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CINDY PEARLMAN
NYT Syndicate
When Richie Keen signed on to direct the new comedy Fist Fight, which was to co-star Tracy Morgan, he wasn't sure what he was getting into.
The whole world knew that, not long before, Morgan had been involved in a highway accident which almost killed him. The question was, how had it affected him?
"I had to ask myself, 'Is he healthy? Can he walk? Does he have brain damage?' This was before he returned to 'SNL' and walked out on the Emmys," Keen recalled."No one knew if he could work."
Keen decided to Skype Morgan and find out for himself.
As Morgan recounted the conversation, the shoe was quickly on the other foot, with the comedian asking the questions.
"I asked Richie, 'Who is Captain Kirk's best friend?' So, to answer my question, Richie said, 'Of course, Captain Kirk's best friend is Spock,'" Morgan recalled."I said, 'No, you don't call your best friend 'Captain' ” what's wrong with you?'"
"I remember thinking, 'He's fine,'" Keen said."He's ready to go back to work."
Sitting for a separate interview at a Los Angeles hotel, Morgan was in fine form. Wearing a blue sweatsuit, a white T-shirt and a gold-chain necklace, he showed no signs of the 2014 accident which left him at death's door.
"I just hate when people call this a comeback," Morgan grumbled."I never left."
He came pretty close, though, which he conceded when he looked back on the first day of filming for Fist Fight. The scene was a high-school football field, with the sun setting behind Morgan and a camera in front of him.
"I was so scared," the comedian admitted."I didn't know if I was funny or not anymore, after all that time trying to heal. I just broke down. I lost it. I let out the tears.
"The truth is, I didn't know if I'd ever be back," he continued, his eyes misting."I didn't know if I would ever walk again. It was a year on my couch after that Wal-Mart truck hit me. I just let it all out on the set.
"What I realised is that I still had a whole lot of funny left in me."
The accident took place on June 7, 2014. Morgan and several other comedians were passengers in a limousine, headed home from a comedy gig in Delaware. Their car was struck from behind by a Wal-Mart tractor-trailer. The result was a chain-reaction crash involving six vehicles that killed Morgan's friend, comedian James McNair.
Morgan wasn't much better off. He was helicoptered to a hospital and rushed into surgery for a head injury, a broken femur, a broken nose and shattered ribs. He was in a coma, and woke to face a long recovery in which he had to learn to walk all over again.
"It was a long road back," the comedian said."A lot of ups and downs. It taught me to just take life one day at a time, one step at a time, one laugh at a time."
Ultimately, though, he made it back. His appearance as a presenter at the Emmy Awards on September 20, 2015, was his coming-out party, and a month later he returned to host his old show, 'Saturday Night Live', on October 17, 2015.
Now he's back in the big screen in Fist Fight, set to open on February 17. The film is set on the last day of high school, with the students indulging in elaborate pranks. The core of the movie is the conflict between two teachers, a nebbishy, idealistic English teacher named Campbell (Charlie Day) and a strict disciplinarian named Strickland (Ice Cube).
When Campbell's complaints lead to Strickland being fired, Strickland challenges him to a last-day-of-school fist fight in, where else, the school parking lot.
"This movie is a cross between Welcome Back Kotter and Law and Order," Morgan said, laughing.
He plays the school football coach, a clueless, big-hearted jock who doesn't realise that the teens mowing his field are actually doing so in order to create huge, lewd drawings of certain male body parts.
"I can't judge," Morgan said with a laugh,"because it reminded me of something I might have done in high school!"
Keen was prepared to work around Morgan's limitations if necessary. For example, he was worried about the comedian's ability to stand on the field for take after take.
"I thought, 'If we had to put him in a chair, fine,'" the director recalled."But that never happened. He was so on his game. He was just above and beyond a kind, gentle, thoughtful person and also crazy and so energetic.
"I always kept a camera on Tracy," Keen added."I knew he would say the words from the script and then there would be four or five takes afterward. Some would make no sense, and some would be the funniest things I had ever heard in my life."
"When Richie said, 'Cut,' that's when I relaxed and did my thing," Morgan said."When I hear 'cut,' that's when I get going."
The chance to make Fist Fight was welcome to Morgan, not only because he liked the script but also because it was a sign that Keen, the producers ” Day and Cube among them ” and Warner Bros thought that he was back in play.
"I love these people for believing in me and my recovery," Morgan said."It felt so good. I love them for asking me back to the party.
"Cube is like a brother to me," he added, putting his hand on his heart."I was so proud to be of service to him in a movie."
For his part, in a separate interview, Cube echoed the sentiments.
"The only problem was that, on the set, Tracy would even make me break," Cube said."I'd just look at him and lose it."
Morgan's return to the big screen is the latest stop on the long and winding road that has been his life.
The second of five children, the future comedian grew up in the projects on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. His father, a musician and Vietnam veteran, left when Morgan was only 6.
He recalled being the target of bullies as a child.
"I had a couple of real fist fights at school," Morgan admitted."The truth is I lost my fights after school.
"One was over a girl," he added with a chuckle."I liked her and didn't know how to tell her, so I punched her and she whupped my (tail) so bad. She had Sonny Liston hands!"
Morgan ended up leaving high school to take care of his ailing father, who died at 39. Meanwhile he also married his high-school girlfriend and had a son. To make ends meet, he began performing comedy for spare change in the streets.
It was the beginning of something big. Morgan took his comedy to the stage and then the small screen, first on 'Uptown Comedy Club' (1992-1994), a sketch-comedy show filmed in Harlem, and then as Hustle Man on the series 'Martin' (1994-1996).
His true break came when he joined the cast of 'Saturday Night Live' in 1996. He stayed with the show until 2003, when he departed to star in the short-lived 'The Tracy Morgan Show' (2003-2004). Then Tina Fey, a longtime friend and 'Saturday Night Live' co-star, signed him to play Tracy Jordan on her NBC series '30 Rock' (2006-2013).
Between his television duties, Morgan also has been seen in such films as Head of State (2003), A Thin Line Between Love and Hate (1996), Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001), The Longest Yard (2005), Are We There Yet (2005), Cop Out (2010), The Night Before (2015) and Accidental Love (2015).
The fact that he is working ” he has an as-yet untitled series in the works ” still astounds him, Morgan said. That looked unlikely for a year after the accident as he struggled with nosebleeds, headaches and memory issues, as well as survivor guilt over McNair's death.
"I just never quit," he said."Bones heal, but the loss of my friend is forever."
It was the love of his family that helped him push through the bad days, said Morgan, who has a 3-year-old daughter, Maven, with his wife, model Megan Wollover.
The other thing that kept him going was the burning desire to get back to making people laugh. Morgan is a comedy junkie who lists among his biggest influences such stars as Carol Burnett, Jackie Gleason, Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor.
"I just love comedy," he said, smiling."I could watch these people all day long. I love performing comedy. I couldn't wait to get back to here.
"All I wanted to do was get back to my family and get back to making people laugh," Morgan concluded."Wal-Mart can't stop me!"
