Deon Cole on Bernie Mac Passing, Damon Wayans, Bill Cosby Backlash
[youtube ytid=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DQLxHdp2-0?autoplay=1&w=580&h=385″ ]
Being a comedian from Chicago, Deon Cole was fortunate enough to have met and even performed on the same stage as Bernie Mac. Prior to his success, Cole says he saw Bernie 3 moths before his death at a local barbershop where the late comic often got his shoes shined. Cole admitted he gained respect from Bernie for following up his standup set, and the two often exchanged jokes whenever they ran into each other. Cole recalled their last conversation being a comical argument about Bernie’s tough love and decision to not give any handouts. “Bernie wouldn’t give you nothing because nobody gave Bernie nothing. He had [a] tough love like that.”
Another comic great that Cole says he interacted with and nearly broke his heart when he revealed his retirement from standup was Damon Wayans. During a run-in on an elevator in New York City, Wayans told Cole that he’d quit standup after receiving backlash over a Bill Cosby joke he did on the Breakfast Club. “It hurt me to see how sad he was in a sense because he told me he retired. He told me he retired from standup.” Cole says since then; Wayans was questioned about the EgyptAir plane that crashed in May and his response was simply, “I’m an American, I no longer have an opinion.”
source
