You never know what you're going to get with comedian and actor Mike Epps. He could be funny, serious, inspirational and down right hilarious. But one thing is for sure, he's entertaining. The Indianapolis native had to go through a lot to get to Hollywood: from dropping out of school, being homeless, selling drugs and landing a chance meeting with Ice Cube that changed his life.
Best known for his role as Day-Day in the "Friday" series, Epps, 50, has played both serious and funny roles on the big and small screen and shows no sign of slowing down, including his comedy tour. But being in the business for over two decades has taught him a lot that he now tries to share with other.
“I’ve been in the business for 20 years now, and I guess in the 20 year span you typically learn everything you want to do," explains Epps to The Source. "I’ve just been a sponge in the business. I’ve learned how to adjust to certain situations and I got to give the credit to God for giving me the talent to do it; to be able to play one role and jump out of that and into another one. I'm a survivor of life. I try to give the glory to God and appreciate what's happening to me. But any role you see me playing, I draw from my own life in all of them: good, bad, sad and happy.”
"When I was a kid, Christmas time would come around and I’d want these toys and my mother used to say, ‘Y’all went crazy about getting all this stuff and it’s laying all on the floor- it’s all in the grass, you really didn’t want it did you?’ And what I learned from that is anything you think you want or need to have won’t necessarily make you happy and make you who you thought you would be. It actually put more pressure and stress on me, so I had to get it, see it, enjoy it and look at it, and say, ‘You know what, this is not what I got in the business for.’"
"I actually feel embarrassed for riding around in a $300,000 car that I thought I wanted. I bought a Ferrari and it’s so hard for me to drive that car because it’s so much attention and people look at you mad and crazy. I just got it to see if I wanted it and now that I got it, it ain’t nothing."
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"What I love to do, is getting satisfaction out of making people happy. That’s my real true love. That’s what makes me really happy. To come out on that stage and make people laugh that I do not know, have never seen in my life and they sit there laughing.”
"I come from a poor background, so everything I get, I feel like I have to share it. I’m learning now as an adult you can’t share with everybody. You can’t make this person happy, you can’t give them what they want, you can’t buy them, you can’t do none of that. You just have to be thankful that it’s yours and learn how to say no. I’ve had such a hard time saying no."
"I’m a Scorpio, we love hard, very hard, and our radar is always on trying to figure out who’s really there for us and sometimes it gets in the way cause we don’t get a chance to see because we put up a defensive side. And we’re usually right.”
