Harold Perrineau
speaker
117 appearances
2 recordings
2 series
first heard May 2025
last heard May 2025
Harold Perrineau’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
Right.
Yeah, no, when I was in, when I grew up in Brooklyn in Cypress Hills, I was just, I was just the cat that wasn't like, you know, I couldn't play any of the sports. I wasn't that cool to hang out with. You know, people used to do the dozens. Yo mama is so stupid. My yo mama jokes were the worst jokes you have ever heard. Like, you know what I mean? And anything that I could do wasn't really cool.
Like, I was really good at math. That wasn't cool. And then I became a dancer, and that wasn't so cool. But like a ballet dancer. There's lots of people who can dance, but I was like a ballet dancer. And so all that stuff was really, really tricky to see yourself succeeding, even though the environment where you are, you're completely failing. because it's just not where you belong.
And you really just have to go like, you know what? This is not for me, man. I'm not knocking anybody else. It's just, this is not for me. I don't belong here. I can't hustle drugs. I just can't. I don't know how to do it. Do you know what I mean? I don't have that kind of, I'm not that brave. I'm not interested in it. And so what I want to do is I want to be, I want to go do Swan Lake.
I really, really do. Like I want to learn how to to dance to Tchaikovsky. I really, really do. I do want to go read, like, you know, the great plays by Arthur Miller and, you know, and do those on Broadway. That's what I want to do. I want to do Shakespeare. So, it's been really tricky to be that goofy guy, but, like, just
step into it and just be like, all right, then I'm just going to, I just got to be that goofy guy. And I'm just going to have to see where that goes. And it's taken me pretty far.
Absolutely. And that's one of the things, again, we talked about this earlier. We talked about representation, right? It's really important to see different types of people who do all these things to see women who are entrepreneurs and men who are dancers, bisexual people who don't have to talk about their sexuality at all, but really succeed whatever field they're in.
Representation is so important because if somebody is out there that feels like they're alone, they're the only person who looks like them, is like them, thinks like them. You know what I mean? You have to know that you're not the only person like that. And you need to see people who felt the same way and actually have been able to succeed in their own journey.
I would listen at the end of the day. I'd say what I've been saying the whole time. You really just have to believe it. I don't know if you should quit your job. I don't know. Like I had a lot of jobs that I didn't quit and I just kept going. I met everybody that I could who was like doing plays and I would do all these readings like a place for no money at all.
And then I would go to my bartending job or my you know, my waiting job and then come back. And I just did everything I could to stretch myself to be in the place where I wanted to be. I started treating myself as if I was already there. Like if I had to do a bartending gig, I'd do my bartending gig and it's like, oh, hold on, I got to go meet this director.
And it really is just a friend of mine who's directing a little play and that's all good, but that's really the place I want to be. Like you have to try to put yourself in those places where, you know, where you will find your community. Every one of us will find, you know, the community of people that vibe with us. And you'll be able to really sail when you find those people.
Right, right. But I do because I'm still hustling, right? I'm still trying to make great art. I'm still trying to make a name for myself, even as it were. And, you know, my daughter just turned 12, and I'm just going to miss this part of her 12, which is going to be really, I'm going to try to do everything I can to see her as much as I can.
But, you know, I'm sacrificing that thing because, you know, I have this desire. I have this desire to succeed. my success isn't more important than my daughter, but I want her to see that, you know, you have to be able to work hard and sometimes you have to do a little sacrificing right now to get what you want eventually. Do you know what I mean?
Like, I think it's... Look, I think it's important to raise, like, great human beings, right? And so... being a great human being means you're active in your own life as well, and so I like them to see me do things that I succeed at or that I work really hard for, because they're not going to see the part that's really hard, which is parenting. parenting is really hard.
They're not going to see that part, but they're going to see the other things that I do and realize that even within that, I still try to incorporate them as well. And I think it's going to help make, help them be really great rounded human beings and find their own passions and figure out like, oh, my dad, he used to work really hard. I remember those times he would go away. So,
I might not be able to be with my friends tonight, but I do want to go and do this thing because it's really going to serve me in whatever it is I'm looking for. And so hopefully they'll see those things happening with me and that'll inspire them in some way. I hope. I hope.
I got to say that, you know, in my career, I've had a lot. I've been really successful. Lucky is what I mean. Not just successful, but, like, there are a lot of actors, and there are a lot of great actors. And, like, not only working hard, but it takes a little bit of luck, you know what I mean? And luck is... almost where you make it, you put yourself in the position to be lucky.
But I do remember when I got William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, and I had the dreads, and I was just, you know, and I was like this dancer who was weird and wacky, and I didn't think I had a shot in hell to get it, but I kept going back and going back and going back, and Baz was like, let's try this, let's try this, and then I wound up being there, and I remember when I got it, I was just like...
Oh, snap. I'm about to do Shakespeare. Shakespeare. With, you know, some of the greatest actors on the planet. And this amazing young director, Baz Luhrmann. And it was one of those times when I was just like, this is wild. Like, this is wild. We shot in Mexico City. It was really, really amazing. It felt like... Yeah, yeah, it felt really good to have to do that.
I had done this movie also. I did this movie called The Edge. And it's me and it was Alec Baldwin and Anthony Hopkins, which is already mind blowing, like mind blowing. It's crazy. and we go to the premiere, and we walk out of the premiere, and somebody goes, young man, that bear ate you up, and I look up to see who it is, and it's Morgan Freeman, and I stop. I'm just like,
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