RAIN PRYOR
Daughter Of The Crazy One
By Belinda Trotter-James
Most children of famous entertainers
are kept invisible from the curious eyes of the public. The world can look pretty cruel through the
eyes of a child watching a photographer almost break his neck to get a
photograph of a celebrity’s child.
Richard Pryor was one of those entertainers who kept his children
invisible. Of course fanatics probably
could tell you all about the iconic comedienne along with his personal life and
I’m sure the children did make an appearance with their father here and
there. However, the typical fan only
wanted Richard to make them laugh. Now
that he is no longer with us on this earth, we look to the children to carry on
the legacy. In a one woman play Richard
Pryor’s baby girl takes the stage with sheer genius as she lets us into her
world, through her eyes in a moment in time in the early years as a biracial
child invisible to her father’s fans.
A child of a famous entertainer may
sometimes be looked upon to do the same thing the same way like their famous
parents. I asked Rain if people looked to her to be like her father. "No, I think they assume I’m like him
and then they realize that there are similarities but she's different; I’m my
own person. I'm a woman first of all so that definitely blows them away”, says
Rain.
In her own right Rain Pryor is a
director, actor, producer, educator, mother and standup comedian. She
definitely is her father’s child. What
advice did Richard give to her about being a woman in the business that we call
entertainment? She replied, "He told me to be honest and to stick to
my guns. Be honest to myself in everything that I do. That taught me a lot because although it may
seem at times like the road really gets slow and treacherous, integrity is so
important. It might take me longer to get to the destination, but I preferred it
that way.”
Rain wrote a book entitled Jokes My
Father Never Taught Me, subtitle: Life, Love and Loss with Richard Pryor.
"I started writing the book before he passed and then the book came out a
year after he passed and it never hit the urban markets”, says Rain. Since the book never reached the urban
market, she brought a few copies from her publisher and did it over
herself.
“First of all I was tricked into
doing it. I never wanted to do stand up. My dad always wanted me to do it and I
said to him, 'No, you're Richard Pryor that's ridiculous. I will act, I will
sing, I will dance and I will tell jokes in between all of that, but I will not
do stand-up.’ Then one night about six
years ago after doing my solo show many times, everyone would always tell me
that I am doing stand up in my solo show. So friend of mine asked me to open
for them and just do five minutes of my solo show. Then as I went onstage my father whispered to
me, ‘Now do five minutes of standup’ and I've been doing it ever since."
That’s right folks; she nailed it in
her own comedic, original way. Richard
threw his daughter into the water and she swam like the pro she was born to be.
They tapped into her talent and Rain found out she was good. "There are
moments when you're not so good and I've had those moments. I was at a place
where I was working things out. Now I'm at the point where I am the headliner and
I do very well. I just keep working on
more material. I work on new material all the time by doing it different ways
to see what works. It's a constant grind."
Rain explain that it's a process developing
new material. Comedians would go to the small
venues and work it out. When they work out
new material sometimes they do hear crickets in the audience. Sometimes the
audience don’t get the jokes and it happens to the best of them. "Sometimes
you just get that feeling from the audience and it's a feeling that you don't
want to get", says Rain. She remembered watching comedians like Chris rock
and Tracy Morgan work out their material and not get the laugh and then that's
when you realize it's a work in progress. Rain explained, “They're working on a
show; they're working to get to that point. The people you see in those clubs
are all working out materials so that when you see them on the road, it's a
complete show. The process that goes into it is not always great; you get
great. They get the laugh and it gets good.”
Every comedian has their own style
and way of doing things to get the audience on the same page. "I’m doing
something different”, begins Rain. “I’m
not doing hip-hop humor, I’m not doing what I call drop-it-like-it's-hot humor.
It's not who I am; it's not what my destiny is about. I'm just trying to be my own person.”
There is one thing you can't buy in
the entertainment business and that's the critics view on your work. The New
York Times loved Rain's one woman show entitled Fried Chicken And Latkes.
It's a look into a moment in her life. What makes one want to do a one
woman show? It takes something that happens in one's life to plant the seed to
allow a show like this to grow. "The inspiration came from countless of auditions
where I was getting roles here and not getting roles there and then one day my
mentor, Melvin Van People's said to me, ‘If you want something to happen then,
create it for yourself.’ So, I started
to write the show. When I performed it the first time, I thought I wrote a
drama but people laughed and I thought, ‘Oh my God I wrote a comedy! My life to
them is funny.’ That's when I knew I had something there. It's been a wonderful
train ride. It's been something that I've
been working on for the last 15 years and it has completely evolved to what you
see off-Broadway. Now my goal is to take it to Broadway for a limited
run.
