Taraji P. Henson Says She Fired Her Entire Team For Not Capitalizing On The Success Of Her ‘Empire’ Character

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Taraji P. Henson Says She Fired Her Entire Team For Not Capitalizing On The Success Of Her ‘Empire’ Character


Taraji P. Henson in 'Empire'Fox via Getty Images

Taraji P. Henson, who has been speaking out about pay disparity in Hollywood, reveals she fired her entire team for not capitalizing on the success of her hugely popular Cookie character on Empire.
Henson starred as Cookie Lyon, the wife of former drug dealer turned hip-hop mogul, Lucious Lyon, played by Terrence Howard, on all six seasons of the Fox drama.


Henson slammed her previous team for not following up on the success of the fan-favorite character in recent interview with the SAG-AFTRA Foundation when she was asked what her best business move had been as an actress.

“Firing everybody after Cookie,” she said. “Everybody had to f—kin’ go. Where is my deal? Where’s my commercial? Cookie was at the top of the fashion game. Where is my endorsement? What did you have set up for after this? That’s why you all haven’t seen me in so long. They had nothing set up.”


Henson added that her team wanted her to headline another show revolving around the Cookie character, which she wasn’t opposed to if it was done “right.”

“All they wanted was another Cookie show, and I said, ‘I’ll do it, but it has to be right. The people deserve, she’s too beloved for y’all to f—k it up.’ And so, when they didn’t get it right, I was like, ‘Well, that’s it,’ and they had nothing else. ‘You’re all f—kin’ fired.”

As we previously reported, in an earlier interview with Gayle King on SiriusXM to promote her most recent film The Color Purple, Henson broke down in tears as she talked about getting underpaid for her work and almost quitting the industry altogether.
“I’m just tired of working so hard, being gracious at what I do, getting paid a fraction of the cost,”


Henson said after taking a long pause and breaking down. “I’m tired of hearing my sisters say the same thing over and over. You get tired. I hear people go, ‘You work a lot.’ I have to. The math ain’t math-ing. And you start working a lot, you have a team. Big bills come with what we do. We don’t do this alone. It’s a whole team behind us. They have to get paid.”
“And when you start working a lot, you have a team,” she continued. “Big bills come with what we do. We don’t do this alone. The fact that we’re up here, there’s a whole entire team behind us. They have to get paid. So when you hear someone saying, ‘Oh, such and such made $10 million,’ no, that didn’t make it to their account. Know that off the top, Uncle Sam is getting 50%, OK? So, do the math; now we have $5 million.
 

WaveCapsByOscorp™

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It’s true, sometimes you gotta clean house when you don’t see a future. Especially when it comes to management, they’re the ones that are suppose to be finding that next thing, the idea people.

As much as I have disdain for execs, management and agencies are pretty much foul for not sticking up for their talent. That idea that talent is dispensable is what is going to ruin the business.

And watch out for the nikka trying to horde all the talent, rarely is it ever because of a “better” deal. More like lack of options.
 

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The Cookie character had become played out towards the end of Empire's run mainly due to the writing. The fact that Fox didn't even bother to give Empire a proper ending should have a tell tale sign to her team that the Cookie spinoff wasn't going to be picked up.

It does seem like her team had no backup plan when the Fox one fell through although I question whether she should have wanted to do another long term TV gig right after Empire's end.

Once you get that label as a TV actor it's kind of difficult to break it, which is why I think someone like Anthony Anderson did the short term role on Law and Order.
 

Piff Perkins

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Something just seems off about her to me personally. Her complaints about roles, which confirmed that she turns down good roles based on money (and thus harms her career/finances). The fact that she has a "team" in the first place as a supporting actress. The fact that she doesn't seem to get that Fox owns that Empire character, not her. Bragging about firing a bunch of people we can probably presume were majority black women and gay black men. Ehhhh.

Go look at her filmography over the last few years. Cash grabs on animated movies and that's about it. Even as dramas and non-comic movies make a come back now, she's nowhere to be seen. An era of Netflix handing out obscene bags to actors...nowhere to be seen. These are choices she has made and while Hollywood sucks for black people there are roles out there and money to be made.
 

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She is a mid actress at best and Proud Mary bombed. I don't know what she is expecting. If you can sell tickets you will get paid.
 

LadyJ2

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So is she working all the time to “pay da bills” or have we not seen much of her because of her dumb ass “team”?

How about the fact that she publicly latched on to Jussie Smollet which probably also had an impact on her ability to make certain asks. Her fan base is primarily people who “look like her” which is like 6% of the U.S. population she is not Beyoncé.
 

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Something just seems off about her to me personally. Her complaints about roles, which confirmed that she turns down good roles based on money (and thus harms her career/finances). The fact that she has a "team" in the first place as a supporting actress. The fact that she doesn't seem to get that Fox owns that Empire character, not her. Bragging about firing a bunch of people we can probably presume were majority black women and gay black men. Ehhhh.

Go look at her filmography over the last few years. Cash grabs on animated movies and that's about it. Even as dramas and non-comic movies make a come back now, she's nowhere to be seen. An era of Netflix handing out obscene bags to actors...nowhere to be seen. These are choices she has made and while Hollywood sucks for black people there are roles out there and money to be made.
Yeah I can see that..

but to be fair roles for black actresses ain't there all like that. I think it's probably better then it us to be, but yeah.

She would be better off trying to get into the production side of things also
 

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The Cookie character had become played out towards the end of Empire's run mainly due to the writing. The fact that Fox didn't even bother to give Empire a proper ending should have a tell tale sign to her team that the Cookie spinoff wasn't going to be picked up.

It does seem like her team had no backup plan when the Fox one fell through although I question whether she should have wanted to do another long term TV gig right after Empire's end.

Once you get that label as a TV actor it's kind of difficult to break it, which is why I think someone like Anthony Anderson did the short term role on Law and Order.

She is a mid actress at best and Proud Mary bombed. I don't know what she is expecting. If you can sell tickets you will get paid.

Yeah I can see that..

but to be fair roles for black actresses ain't there all like that. I think it's probably better then it us to be, but yeah.

She would be better off trying to get into the production side of things also

I'd also add (or inquire) what the benchmark even is for a black actress (or actor) tryna capitalize off the success of a hot tv character? Which isn't to say her team couldn't have done better but that it likely would've been an uphill battle regardless.

I never watched Empire but i did watch the first couple seasons of it's premium channel equivalent (as far as popularity) in Power, and of the four actors who became overnight pop culture sensations as Ghost, Tommy, Tasha, and Angela... none of their IMDBs are exactly scorching since. Naturi is essentially out of sight out of mind in the mainstream, outside of playing Tasha. Omar Hardwick is probably the best of them, and he just shows up on the occasional Netflix movie as 3rd billing.

And giving that he's 49 years old, that's probably his ceiling; he's not getting picked over Michael B Jordan, Damson Idris, John David Washington, etc for big movies. or Daniel Kaluyaa, LaKeith, etc for more serious/artsy films. Given that Taraji is in her early 50s, whatever limited roles Hollywood provides for old(er) black women, they gon just give to Viola Davis or Angela Basset.
 

Jazzy B.

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She first needs to understand that she will NEVER be a star the way she thinks she will be and humble herself :yeshrug:


Because her attitude comes across as a person who thinks she's too damn good for black roles :manny:
 
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