Tracy Morgan, On How He Will Sell His Emmy Award If Things Get Bad

July 23rd, 2009

By: Ben

There has been a trend in comedy, as the stage for every movie and show has expanded offscreen and onto the internet, to build a character whose “real-life personality” and whose act are indistinguishable. In some cases, the whole thing is obviously a performance (Sacha Baron Cohen), in others, obviously not (Mitch Hedburg). Somewhere in the middle falls Tracy Morgan, who might be the funniest of these comedians.

He was nominated for an Emmy for his role in 30 Rock, and he’ll probably get it. However, he told Letterman last night that he was worried his award would end up like Whitney Houston’s, in the home of a shady “Jewish doctor in New Jersey.” So to prevent himself from selling it if times get tough, he came up with a solution… Video, and Tracy’s thoughts on sobriety, ATJ.

“I’ve been sober for a year-and-a-half now, and I feel it all,” he says. “I’m not inebriated anymore. I want to feel the good, the bad and the ugly. I want to remember it all. I couldn’t do that when I wasn’t sober. What I have learned over the years is to try to stay in the moment. I want to feel it all because I’ve realized nothing lasts. I’m not perfect but I strive for it. I take it one day at a time, but if you can get it to one hour at a time, I’m good.”

He also added,

“You will be surprised but I do a lot of studying and I watch National Geographic,” he says. “I try to stay away from the reality shows. I don’t get anything out of Kim Kardashian and her family and nothing out of Kendra. When I watch television, I got to walk away with new type of knowledge. I get none of that from Kendra [Wilkinson] and Hugh Hefner and his girlfriends. I’m not a ninth grader who gets enticed by the female anatomy like that!”

These do not sound like the words of a man who got on a local Texas talk show a few years ago, took his shirt off, and declared that with him in town, “somebody gonna get pregnant.” But grown-up Tracy Morgan has his moments as well. The first clip is him on Letterman, the second, on El Paso Live at 5 or whatever.