Comedian Chris Rock on Coming Back to Broadway: ‘I Would Love To’

Film star and comedian Chris Rock has a full dance card these days. The actor, who made his Broadway debut in last year’s The Motherf**ker with the Hat, has roles in the currently filming Grown Ups 2 and just-released 2 Days in New York—but he recently told The New York Times that he’d be more than game for another go on the Great White Way.

“Oh, I would love to,” Rock said of a Broadway return, though he quickly added that it would take a special project to get him back on the boards. “I realized with Broadway everything written for black people is usually written in the past,” he said, “and I’m kind of a contemporary guy. I don’t think you want to see me in Raisin in the Sun.” He continued, “The other thing—everything on Broadway with black people, at some point, becomes [stereotype voice] ‘Is it ever gonna get any better?’ I don’t feel like saying that.” As an example, he offered up Martin McDonagh’s A Behanding in Spokane, featuring a black character who claims he has a severed hand to sell. “I almost did that one,” Rock said of a role that was played by Anthony Mackie. “But I didn’t feel like leaving my nice house, my palatial estate to drive into Manhattan and get called n***er every night. [He laughs.] It’s like, really?”

What he did choose as his first Broadway role was that of Ralph D. in Stephen Adly Guirgis’ Tony-nominated The Motherf**ker with the Hat, the AA sponsor to Bobby Cannavale’s newly sober parolee. It was an interesting choice for Rock, already a bone fide star, to take on a supporting part. “I wanted to be in a play. I didn’t want to be a play,” he told the Times. “When I do stand-up, I’m basically doing a one-man show. I wanted to show people I can act. I realize you’ve got to remind people you do this stuff. Sometimes a girl has to let people know she’s available. Go to a party with someone you didn’t want to go with, just to let people know you’re dating.”

Whatever role eventually brings Rock back to the Rialto, it’s sure to be a doozy, if his current sentiments hold steady. “I haven’t done any dirty work in a while,” he said. “I’m ready to curse. I’m ready to really, really be a bad boy. I’m ready to actually be Chris Rock.”