My Name Is Mo’Nique ~ The Jester’s Privilege
Just in case you missed it the first time, they were not fucking around when they call themselves Queens of Comedy.
Sommore released her special back in February, and she referenced another “Queen of Comedy” within it: Mo’Nique. While I had not heard of her stand-up career, I was admittedly much more familiar with Mo’Nique than I was with Sommore. A decorated and revered actress, she has had a whirlwind time in Hollywood. She built a reputation fighting for what she believes in, going up against insurmountable forces in media, including the streaming conglomerate Netflix, and perhaps even more powerful than that: Oprah. Hold for gasps.
From the moment her special “My Name Is Mo’Nique” starts, she exhibited a rare level vulnerability and self-awareness, the kind that, even when people know they have something important to say, they are afraid to hit an audience with right off the bat. But Mo’Nique has waited a while to have her moment, and she will not waste it, goddamnit.
Let’s get a few things out of the way: if you’re looking for nonstop laughter and a barrage of jokes, adjust yourself. This is not a hilarious special, though it is special, and not in the way that Mo’Nique’s teachers thought she was special. You have wealth-flaunting, a “motherfucker” dropped in every other sentence (I’m barely exaggerating), and a style of delivery that may turn some people off. I normally am. But the jokes are there, and more importantly, Mo’Nique is just different.
She knows what she is about, and she lets it all out on stage. She has a fiery personality that possesses her as she runs from one end to the stage to the other in platform heels, and it brings out all of the best parts of her stories. Stories that shaped her through a lifetime of struggle and responding to said struggles with optimism, laughter, and an edge that tells the universe that they are not the one. I often ask myself whether or not the strictly funniest specials should have the highest reverence on the scale of best comedy specials to worst, and this special could redefine anyone’s idea of what comedy is all about.
I believe it’s about being compelling, getting on stage with nothing but a microphone and entertaining anyone who is listening, and there is nothing more compelling than watching someone put it all on the line like Mo’Nique did. I don’t know if I ever have seen a comedian go full 8 Mile, arms heavy, Mom’s spaghetti, and put on the performance of a lifetime like that. Ever. And my hunch is that it’s because to her, it wasn’t a performance. In the midst of missing out on jobs and fighting for equal recognition and compensation as her peers, Mo’Nique was fighting for something on that stage, and not just any fighting, East Baltimore fighting.
So, perhaps, she swears too much for one’s taste. Maybe it’s not joke after joke like other comedians. Maybe she talks in a way that a general audience is not used to, or doesn’t understand. But if you can try, and I hope you do, you will witness what she has been since the beginning: a motherfucking queen.
8.5/10
