The Last Black Unicorn - Tiffany Haddish Page 0,62
That’s what I get paid on a regular basis.”
Rumpelstiltskin: “Well, I guess you gonna be headlining this for yourself, you can just go on out there and headline for yourself.”
Tiffany: “Will do. You bet.”
And then I started headlining some shows and stuff, and I did pretty good. I guess he heard about how good I did, so he called me:
Rumpelstiltskin: “Well, I just want to apologize. Nigga, you out here getting it. You really doing things. I want to apologize. I was wrong the way I treated you.”
I thought that was cool of him, to admit he was wrong. Good for him.
But I had to earn that respect.
There was this other guy that pissed me off for a long time. Let’s call him “Cry Baby.” He’s a comedian you have heard of. When I was starting off, like twenty-two years old, I met him at an open mic. He said I had promise, but I needed to hang out with more comedians to get funnier. I was like, Cool, this guy’s trying to help me.
So he invited me to a taping at one of his shows for BET. Well, that’s what he told me it was. I’m thinking he is on the TV show. I get there, and it’s not his show at all. He was just doing the audience warm-up! After the show, he was all excited.
Cry Baby: “So what did you think?”
Tiffany: “I thought it was pretty interesting, it’s cool.”
Cry Baby: “You see how I’m the man up there?”
Tiffany: “You not the man, you the audience warm-up. You warm up the audience.”
Cry Baby: “Why you talking to me like that, bitch?”
Tiffany: “Why you talking to me like that?”
Cry Baby: “You disrespecting me?”
Tiffany: “You’re disrespecting me, what do you want from me?”
Cry Baby: “Girl, you know what I want from you.”
Tiffany: “I do know what you want, and guess what? You not my type. Your titties are bigger than mine, I’m not interested, it ain’t never going nowhere. So you just need to chill. We comedians, and that’s that.”
Cry Baby: “Man, fuck you, stupid bitch.”
I just kinda laughed it off. I know his feelings was hurt, but whatever.
But he and I were on the same club circuit at the time, and he was a bigger name than me then. So every time I seen him—for five years—he would bump me off of comedy shows.
If I was supposed to go up next, he’d tell the manager of the club, “No, I want to go up.” He’d bump me. It got me pissed, but I just held back and waited. I knew my time would come.
Four years later, we were at the Laugh Factory, and the Laugh Factory is my house. I host there, I headline there, it’s my home. So he tries to bump me off the show, and they wouldn’t bump me.
Cry Baby: “Yeah whatever, Tiffany, you finna go up there and bomb, you ’bout to ruin the whole thing for everybody, you suck. You ain’t no real comic.”
Tiffany: “Yes I am a real comic, and I’m about to destroy this room, and you gonna have a hard time following me.”
Cry Baby: “Please. You ’bout to eat ass, you ’bout to bomb.”
Tiffany: “You the only motherfucker be overeating in this bitch.”
Right before I went on stage, I prayed to God to make me as funny as possible in this one moment. If I’m never funny again, make me as funny as possible in this one moment, so I can shut this motherfucker up.
I did fifteen minutes, demolished it. I got a standing ovation, six people stood up for me, it was great. I came off the stage, and all the comedians were clapping. They had heard Cry Baby and me yelling at each other back and forth in the VIP area upstairs. So when I came off, they were all clapping for me like, “Yeah, nigga, you killed that, you did that, girl,” and I was like, Yeah I did. And it was his turn to go up next.
Cry Baby: “I can’t believe this shit. You making me eat my words.”
Tiffany: “Yep. Eat them. Eat them up like you eat all them free sandwiches.”
So then he went up onstage and he bombed, bad. And then he came back upstairs. He came up, gave me a big ol’ hug, he was like:
Cry Baby: “Man I am so sorry, Tiffany. Obviously somebody tried to teach me a lesson.”
Tiffany: “Yep. God trying to teach you today.”
Ever since then, we have been cool.