As unsparing as Katt Williams was last month when he nearly broke the Internet, laying low a swath of comedians in his path, Mo’Nique fired some nuclear blasts on former football player Shannon Sharpe’s “Club Shay Shay” podcast.
During a nearly three-hour interview Wednesday, Mo’Nique went off on several A-list comedians and elaborated on some ongoing feuds in a new podcast. She also concurred with “everything Katt Williams sat up here and said” when he was on the podcast in January.
“We all know it to be the truth. However, we get so caught up in, ‘Well, I ain’t gonna say nothing. Can you believe he said it?’… It’s the messenger, baby. We get so caught up in the messenger that we’ll overlook the message. People have a hard time hearing a 5-foot-5 giant tell the truth; people have a hard time with a Black woman over 200 pounds tell the truth. People that look like us, we should just be grateful we got invited to the party.”
Like Williams, the Oscar-winning star of the movie Precious went in on Kevin Hart but also had pointed words for Tiffany Haddish and Oprah Winfrey.
Haddish made references to Mo’Nique’s husband/manager, Sidney Hicks, that clearly offended the comedian.
“It’s like, Tiffany, if you had a husband like mine, you may not have two DUIs,” she said. “If you had a husband like mine, you may not be caught up in what looks like you could have been grooming a child.”
The comedian turned to Winfrey, who had invited estranged family members of Mo’Nique’s to her talk show in 2010, saying, “You betrayed me, sister. Family is sacred, and we don’t cross the line with family.”
Her comments on Hart weren’t as severe, though she has issues with him too.
She said Hart had offered to partner with her to executive produce any projects she wanted but later recanted, allegedly communicating through his manager that he didn’t want “anything to do with” her. Hart said that was a “miscommunication” but never followed up in the two years afterward.
She gave Hart what she called “proper credit” for giving her money when her family was financially tight.
Mo’Nique said she still feels blackballed by Hollywood and contended that she would have received many more opportunities if she were white.
“If I was a white woman, my name would be Melissa McCarthy,” she said. “Same track record. Five-year sitcom in syndication. Same track record. The opportunities are not the same.”
In that vein, Mo’Nique also took time in her conversation with Sharpe to empathize with actress Taraji P. Henson, who has clashed with Hollywood over pay inequities. She said she and Henson had talked about the subject 10 years ago. After years of boycotting Netflix, because she said they lowballed her while offering white and male stand-up comedians better money for the same work, she settled with the streaming service in 2022. Mo’Nique debuted her first special on Netflix, My Name is Mo’Nique last March.
“Taraji and I had a conversation over a decade ago in my trailer when I was doing The Mo’Nique Show,” the comedian said. “And she said, ‘You know, you gotta keep on getting it until your turn comes.’ And I said, ‘Taraji, most of us die before our turn comes. We gotta ask for it right now.’ Now, I understand that because there was a time I felt the same way because that’s what I was told.”
Mo’Nique also gently chastised Henson for making conciliatory remarks to Winfrey when it was clear to the comedian that Henson and Winfrey’s relationship was strained.
“We know you were mistreated,” Mo’Nique said. “We know it wasn’t right. We know it was unfair. And then you turned around and say, ‘Oh, but Lady O handled it.’ I have a problem with that. That allows Lady O to keep doing what she’s doing and we’re in a position of, ‘I don’t want to say nothing because we saw how Mo’Nique got whooped.’ “
