It's hard to argue with Tyler Perry's success as a businessman. As bad as I think his movies are, and ultimately detrimental to African-American cinema in a certain way, Perry has molded himself a little corner of the industry that is consistently lucrative, putting out small budget flicks that always earn in the dozens of millions of dollars. I will never knock his ability to make money, and knowing how to make movies his audience wants to see.
Perry doesn't appear to be taking much of a break. In fact, he seems to be doing more than ever, already having Good Deeds on the verge of release, and The Marriage Counselor not too far behind it. That doesn't even include his inexplicable starring role in I, Alex Cross(should've been Idris Elba!!!!!). But with all that, Perry knows where his bread is buttered, and that is his cross dressing role as the smart mouthed granny, Madea. Perry is piecing together the cast for Madea's Witness Protection, and THR reports he's added Eugene Levy, Denise Richards, and Lil Romeo...er, Romeo Miller.
They'll join the previously cast Doris Roberts, Devan Leos, Tom Arnold and Danielle Campbell in the comedy that has Levy as an investor who goes into the witness protection program after his firm goes bankrupt due to embezzlement. He, along with his wife played by Richards, are forced to move from their wealthy Connecticut neighborhood down to Madea's home in the south. Romeo will play a character who blames Levy's for the loss of his church's investments.
This sounds awful, but it'll probably make bank regardless. Levy has never been all that funny to me in anything outside of Christopher Guest films, and the idea of him trading awkward barbs with Perry in drag make my stomach hurt.
