Romany Malco Talks ‘Last Vegas’ and PoliticsBy Max Evry
October 31, 2013
One of the most outspoken black actors in Hollywood, Romany Malco made a splash as one of the trio of dudes who helped Steve Carrel get laid in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” and solidified his fame as a regular cast member of Showtime’s hit series “Weeds.”
More recently he co-starred in the sleeper hit “Think Like a Man,” and this week plays host to Vegas tourists Robert De Niro, Michael Douglas, Kevin Kline and Morgan Freeman in the raunchy comedy “Last Vegas.” We talked one-on-one with the talented actor about these four acting legends going blue between takes, next year’s “Think Like a Man Too,” his own original internet self-help character Tijuana Jackson, and a controversial article he wrote for The Huffington Post.
Your character Lonnie seems to be a kind of concierge/high-profile client facilitator. Do these jobs actually exist and where do I submit my resume?
ROMANY MALCO: Yeah they do, they’re all over. Christian Ekunwe is the only Las Vegas host who operates from a wheelchair. I think a reality show might be made about this guy. He’s at the Palms. Being an actor you go there and meet hosts and you end up hanging out with them all the time whenever you’re there. These guys do it for a living, it’s what they do, and to be frank you don’t really experience Las Vegas until you have a host.
This is obviously a vision of an infinitely hospitable Las Vegas where everyone wins lots of money, gets comped hotel rooms and finds romance with a bevy of beautiful broads. How close have your Vegas experiences been to the one in the movie?
MALCO: I’m kind of a bit more on the reserved side of things. I’m one of those guys that grew up hunting and fishing, so I like to earn my kills, if that makes any sense. If you tee it up for me I’m probably gonna fall asleep.
You like working to get something.
MALCO: Exactly. There’s all the things that happen within that which are really fun, yeah.
The “Hangover” movies have prepped audiences for a much grimier, more cynical version of Las Vegas as this den of decadence straight out of Dante’s Inferno. What do you think an R-rated version of “Last Vegas” would have been like?
MALCO: An R-rated version of “Last Vegas” might have involved Mickey Rourke. (laughs)
And one of the geezers would die of a cocaine overdose with Mickey.
MALCO: Naw, you know if they wanted the R-rated version all they had to do was roll camera between takes, it was that simple. I am afraid to tell you because it may come back to haunt me. These guys were so grounded and down-to-earth like regular people, which is so refreshing in and of itself. It reminded me of “40 Year-Old Virgin” where things would come up in the conversation and we’d have to figure out a way to get it into the movie. Jon Turteltaub would be like, “Not in my movie!” (laughs)
You were shooting “Think Like a Man Too” in Atlanta around the same time this movie was shooting there as well. Did you, Jerry Ferrara and Michael Ealy just wander onto the set and get cast?
MALCO: That’s a nice game and I’d love to play it but to get the facts right “Think Like a Man Too” started after “Last Vegas” and it shot the entire time in Las Vegas. There might have been a two week break from one job to the next one.
Where is Zeke when we find him at the beginning of this new “Think Like a Man”?
MALCO: The relationship’s evolved. They’ve been together for quite awhile now and you’re finding you’re in a situation where things have changed. All the issues you work through in the beginning and the newness of it is gone. There’s a different type of excitement, you know how people get during weddings, and then having to contend with those dynamics. Pretty interesting.
At the end of the first one you guys had learned a lesson or two about how to treat women and vice versa. In what new ways does part two challenge precepts of African American masculinity?
MALCO: That’s a good question. I think one of the things it does, in my opinion… I shouldn’t say this because I don’t want to speak harshly about a film but a lot of the times minorities –African Americans particularly- are portrayed as having two dimensions, or having a very binary perspective on things. You’re either this or you’re that, right? One thing you can’t deny is in the Steve Harvey book “Think Like a Man” we showed you many aspects of black men, and in “Think Like a Man Too” we expound upon that and go deeper into it. It really bugs me sometimes when I see a film where people in a black household don’t address issues in a constructive way, whereas we get a whole movie that’s not only addressing issues but working through them and coming to a point of resolve. The master narrative of a man as a whole is you take a stand, you stick your chest out, you do this, you do that… I feel as though I’m in a film that’s trying to dissipate that master narrative and rewrite it, redefine what that means. You’re looking at black men who are sincerely in love with their women and being forced to address and talk out their emotions to come to a resolution that’s healthy for both them and the person they love without there needing to be someone shot or cheating.
