OP-ED: Why We Line Up For Tyler Perry

The moderate-conservative columnist writes: "Angela Bassett is one of our finest actresses. She is such a master of the expression of human feeling that she doesn't need melodrama to communicate. Given that, why is Bassett starring in Tyler Perry's new comedy 'Meet the Browns,' which is so broad, so over the top and so given to sentimentality? Good question. 'Meet the Browns,' like the rest of Perry's movies, is a big commercial success. All told, his movies have grossed in the neighborhood of $500 million. The man is something of an industry. But the box-office boom is a mystery to many. You can almost hear the muttered question hidden somewhere under the words of the lukewarm reviews: 'Do those people really like this stuff?' As usual, they know not what they ask - or from whence its tradition comes. It is too basic to us all."

Mr. Crouch continues his commentary: "You see, Tyler Perry made his reputation on the theatrical chitlin circuit of community black theater - in which much is accomplished by putting a man in a dress, making fun of the pretentiously illiterate, writing dialogue that is extremely obvious, and filling the mouths of the characters with threats, putdowns and puns so heavy that one could not lift them if they took the form of barbells. Those black people who are not so estranged from Perry's kind of humor that they even find the inanely narcissistic 'Seinfeld' sophisticated find something in Perry far less corny than what one encounters in the mush-mouthed posturing of hip hop's thug icons. The reason is that Perry's work always features a heart as big as it is tough. Never misses. That quality is not so much ethnic as it is human and historic. Most of the situations and beliefs Perry presents have run through this country's comedy equivalent of bootleg liquor since the middle of the 19th century....What Perry has mastered is the perfect mix of buffoonery, anguish and spiritual redemption. He knows he can hold his audience with variations on slapstick, pies in the face and clown costumes as long as he does not avoid the sandpaper that has scraped the hearts of so many who are lost, living far above or all the way down at the bottom. Finally, Perry knows that he must take his characters and his audience back to the church, where the greatest use of the English language other than Shakespeare lives. It's right there in the King James Bible, where forgiveness and redemption are made more than real in the big feeling of those who truly believe and who live it by the day."

And more: "In Perry's work, we see the shallowness. We feel it. And, recognizing what is missing in these lives, we connect to something bigger. That is Tyler Perry's great secret: He knows how to bring trash and soul together in a way that doesn't make one get in the way of the other. Like it or not, that is some form of genius."