Tyler Perry

The Madeafication of African-American storytelling from Tyler Perry and his imitators has been a depressing downward spiral, reducing important social topics to countrified nonsense, often chased with a heavy wallop of misguided religious justification. Though "presented" by Ty...

Earlier this year (2009), when his big screen comedy Madea Goes to Jail was exceeding all standard box office expectations, rumors had playwright/director/actor/industry Tyler Perry intent on finally "killing off" the gun toting, pot smoking, sassy old drag granny character once a...

In a shocking change of pace for Tyler Perry, "The Family That Preys" is, get this, a southern-fried melodrama, frosted with overbearing performances, low-budget production polish, and obscene displays of artistic and moral ineptness. It's nice see that Perry, in his fifth directori...

Watching them, you'd never question why Tyler Perry and his plays have become cultural phenomenons. After all, audiences eat up every Jesus jonesing word of their demographically corrent comedy. They laugh uproariously at every joke (no matter how cutting or corny) and they openly and l...

It's easy to understand why critics and certain audiences don't "get" Tyler Perry - he's not speaking to them. His is a demographic devoted to family, faith, and the foibles derived from both. He comes from a background that understands the urban experience, offering insights that even th...

Why Did I Get Married?" is Tyler Perry's best screen effort to date, which is to say it's comfortably mediocre instead of criminally intolerable. Last February's "Daddy's Little Girls" brought mogul/filmmaker Tyler Perry to his lowest point. Not only was the feature a cancerous, social...