and see if we could sell tickets.” And they sold — lots of them. New York City’s Madison Square Garden sold out in advance while Washington, D.C.’s MCI Center sold out all four nights there was a performance. It was also the hot ticket in Chicago and Los Angeles.
The level of the tour’s success surprised even the performers. “You knew that if you were doing $40 million in the box office, that wasn’t just your African American audience,” says Cedric. “It definitely broadened out. That was really our introduction into the mass market, like, ‘Whoa, it was bigger than I thought.'” For Mac, born Bernard McCollough, the tour led to numerous appearances on television and film, as well as his own successful sitcom, The Bernie Mac Show, which he produces. Entering its fourth season, Mac sees syndication on the horizon as well as endorsement deals with Pepsi and Nike. For Cedric, Mac, and many others, comedy has become serious business.
Harvey sees himself as a businessman with a knack for making folks laugh. Judging from his accomplishments, that’s an accurate description. One of the four Kings of Comedy, Harvey has tapped into several revenue streams, both inside and outside of the entertainment industry. Among his enterprises is Nu-Opp Inc., a Hollywood-based production startup that, while still in its infancy, has generated about $500,000 this year. Nu-Opp. produces Steve Harvey’s Big Time, a variety show that airs on the WB, and the Hoodie Awards, a show that honors local business establishments, religious leaders, churches, and high schools for their contributions to the community. Harvey’s company also produces Pulled Over, a reality makeover show for family cars, which airs on E!
Aside from Nu-Opp, Harvey owns Steve Harvey Products, a clothing line that includes suits, ties, shirts, shoes, and hats sold through boutique stores and Rich’s and Lazarus Stores, part of the Federated Department Stores chain. While many of the clothing items launched this year, Rushion McDonald, Harvey’s business manager, says buy orders already range between $1.5 million and $3 million.
Harvey’s recognition of the business side of comedy started fairly early in his career. “I started thinking of ways I could take advantage of the talent of jokes and comedy and spin it off and produce
shows, and manage other talent, and do movies, and do radio, and do TV, and then step out and invest in land,” he says. Harvey owns nearly 3,000 acres of land in Texas that include 48 natural gas wells. “When I’m done [with comedy], I want to build this huge real estate empire, production empire, management empire, publicity empire, and just have it all stem from that one little thing that we take not so seriously called a joke.”When Harvey first started out in entertainment, he wanted to be known as one of the top stand-up comedians in the country. After some time, his goal changed, and he and McDonald decided to consider other entrepreneurial endeavors. “You start looking at other opportunities that are available to you and, if you’re smart, then you start saying ‘OK, I probably won’t be able to tell these jokes all my life, nor do I want to be 75 and trying to sell myself to an audience of people in some city for 5,000 people to come and see me,'” says Harvey. “So you start looking at ways to branch out. I always had a great entrepreneurial spirit.”
Harvey says the key to success in business is sticking with what you know. “You can’t ever steer too far away from what it is that you truly do. If you start off in hair care products, you might [be able] to go into skin care but you can’t really go open up a bakery,” he advises.
For Cedric — whose real name is Cedric Kyles — comedy is more than just acting up. It’s about leveraging opportunities. In addition to endorsement deals with McDonald’s and Budweiser, he co-owns A Bird and a Bear Entertainment, a production firm that recently inked a three-year, multimillion-dollar deal with MGM. In the deal, MGM has the rights to first refusal on any projects with Bird and a Bear in return for an undisclosed seven-figure sum. The 2-year-old company’s first effort was the feature film Johnson Family Vacation. With a budget of $13 million, the film grossed $31 million at the box office. Cedric and business manager Eric Rhone hammered out an arrangement with MGM that should net their firm as much as $5 million from the $10 million to $15 million anticipated from the movie’s DVD sales.
Back-end deals like these, however, can be complicated and risky. “Your front end is determined by the value that you feel you add to the film — that you know where it’s going to land right off the top. Up-front payment is negotiated early on, but Bird and Bear gambled that its first film would be a profitable one and opted for less cash up front in return for a portion of the DVD sales — the back end,” Cedric explains. “The risk is that if the film is unsuccessful, it won’t generate enough in the box office or in video sales to generate back-end residuals. This [film] paid off.”
For Cedric, the route to entrepreneurship was about control and ownership. “That was the reason Bird and a Bear was formed; in order to develop some films, develop some ideas, to have a certain Cedric The Entertainer kind of energy to them,” says the comedian. “We can control the style of the movie and its content and its characteristics. Often, especially as African Americans, [we’re] accused of doing things on-screen that [are] considered buffoonery or something to that nature. Well, that’s really determined by the writers and the powers — the people writing the check.”
While he says he was inspired by the likes of Pryor
from a comedic perspective, Cedric doesn’t wish to make some of the same mistakes. “He had individual film production deals. He had people who were putting up money and he had money set behind him,” says Cedric. “I remember the deal he had with Jim Brown. He had a studio deal that was going to afford them $30 million to $40 million worth of film and that kind of thing. It’s just unfortunate that, in those times, for whatever reason, they never really reached any kind of heights with it. I think that nowadays in the world, most comedians understand that they build their business. They look at themselves as an industry.” Cedric is currently wrapping up a film based on the 1950s sitcom The Honeymooners, which stars Mike Epps, Gabrielle Union, and Regina Hall. The film has a $30 million to $33 million budget.Feature films are like the Holy Grail for many comedians — potentially the most lucrative and highest-profile medium in the world of entertainment. Mo’Nique Imes-Jackson is one comedienne who’s breaking into films while pursuing other business ventures. Her film credits include the MGM comedy Soul Plane; Showtime’s Good Fences with Whoopi Goldberg and Danny Glover; 3 Strikes with David Alan Grier and George Wallace II; Baby Boy by director John Singleton; and Two Can Play That Game opposite Vivica A. Fox, which earned her an NAACP Image Award nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture. She’s currently starring in the lead role of the comedy Hair Show co-starring Gina Torres and The Bernie Mac Show’s Kellita Sm
ith.
Mo’Nique also hosts Showtime at the Apollo and co-owns Ten Times Greater, a production company she founded with her brother. And if that wasn’t enough, she has a clothing line for plus-sized women in the works. A one-woman marketing machine, Mo’Nique often wears her own clothing — particularly when on camera or in front of an audience. And in April of last year, she authored a book titled Skinny Women Are Evil: Notes of a Big Girl in a Small-Minded World (Atria; $13.00), which became a New York Times bestseller.
The entrepreneurial roots run deep for the former star of UPN’s The Parkers. When she first performed in nightclubs in her hometown of Baltimore in the late 1980s, she said she autographed black-and-white posters of herself for $3 in order to help make ends meet.
Mo’Nique has had her share of business failures. For instance, a clothing line she tried a few years back went under. “I thought I could just make some clothes [and] put them on a Website and have a clothing line — wrong,” she says, conceding that the line suffered due to substandard workmanship and her inability to size clothes. A nightclub venture also didn’t pan out. “I used to own a comedy club, but back then I didn’t know how to run a business,” the comedienne recalls. “I knew how to have fun. Baby paid no bills.”
This time, she did her homework. She learned the business and worked out things like marketing plans. “Now, there are other people involved who are experts in [producing] clothing lines, so we can get it done right.” She’s working toward a 2005 launch.
For Mo’Nique, business is about ownership. “Remember the Power Rangers? You know those kids really made no money?” she points out. “They had lunch boxes — everything was a Power Ranger at one time. But they had no control of the business, so someone else generated money off of those kids. I don’t want that to happen to me.”