In order to get her show
to Broadway Rain has to come up with a lot of cash which should be no
problem for the legacy of Richard Pryor.
Fans definitely want to see Mr. Pryor’s baby girl on stage to hear about
her life growing up as Richard Pryor's little girl. Rain is very careful not to
shout from the rooftops that Richard Pryor is her father in order to open up
doors, however it is what it is. If
that's the door that she has to open, then so be it. "There is something
to be said about recognizing that he's my dad and to honor that Legacy by kind
of being on my own”, explains Rain. “My
dad was really about that. I had regular jobs growing up, we had to clean our
rooms and we had to learn how to cook. He was about making you do it on your
own. He never gave a hand out. However he did take us shopping or if we ever
needed money of course he would give it because he was that type of dad.
However he really was about instilling in us that you need to make it on your
own if you're going to make it. He wanted to see if you had the guts."
In seeing Rains perspective on how
she was raised by her father I see that we, the audience, look at Richard Pryor
as this major entertainer and she looks at him as just her dad and that's why she
or probably many other children of entertainers do not raise the flag of who
they are all the time. Some of them use it only when necessary and they should.
It's their right; it's their legacy. However once they get through the door,
its show time! "In my mind I guess this is why I have not connected
the two together. I look at him as my dad. I don't look at him as Richard Pryor
like everyone else sees him. The last thing on my mind is to push his name
because he's my dad. When you can make it on your own, that says a lot about
you.”
Rain's documentary, That Daughter’s
Crazy, is a play on the words from one of her father's albums, That Ni**er’s
Crazy which is circulating through the film festival circuit and will be in
Chicago on August 15 and 16. It was
definitely a labor of love that we worked on for the last year and it's finally
being shown. It's not my dad’s story; it’s my story and what it was like to grow
up a Black, Jewish girl via the entertainment business.
At this time in her life she is very
happy. She's a mom, who has a beautiful baby girl who did give her an
indication on what she would like to do when she grows up. “She told me she wants to be a chef and open
a restaurant when she grows up and I said, ‘Wow, you are my Princess’. She has
an easy bake oven and she's determined to help out in the kitchen. She also takes
dance classes. After one of her recitals
she said to me, ‘Mommy I don't know if I really want to do this.’ I replied, ‘You don't have to do it. You can
be whatever you want to be. Do you know what you want?’ She said, ‘Yes, I think I want to be a chef.
I think I want to have my own restaurant,’ and I said, “Okay.”
Aside from being a mommy she has a
fantastic boyfriend in her life, really good business relationships, great
friendships and an awareness that when something doesn't feel right she can sense
it quicker than she could in the past. She revealed that she just got rid of
some people in her life that did not feel right. “I just got rid of someone
that I worked with for a long time because they stole money from me. They took
it at a time when I really could've used it.
It's funny that instead of me harboring feelings of being angry, upset
or bitter... I don't know that I'm bitter, but I am angry. I'm at a different place in my life now where
I feel sad for them. I feel sad for someone that has to do that to another
human being. I think my spiritual path is so strong because I practice an African
Nigerian tradition called Yuruba. Being on a path where you're connected
spiritually definitely helps you get through life’s challenges.”
I wish more people knew how much
being spiritually connected really strengthens you and gets you through some of
life's challenges. When things happen to us and we are asked to forgive and
send love and light to that person, however it's a challenge for some to do
that.
"That's a good point because I
think most people misconstrue why you need to forgive. People have to
understand that forgiveness is not for the person; it's for you. There are
several levels of forgiveness and it doesn't mean that you forgot the incident
or the transgression. It just means that I understand you are sick, incapable
and lousy. That's where they are, that's what they had to do and that's how I
feel about the people that hurt me. That's the sick world they're living in. I
wouldn't want to live in that world where I would have to take from someone
else, take a life from someone else or would take money from someone else.
That's their world and their Karma to deal with and I still have to continue on
with my right path which is to be in and of integrity at all times no matter
what.”
The world is a complex place of
challenges, tests, obstacles, problems and pain. However, you don’t have to live in that world
if you don’t want. (That’s another
topic.) There is always light at the end
of the tunnel full of love, laughter, fun, light, joy, happiness and abundance
beyond your wildest dreams. Hang on to
that thought and watch what happens. On
that note… you can continue having conversations with Rain on Twitter, check
out her website at http://www.rainpryor.com and definitely see her in action in her
one woman show and on the comedy stage.
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