Source: Keenan “HIGz” Higgins / Reach Media
As we slowly come to the end of Black Business Month for 2024, it was only right to take some time and talk shop with a certified expert in their field of biz. Who better than veteran comedic actor Lamorne Morris?
Known for making a name for himself throughout the 2010s in projects like Barbershop: The Next Cut, 7 great seasons on New Girl and one hilarious episode of Comedy Central’s Drunk History portraying Martin Luther King Jr. just to name a few, his latest claim-to-fame in Hollywood was an impressive run during season 5 of Fargo.
In fact, his performance as “Trooper Witt” was so good that it led to a nomination at the upcoming 76th Primetime Emmy Awards in the category of “Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie.”
“For me, I just have to stay true to myself. Earlier in my career, I found myself trying to be what you think Hollywood needs you to be. At some point you just say, ‘F**k it; I’m doing what I want to and staying authentic to myself.’”
— Lamorne Morris
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It all came full circle in our brief conversation with the star as we visited him in NYC at a “Jobstacle Course” in partnership with Mike’s Hard Lemonade. Before the ticketed event began, which allowed attendees to take a stab at three alternate career paths in order to make a point that no one job is easier than another — we’re all working hard out here! — Lamorne took a break from acting to test out the course himself. Let’s just say if you need a candy taster, makeshift librarian or weatherman on any given day, Morris is your man.
After he proved his prowess in a few other fields, we wanted to bring it back to basics and see what assets Lamorne feels he personally brings to the world of Black Hollywood. In his words, “[I bring] a sense of authenticity — just trying to stay 100% myself at all times. A lot of times with Black folks, we get this [feeling] of having to be one way. That’s depicted on television a lot, but nowadays it’s opening up a lot more where we see characters of all types of backgrounds and walks of life. For me, I just have to stay true to myself. Earlier in my career, I found myself trying to be what you think Hollywood needs you to be. At some point you just say, ‘Fuck it; I’m doing what I want to and staying authentic to myself.’”
Lamorne references his two-season stint starring in the Hulu series Woke, where he played a Black cartoonist who begins talking to inanimate objects that keep him ‘woke’ following a racial profile run-in with police, as his greatest lesson in this theory. “That was the first time it opened my eyes to being who I truly am being that the show spoke about that a lot,” he states, also referring to a fan-favorite role by adding, “When I was on New Girl, I got a chance to be really goofy and silly; there weren’t a lot of characters like that at the time. You could probably go back to the Steve Urkel days.” [Laughs]
Ultimately, he made it clear that bringing your best self to the table is the quickest way to finding success in any business, closing out by adding, “I started finding that the more I was myself, the more I was true to who I was, the more successful I became. Everyone is different like a snowflake. You have to express how different you are because that is your ultimate superpower. No one can be you like you.”
Take a look below at Lamorne Morris taking a break from his Black job as a Emmy-nominated actor to try out, well, a few other things in his Jobstacle Course with Mike’s Hard Lemonade:
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