By: Amanda Anderson-Niles
Comedian and actress Mo’Nique won an Oscar for her performance in “Precious,” but many have noticed that it was actually Gabourey Sidibe who started getting all the work.
The last time we saw Mo’Nique, she was hosting a “Love and Hip Hop” reunion. But now she claims the reason we don’t see much of her these days is because she was blackballed by Hollywood.
She tells the Hollywood Reporter:
“I got a phone call from Lee Daniels maybe six or seven months ago. And he said to me, ‘Mo’Nique, you’ve been blackballed.’ And I said, ‘I’ve been blackballed? Why have I been blackballed?’ And he said, ‘Because you didn’t play the game.’ And I said, ‘Well, what game is that?’ And he gave me no response. The next thing he said to me was, ‘Your husband is outbidding you.’ But he never asked me what [salary] we were asking for. You know, my husband and I had to change things so we wouldn’t have to depend on [others]. So we do it independently. We’re very proud of taking the independent route, and we have a movie coming out on April 24 called Blackbird.”
Mo’Nique then says Lee told her some of the studios told him they felt she was too difficult to work with, so she eventually lost her “Empire” role:
“Well, actually, I was offered the role in The Butler that Oprah Winfrey played. I was also approached by Empire to be on Empire. And I was also offered the role as Richard Pryor’s grandmother in [Daniels’ upcoming Pryor biopic]. Each of those things that he offered me was taken off the table. (Laughs.) They all just went away. But that’s just part of the business, you know? I can’t be upset at anybody, ’cause life is too good. It’s just what it is.”
After the interview went viral, Lee Daniels released a statement to THR and he says Mo’Nique’s refusal to promote “Precious” because she wasn’t getting paid to do so soured her reputation with the executives of numerous movie studios:
“Mo’nique is a creative force to be reckoned with. Her demands through Precious were not always in line with the campaign. This soured her relationship with the Hollywood community. I consider her a friend. I have and will always think of her for parts that we can collaborate on. However, the consensus among the creative teams and powers thus far were to go another way with these roles.”
I guess Mo thinks we forgot how ridiculous she acted during her Oscar buzz. She refused to promote the movie and was completely rude about it. She should not be surprised she turned off a lot of people.
Hollywood isn’t much different than corporate america. You have to play politics to survive. The moment she told people she wasn’t promoting that movie because they didn’t pay her extra, she sealed her own fate. There are stars bigger than her who had to promote films for free. She let her husband inflate her ego and now she’s been cut off.
I kind of figured this was the case. Most of us saw it coming especially after that speech.
Damn MO I got a awesome independent idea if your interested. Sorry to hear this.
It’s a pity she shot her own self in the foot, because those roles she was up for were/are all career making. Her resume would’ve been boss if she hadn’t let hubby blow her head up so big. Oh well, you live and learn!
Welcome to show business.
When you’re a black actress, you either play the game or they toss you out with the quickness. Black people don’t get the pass white actors get for being divas behind the scene. I hope she can rise above this and still win.
This! Now black actors and actresses get blackballed for any or everything see how those executives tried to label Kevin Hart and those hackers exposed them. But you have Woody Allen a child molester still making movies, Charlie Sheen who cursed out all of the Warner Bros. executives and never stop working, Katherine Heigel criticized producers, and writers and still got jobs and is now a lead in a tv series. Isaiah Washington said one homophobic slur ain’t had a role since Greys Anatomy. But people like Charlie Sheen and Neil Patrick Harris can call us n-ggers and still get work like nothing smh.
Sometimes you got to humble yourself and smile in your dreams later!
She’s very talented but she handled getting that Oscar all wrong. You play the game long enough to make those connections so you can start calling the shots eventually. There’s politics to play in every industry.
I knew it.
Hollywood is a tough business, especially for US. But MoNique handled it all wrong. And I can tell she still does’t get because she just threw Lee under a bus when he was only trying to be honest with her.