Tyler Perry’s “Divorce in the Black” Star Richard Lawson Talks New Movie, Divorce From Tina Knowles, and His Purpose

Nothing could stop our interview with veteran actor Richard Lawson. “Not even Hurricane Beryl and power outages.” What we scheduled to be a video interview pivoted into a wonderful audio conversation (on our end)… with the star of Tyler Perry’s newest film, Divorce in the Black, sharing over 20 minutes of how he got his latest role, where he and Tina Knowles stand today to whether he would ever remarry, and how he and his co-stars Meagan Good and Cory Hardrict bonded on set.

How did your role as Clarence in “Divorce in the Black” happen?

The first time I think I worked with Mr. Perry was on the show House of Payne many years ago, and then I did a movie called “Four Colored Girls,” which was an amazing experience with a lot of wonderful people. It was my third time working with (Tyler Perry) when he asked to be in this movie, and I was “So thrilled!”

Tell us more about your character?

You know, it’s interesting how it came about. The role I was originally offered was the father of Meagan Good’s character, “Ava,” along with my wife Gene, played by Debbi Morgan. Clarence is a concerned father, a farmer, and a rancher. We live in the country, and my daughter shows up at our house traumatized because of her relationship. Things are not going well with her husband, Dallas (Cory Hardrict).

(Here’s the background story behind my character). That Sunday night before the first day of shooting. I was a “concerned father.” That was at midnight. At 2 am, I got another script (and now), “I’m the preacher of this community and a concerned father.” So I have the spiritual souls to care for and my daughter’s own personal life. My role expanded “exponentially” overnight. And it was an exciting kind of pivot I had to make to create this whole other dimension to this character.

My marriage with Tina and my experience with her, I didn’t draw any more from that than from the other relationships I had in my life

How did your role as a “protective father” in the film resonate with who you are in real life with your daughter?

Meagan became like a second daughter to me. I was a fan of her work for many years. She has such a warm heart and gracious spirit, and she reminded me a lot of my daughter Bianca, who is an actress and has a really outstanding career herself.

When we showed up to the set, it was sort of a natural and organic thing that existed between Meagan and me and her and Debbi (they worked together in Eve’s Bayou). Debbi and I worked together on four different occasions and have always had great chemistry. Maybe Tyler knew something we didn’t know when he put us together. It’s a really strong cast. We were very symbiotic in our journey as artists playing a family that was dealing with trauma and dysfunction.

Richard, we read somewhere that you “drew from your previous three marriages for this role, more so with your recent divorce from Tina Knowles. Why that one in particular? And did it allow you to bond more with co-stars Meagan Good and Cory Hardrict, who are also recently divorced?

Tyler Perry’s “Divorce in the Black” Star Richard Lawson Talks New Movie and Tina Knowles Divorce

Hey, listen. If you live in this life, you are going to experience some losses and trauma. We’ve all been through relationship things. My marriage with Tina and my experience with her, I didn’t draw any more from that than from the other relationships I had in my life. Sometimes, things just don’t work, and you process, pivot, and proceed. That’s what we are both doing, but in the process of dealing with what is going on, you are understanding the lesson. What is the lesson? For me, it’s only lessons. There are no losses. Life is going to have its ups and downs. And it’s not really what happens to you as much as how you deal with it.

So, the three of us (Meagan, Cory, and me) had our own history with relationships and transitioning, so you have a lot to bring to the table. That’s easy enough to help you draw on so that you can give to the character (your knowledge) of what is your experience. If you watch the movie, you will see all four of us because Debbi had her own (real life) relationship things— that we all could draw from a deep place. We didn’t necessarily talk about our divorces overtly, but we brought an understanding of what these characters were going through in a very organic and ground way. And the beauty of art is that you can borrow from your life and put it into these characters, making them real and accessible to people.

My heart is still breakable

Richard stops to think for a moment before saying, “I’m like God’s paintbrush,” and then he continues with the rest of his conversation.

God picks me up as a brush and uses me as a stroke to paint on the canvas of life so that when people see the colors I bring, they will understand that it’s real. What I experience through the characters I play is real, so it becomes a ministry to others. In the case of Divorce in the Black, it’s emotional and relationship trauma. It’s community trauma, too, because it’s a community thing, and it’s how this family affects the people in the community. “I am a just a tool for God to be able to tell these stories that people need to see.”

Would you be open to marrying again?

One of the most beautiful things about life that I love is my approach. “My heart is still breakable.” I always want to have a breakable heart, meaning I’m open and vulnerable to possibilities. I’m not jaded, closed down, or hardened. And hopefully, the experiences I’ve had, not only in terms of marriages but in life (keep my heart breakable). Listen, I have been to Vietnam, I’ve seen over 300 people die, I’ve been in plane crashes, I’ve survived drug addiction and three marriages, and I still have so much to give to this planet (this earth), my life. I’m still interested in helping other people realize their dreams. That is my purpose. And I want to fall in love every day with something. Some place. Some person. That can be the celebration of life in a newborn baby, a dog, or an old lady crossing the street. It can be how a flower blooms or a beautiful tree because falling in love is not necessarily on a man and woman basis but on a life basis.

Dreams don’t have expiration dates

How do you challenge yourself in acting after all these years in the industry?

The very first thing I did (as an actor) was called “Golden Boy.” It was a musical. I had to learn to sing, dance, and act. It was closing night on my birthday in 1969, and I had a revelation that God spoke to me and said this is why you’ve been put on this earth. It was clear to me like my North Star, and from that moment to this very moment right now, I have been on vacation. I am following my purpose, and I have never strayed from that. Sometimes, things (in life) went dormant, but I always knew my purpose was to help others because Dreams don’t have expiration dates. You can create the life you want if you see it. Mark Twain said, “The two most important times in life are the day you’re born and the day you figure out why.” I feel like I’m watering the plants God wants me to water regarding helping other people.

Back to the film Divorce in the Black. What excites you most about its debut, and why should the streaming audience watch it?

A lot of people will look at it and say, “Well, Tyler Perry is doing another movie about black folks having struggles and problems, and those people will have their point of view, but this film is much about reclaiming one’s spirit, one’s life, and one’s sense of self-respect. It’s about family. It’s about love. It’s about support. It’s about friendship. It’s about communication. One of the things I love about playing this character, Clarence, in the movie is that he is a black man who loves his daughter and his community. He loves his wife, and you see him give his daughter a great example of growing up with self-love, but somewhere along the way, because of her love for this man Dallas (Cory Hardrict), she lost herself, and you see my character help her to love herself again. My character is a great example of what a black father does (that does not often get seen in cinema and books). Black fathers don’t get enough credit for being strong (stable) protectors. Clarence is a protector of his family, his daughter, and his community. And he’s a great example of a mentor for other young men in terms of how to treat women. How to treat themselves and how to love themselves. At the end of the day, our happiness is not dependent on anyone else. We are responsible for our own happiness. And this is one of the things I am trying to teach my daughter in the film. You’re responsible for your own happiness, so you have to decide to let things go that you want to hold on to that are not good for you.

The veteran actor continues to maintain his career longevity in movies like Tyler Perry’s “Divorce in the Black” while also maintaining self-care in Instagram posts that show him dancing, to which he says he always starts and ends his classes with dancing as an instructor at the Richard Lawson Studios which he founded and co-owns in North Hollywood. Other videos are of him doing the cold plunge, which he champions as a health benefit for those pesky aches and pains. “Don’t count out the cold plunge,” he says spiritedly. Okay, Richard, we’ll leave that one entirely up to you (laugh).