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Cedric the Entertainer on How His Ralph Kramden Differs from Jackie Gleason's: "I think my Ralph, again, is not as gruff as he was in [the TV series] and not as irritable as he played it. The difference was that I thought that [since it was set in the ?50s and ?60s, for whatever reason it was not politically incorrect for him to threaten to beat his wife or any of those things. So that helped that he was so angry all the time, and then he can go, 'Alice, you know?' But you can?t really do that nowadays."
Improvising on the Set of "The Honeymooners:" "That really happened once John [Leguizamo] came on the scene because Mike [Epps] and I were there, we were working and we were doing it and having our rhythm. Then Leguizamo came and he had a character. Again, he wasn?t tied to the show or any of these historic characters in any way. He was just a guy. So he would come on the set and just be blowing it up. We were like, 'Oh, hell no.'
I mean, a lot of the stuff that you see like the montage scene where we?re kind of training the dog and all that stuff... No, we were not doing [anything] on the page. 'We?re going to redo this.' We could get some funny stuff in there and have a good time and it was great. He?s an extremely talented guy and a great actor and he was just a lot of fun to have on the set. I was really glad to have him a part of the cast."
Handling the Pressure of Being an Executive Producer: "You know, the main thing about when you get the producer credits and especially as executive producer, you just want to be able to have some say so in the direction.
You all noticed that there was like five writers on this movie and that was really the hardest thing, was trying to get the right voice for Mike and myself and how we wanted to do it.
This movie took about 18 months to really develop. This was after we got on board. So to even find the right attitude or direction that we thought we were going in, the executive producership gives you at least the power to say, 'I don?t like this. We got to do this this way.' Without that, you just really gotta go with what the studio says. That was what you find the most important, and then also to be involved in the casting so I was able to get Gabrielle [Union] as my wife, which was very important to me."
Upcoming Projects: "'Mr. Lucky' is set at Revolutions. Bruce Willis and myself. We?ve actually moved it. We were going to shoot it right after this next movie I?m doing, but Bruce Willis is now going to do 'Die Hard 4' so we?re going to shoot that at the top of next year. That?s exciting.
'Flash' was an MGM project that is now going over to Sony. We?re still talking about it. That?s a project for Nelly and myself and I think it?ll probably get hot now once people see 'Longest Yard' and see how great a job Nelly did in that. But we?re both from St. Louis and we were looking for an opportunity to do something together. 'Flash' is not the comic book but it?s about him being this young character, Flashy, that ends up being a track runner. That?s Nelly. Nelly is Flashy. I?m the coach. I?m the guy who ends up pulling him from his street life and leading him into this world of professional running.
You know, we like Nelly. We think he has charisma. I think the guy, one, he sells a lot of records and he?s just really trying to go into this movie side and I think that we just recognized early on that he just has the kind of charisma that can be a star. And I think that people will like to see him on screen like that. And then again, we?re just looking for projects that we can do. Both of us are really St. Louis cats and we want to shoot a movie in the city and bring people to it. So it was just that kind of thing and so that?s one of the projects. We have a couple other things that we?re developing though."
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