Urban Thought Collective

TV personality Wayne Brady releases debut R&B disc.
Presented by Electronic Urban Report.

Who is Wayne Brady? Is he a comic, an improv master, a TV host, a singer? Yes. Emmy-winning comedian and television personality Wayne Brady is a man of many talents. Just when you think you know him, he offers another very entertaining persona. Whether it’s comedy or drama, Brady has dabbled and done well. Tomorrow, Brady’s musical offering makes its debut in the form of the R&B CD “A Long Time Coming.”

Brady shot to fame thanks to his clever and quick improvisations on the hit ABC TV show “Whose Line Is It Anyway?,” which won him an Emmy – and his talk show, “The Wayne Brady Show” – which won him an Emmy. This year, Brady began hosting duties on the TV game show “Don’t Forget the Lyrics.” And now, Brady is currently on tour in support of his debut disc.

“I started doing musical theater when I was 16, and started acting at the same time, and started doing improv when I was 19,” Brady said of the basis of his talent. “I’m sure there were a lot of early things that I was horrible in, but I kept coming back. I think I had a natural affinity and a natural talent that would sometimes trump the fact that I didn’t know what I was doing and I was not good at it. So I just kept going back and going and going and auditioning for everything. Every time something wouldn’t work right, I would come back and try something else. Experience really is a good teacher, particularly in the realm of improv comedy. We did shows six nights a week and sometimes two shows a night, just because you’re hungry to do it and as long as you have an audience, you’ll go. So the first six nights, I sucked – maybe all six, then five, and then three. I started becoming better and learning what I was doing. So, by doing that, I got better and developed it by on-the-job training.”

The very persistent Brady continued that while he worked hard to hone his comedy skills, there is a bit of natural talent required in improv.

“There is a certain combination,” Brady said of the improvisation formula. When I teach improv class, I always say, ‘I’m not going to teach you to be funny.’ When I started learning improv, I think I brought something to the table. Not everyone can do improve, because it takes a certain level of intelligence. Coming from a background where I read everything I can get my hands on, I watch everything I can, I’m basically a receptacle of a lot of information, some of which is useless until I’m on stage. You have to be a learner to be able to do improve. It’s not about, ‘Hey, I just did a funny fart joke.’ It’s about the reference you can make while doing the fart joke. That’s what I think improve boils down to. ‘Whose Line’ is really about a bunch of nerds being funny and trying to one-up each other with cultural references, a character, or some bit of trivia that we can stick into the scene.”

Such commentary might be one of the reasons some consider Brady a celebrity elitist. It’s no secret that some consider him too mainstream or commercial – to be a black man.

“I think what happens is the same thing that has happened to me my entire life. My folks are from the Virgin Islands. I had a very strict island upbringing and my mother always told me to always hold my head up and to always try to be the best person in the room” Brady said in attempting to explain why some people react to him in that way. “That doesn’t mean that I’m going to be the best person in the room. There are so many people that tower over me in intellect and talent, but I just happened to get lucky. So I’m going to try to be the best person in the room…

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