You wrote a very eloquent article for Huffington Post about Trayvon Martin, while your character Tijuana Jackson seems to be a more sly way of articulating some of your socio-political views on politics, corporations, etc. Are you able to channel more subversive honesty as Jackson than as yourself?
MALCO: You’re the first person I’m telling this to: That WAS Tijauna Jackson. I was going to write a really specific article addressed to nobody but a very ratchet subculture that’s misrepresentative of black culture as a whole. I don’t apologize for it, but if I was given a chance to articulate it I would have written this article in completion to that ratchet subculture. I was actually working on it. What happened was I had written it initially as a rant, I thought I could do it as TJ, but either way I’m getting it to that subculture. I showed it to an editor, trusted her, and normally she’ll say “Scratch that, keep this,” and over the course of a month we’d write an article. She submitted it to The Huffington Post within 20-minutes of me giving it to her and all I saw was an e-mail in my box that said, “You’ve now become a blogger with Huffington Post.” I was like, “What?” I instantly called my publicist Jenny Weinman, and she said, “They’re still your words, it doesn’t matter, get in front of it, not behind it.” That’s what I did. I don’t apologize, I still feel in the same way about that ratchet subculture. I feel it was unfair that it was presented as if it were all of black culture. No. There’s a certain demographic that is detrimental to the master narrative of what it means to be black. I don’t apologize and as far as I’m concerned it’s my job to piss people off.
Last time we talked you were just beginning to Tijuana Jackson to life. You now have dozens of videos and the character seems to have morphed from the standard self-help powersuit to a little more thug life. How did that character evolve and how did the live performances inform what you were doing?
MALCO: There’s so much to be said now because you’ve actually brought up some real questions and I appreciate it. Here’s the deal: My issue with a lot of entertainment today, with the news, the way America perceives things, it’s very “either/or”. A very binary perspective. You’re either the good guy or the bad guy, the whore or the God-fearing Christian. Those things take precedence over the real issue so when the country gets manipulated into being divided over things that, at the end of the day, do not matter, they just seem to when you’re emotional. What I use Tijuana Jackson to do is… Look, a person’s parents don’t put you through certain things. Your parents don’t put you through hardships because they were bad people, and just because they took you to church doesn’t make them saints either, but we address the world like that and that’s what I use Tijuana Jackson to break that pattern. I got advice from very flawed people growing up, and it couldn’t be that bad ’cause you’re on the phone with me right now. (laughs) That’s what Tijuana Jackson is, he’s preaching what he needs to learn, passionately sharing and researching real ideals and practices that are gonna help that person and hopefully you in the process.
You can talk about things like corporate responsibility and GMOs and get away with it because it’s more a “do as I say, don’t do as I do” type thing.
MALCO: Absolutely, he’s trying to do it too, but guess what: just because you’re on a diet doesn’t mean you don’t slide off the diet. Do you think all reverends haven’t said a few curse words during their practice? C’mon dude. But I didn’t write that article so conservatives could throw it into their agenda. I was writing it specifically to the ratchet culture, and me an TJ go deep with ratchet. Unfortunately it was published without my permission, but I thought it was hilarious thing that people on both sides were using it to torment people rather than address that a 17-year-old child was murdered. A lot of people who cheered that and were happy with the verdict are the same people speaking out against abortion, which is confusing as hell. Christopher Cervini, who was an Italian kid shot by a black neighborhood watchman, he was actually caught breaking into cars. I have done a helluva lot worse, I was lucky to get a second chance. I can’t justify the death of either of these men whether it’s Trayvon or Christopher Cervini because when you’re a kid you do things, whether it’s breaking into cars or loitering in your father’s neighborhood. I don’t understand how anyone in their rational thinking can justify the murder of a child. I think that’s where me and a lot of the other people emotionally invested in this case differ. Just because I don’t see it your way doesn’t make me a Zimmerman sympathizer or anything else. That’s the binary way of thinking we’ve fallen into, and that’s the trap that inhibits us from ever addressing the issues.
“Last Vegas” opens everywhere this Friday.
