Chris
Rock had a great bit in his last standup special about the whole Siegfried
& Roy/tiger attack debacle where he observed “That tiger didn’t go crazy!
That tiger went tiger!” I keep waiting for Bernie Mac to go tiger. I got to
know the guy through his ultra-raw, raucous, and goddamn funny as shit standup
back in the days, and to say that the guy was another performer altogether is
putting it lightly. Granted, that type of stuff plays almost strictly to black
audiences, and you can’t blame a guy for “turning it down” to appeal to wider
audiences. But whether it was his eponymous sitcom (How did that show ever make
it to 100+ episodes? Seriously…Fox rescheduled this thing like it was an
appointment to catch AIDS.) or his many supporting turns in films since, he’s
struggled to reconcile the “friendly” Bernie Mac with the one that made people
give a damn about him in the first place. Perhaps the closest he’s come are the
Ocean’s
films, and those are glorified cameos.
But with
that franchise done for now, big paychecks seem to be the priority, and that’s
become clear with him signing up for Old Dogs, which needs no real
introduction for people reading this site. Walt Becker…Travolta…Robin
Williams…Azazel….you get the point. It’s gonna be bad. But while you’d think Mac would simply slip into the vacated “formerly explicit black comedian turned
bland presence” slot held by Martin Lawrence in Wild Hogs, Mac isn’t
signing on as a generic pal of the leads. He’s playing Johnny Lunchbox, here
regarded as a super-popular puppeteer that is adored by children. Um, ok. I
guess this takes place in the 80s?
Is it wrong to hope that Mac loses it on the set and goes "tiger" before being escorted off the lot?