“I think that’s beautiful. That’s the great thing about comedy, when it works well, people on the total opposite side of the world is laughing at something that you did,” Shawn says, gauging his cultural reach. “I never thought it would reach that far. The social commentary that we were making was so specific, but the physical and the broadness of Don’t Be A Menace is what reached all across the ocean to the other side of the world and it’s what you guys enjoyed about it. Once people find out what we were doing, if they did their research and knew that we were parodying these specific movies, they’d probably get a bigger kick out of the movie.”
As for the stand-up show, Shawn and Marlon embody a reverence for the all-time greats. “Everybody from Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Lucille Ball to Jackie Gleason, Art Carney, Jerry Seinfeld, Bob Hope. A lot of the old school, great classic comics who paved the way for the Wayans family and everybody else who came after them. You definitely want to move forward, but was those people did was special. Even though that you want the future to be new, but you want it to be special as well. Taking a lot of the old school with the new never really hurt nobody. Now, comedy has reached a point where it’s more awkward than it actually is funny,” Shawn assesses. “I think we need to get back on track to funny, not awkward. Awkward ain’t really funny, it’s just awkward. This ain’t fashion – if you get a laugh you get a laugh. You’re not going to be outdated if it’s funny.”
The Wayans brothers, including Damon and Keenan Ivory, broke through in the late ‘80s with the landmark sketch TV series In Living Color – a program that proved fertile ground for some of the biggest names in entertainment. “I have to put it up there with the top shows because of its impact and what it did at that time, and how it still holds up even today. If you think about how many stars it launched from that one show – you got Keenan and Damon, Jim Carrey to Jamie [Foxx], J-Lo, me and Marlon, Tommy Davison, David Alan Grier, Sister Kim. So many different great careers that are still relevant today.”
Despite a rich pedigree of comedic talent on set, the frivolity is managed to be kept in check, as Shawn explains. “On the set we’re really about business. We have our fun, but we know that we have to come prepared, hit our mark, and do our scenes right because we’re under the gun. A movie like White Chicks was really difficult to do. Apart from the seven hours of makeup, we were shooting a movie that was supposed to be taking place in the summertime at The Hamptons, but we were in the opposite extreme weather. We were in Canada in below-zero weather by the ocean with a short skirt on, acting like it was hot out. There wasn’t a lot of laughing on those days. But sometimes we get giddy and have our scenes. But I’m glad you guys embraced it and enjoyed it, it was all worth it.”
While Australia gears up to witness the Wayans brothers on the live stage, it won’t be long before we witness new feature film offerings. “In the pipeline right now there are two things. Marlon has a movie coming out in January called A Haunted House, which is kind of like the movie Paranormal Activity. It’s like that movie, but if it happened to a black couple. He got that coming out, and I’m in the process of finishing up a script that I wrote with one of my writing partners and my brother. It’s under wraps, but it’s a comedy in the vein of what we do. I’m excited about it.”
BY LACHLAN KANONIUK
