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    Friday, April 26, 2024

    Marlon Wayans on his latest Netflix horror comedy, Dave Chappelle's attacker, helping his stand-up friends

    Marlon Wayans (Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images/TNS)

    Marlon Wayans loves a good scare but he wouldn't tolerate anyone attacking him on stage the way Dave Chappelle was earlier this month at a comedy festival.

    "That was crazy," Wayans said in a brief interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "I love how that guy got his butt beat. He was like a pinata."

    Wayans spends a lot of time in Atlanta shooting Netflix films. After comedies “Naked” (2017) and “Sextuplets” (2019), he last year produced what is tentatively called “Boo!” in metro Atlanta.

    He has a thing for horror and comedy, following the success of four "Scary Movie" films and two "A Haunted House" movies. In "Boo!," which is set to debut in the fall on Netflix, he plays a dad to a rebellious teenage daughter Sydney, played by "Stranger Things" star Priah Ferguson. She accidentally unleashes the spirit of Stingy Jack, the spirit of all jack-o'-lanterns and, as a result, Halloween decorations come to life. She reluctantly works with her dad to save the town and the world.

    "I love mixing comedy and horror," Wayans said. "You get to go horror, comedy, tension, tension, scare, then a joke."

    And he enjoys working with Netflix. "I like to work," he said. "They appreciate that I have a huge international audience."

    But he isn't exclusive to them. After releasing a stand-up special with rival streaming service HBO Max last year, he recently hosted a comedy stand-up special with them called "Marlon Wayans Presents: The Headliners." The five rising stars are all comedy club headliners who have not yet become household names: D.C. Ervin, Tony Baker, Chaunté Wayans (Marlon's niece), Sydney Castillo and Esau McGraw.

    "I wanted to give them a bigger audience," he said. "I love giving a showcase to my friends."

    He's proud that many of his films, no matter how silly or satirical, remain perennial favorites and draw new generations, be it the "Scary Movie" franchise, "White Chicks" or "Don't Be a Menace." His movies are largely critic proof, with those six films alone generating more than $540 million in collective domestic box office gross. They also became popular on DVD and basic cable.

    "You watch them today, they're still relevant," Wayans said. "We're not about a time. We're about the spirit of the culture. It's eternal."

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