Currently airing on Showtime Sunday nights is the ten-episode second season of its acclaimed comedy series BLACK MONDAY.
The series is executive produced by Emmy® nominee and Golden Globe Award winner Don Cheadle, who stars with two-time Tony Award nominee and Grammy winner Andrew Rannells (Girls), Regina Hall (Little, Girls Trip) and Screen Actors Guild® Award winner Paul Scheer (Veep). The series is created by showrunners and executive producers David Caspe (Happy Endings) and Jordan Cahan (My Best Friend’s Girl). Emmy nominees Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg (Good Boys, The Boys) serve as executive producers.
Season one of the series followed Maurice “Mo” Monroe (Cheadle) as he and his group of outsiders took on the blue-blood, old-boys club of 1987 Wall Street, ultimately leading to the largest stock market crash in history, AKA Black Monday. Friends became enemies, traders became traitors, and two people became dead.
This season focuses on the aftermath: As we begin, Dawn (Hall) and Blair (Rannells) are the bosses now, quickly learning that heavy is the head that wears the crown, especially when that head is constantly looking over its shoulder for Mo, who’s on the run with Keith (Scheer). Who will go down for the crash? Who will go down for the murders? Who will go down for fleecing Mo? All will be revealed in season two.
For Cheadle, who previously headlined Showtime comedy series House of Lies, getting back in the comedy genre is enjoyable when it comes with a funny story, and great cast and a fun environment. After all, he’s playing a character in a show that is set in 1980s along with wearing outfits that most wouldn’t wear these days. Last seen on the big screen playing James Rhodes/ War Machine in Avengers: Endgame, Cheadle’s next film is opposite LeBron James in Space Jam 2, directed by Malcolm D. Lee.
In speaking exclusively with Blackfilm.com, Cheadle talks about season 2 of Black Monday.
For those who have not been watching the show, can you briefly describe the character you play and how much fun you have playing him?
Don Cheadle: I play a character named Mo Monroe, who last season was the head of a group called the JAMA group. This season, he’s not the head of anything. He’s trying to figure out how to get back in the game or if he’s going to get back in the game. But he is a dude who is all in and doesn’t really have a governor switch or a filter and he’s a dude who would rather have all of his chips in the middle of the pot with the last card to come and pray just to see what happens as opposed to knowing he’s going to win the pot. He’s an adrenaline junkie.
How much fun are you playing his character? How different it is from our last series because this is also a comedy.
Don Cheadle: Exactly. I’m having a lot of fun playing the character. I think he’s completely unhinged in a great way. Like I said, he’s all in. He’s all just impulse. He’s definitely the definition of shoot, ready, aim. Having the opportunity every day to be with Regina Hall, who plays Dawn on the show and all the other great cast Andrew Rannells, Paul Scheer, Ken Marino, Yassir Lester and Horatio Sands, the whole group is great. We have great guest stars this year. It’s just a completely over the top comedy.
Having done a comedy series before and you working alongside some gifted comedians, can you say you now have funny bones?
Don Cheadle: I think I always have funny bones. I think these shows give me the opportunity to really let the freak flags fly and just be all out there with obviously, as you say, comedians and really, really strong, both actors and improv artists who are able to do it all. So we we have a lot of fun on the show and we are in an environment with great producers who encouraged us to do it, They are joke whores in the best way and it’s a very best answer wins environment. So we have a lot of opportunity to bring our ideas to bear and they’re welcomed and desired and that’s not always the case.
The series is set in the 80s. What do you make of the outfits you’re given to wear?
Don Cheadle: Well, it really informs the character. It’s so much fun. It’s something I imagine when we look back on today, we’re going to say, “They were wearing that? Like they thought that was cute?” When I was growing up, these were jeans that didn’t hit your the top of your shoes; you were flooding. Now you’re just hip. So all of those things give us the opportunity to make fun of, to send up, and point to a time when things were very different. But also socially, to see how far, like our producers like say, often the show gives us the opportunity to see how far we haven’t come and things that we’re still dealing with.
When you’re in a comedy series and the jokes are written, do you do a number of takes before you know the jokes are hitting its marks?
Don Cheadle: There’s so many elements that are involved when you’re filming, Everything has to work together. And anyone who is in the chain in creating these moments, if it doesn’t work, the sound doesn’t work or the lighting doesn’t work or you flub a line or don’t hit your mark or the focus is off, there’s so many people and so many things that have to come together to make it actually work. It’s a miracle that it does, but it’s also why it takes 14 hours a day sometimes to accomplish. So you’re always trying to catch lightning in a bottle and always hit or miss. But when we have the professionals that we have, we have more opportunities to hit and miss. And that’s the great part about this show is the people that we are able to bring together. We can be very ambitious.
You seem to be balancing between films and TV. What goes into saying yes, when you decide to take on another series?
Don Cheadle: The same thing that goes into saying yes when I take on any role. It starts with the script, the character, the subject matter, is something that I think the world wants to know, is it going to be something that is going to allow me to extend myself as an actor, are these people that I want to spend this amount of my life with? And is it something that’s going to be challenging and ultimately rewarding? Yeah, all those other factors come into place. Now my kids are grown and out of the house and that used to be a big part of it. How much am I going to actually still be able to be in my family? I’m in a relationship that I’ve been in for over 20 years that I want to keep. I want to see my kids and able to be in their lives. Now they’re adults, and they’re out of the house. But all those things go into whether or not to saying yes to something.
How was working with Bridgid Coulter on the show?
Don Cheadle: It’s fun. We were in Rosewood together. She played my wife in that film and this one she didn’t play my wife. She’s the wife of a friend of mine, but it’s fun to work with her. We have a lot of fun. It’s good to be able to look over and have your partner right there.
What’s a good reason when people start catching up on Black Monday besides the fact that you’re in it as well as Regina and other cast members?
Don Cheadle: Well, because it’s not like anything else on TV. It’s very unique. It’s a sitcom on cable. It’s an R rated sitcom. House of Lies was very funny, but I think it was in the dramedy category. And that’s not a majority. It’s just different. But this one is completely different. One of the reasons David Nevins, the head of Showtime, loves it and one of the reasons that I think it works is “if a joke hits and you don’t like that joke, just wait a second, there’s gonna be another one that you will.” It’s just nonstop rapid fire.
How was working on Space Jam 2?
Don Cheadle: It was a cool experience. It’s about the people and I think the most fun I had on that was working with LeBron and working with CJ who who plays his son, just meeting two more you know really cool dudes to create with and they’re both really professional and got it and able to really bring some really cool performances to it.
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