Los Angeles radio personality Boy says there’s no reason for celebrities to complain about “gatekeepers” preventing them from reaching their goals.
Big Boy, who is popularly known as “The Voice of L.A.,” hosts the syndicated “Big Boy’s Neighborhood” on iHeart’s Real 92.3.
The radio star, born Kurt Alexander, created YouTube interview platform Big Boy’s TV, and also hosts star installation ceremonies on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Related: Mo’Nique Trashes ‘Gatekeepers’ Oprah Winfrey, Tyler Perry, Kevin Hart
During a recent interview with Ciara, he discussed using social media to build a media empire.
Ciara said the music industry has changed a lot since she released her debut album Goodies in 2004. The singer-songwriter and dancer noted that record labels now expect artists to promote their own projects, which she said is unfair.
“Nowadays with the digital era, the digital and social era, people look at you to do the work… it’s like wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, like that math is not mathing,” Ciara said during an Aug. 29 interview with Big Boy.
Ciara noted that artists can produce and release their own projects online, without a recording contract.
“It’s just a new day and time. People are now more empowered than ever through creating their own platforms. There’s so many self-made millionaires through their own social platforms,” she said.
“People ask me what should I do to get discovered? And I’m like, ‘Go create your own platform.’ Literally, that’s where it starts,” she continued. “You can create your own platform, put up your own content, curate your own programming, build your own audience, and it’s just organic.”
Big Boy agreed. He said after trying to get a video production deal to showcase his celebrity interviews, he stopped waiting for something to happen.
“I remember we were trying to do these production deals for interviews, and all this stuff, and I got to a point where I was like, why am I talking to people about what I want to do? That’s why I created my own, Big Boy TV,” he said.
“If you’re still saying somebody is a gatekeeper, then you damn near deserve to be on the other side of the gate,” he continued.
Big Boy didn’t name names, but Mo’Nique has frequently called Tyler Perry, Oprah Winfrey and Kevin Hart “gatekeepers,” saying they’ve prevented her from making “millions” of dollars.
In a 2024 interview on Shannon Sharpe’s “Club Shay Shay” podcast, she said about Winfrey: “You’ve been unjust and you watched a Black woman be thrown under the bus and you said nothing.”
Mo’Nique told Sharpe Perry told other Hollywood insiders to avoid her because she’s difficult to work with. “That cost my family tens of millions of dollars over a lie and a rumor,” she said.
The comedian’s problems with Perry and Winfrey date back to the 2009 film Precious, which Perry and Winfrey produced.
Mo’Nique has said she was “blackballed” after refusing to take part in awards season promotional events unless she received additional pay.
As for Hart, she said he ghosted her after promising to open doors in Hollywood and executive produce some of her projects.
She said when she finally got him on the phone, he said he would call her back for a longer conversation “on Tuesday.”
“That was two years ago,” Mo’Nique told Sharpe, adding that she hasn’t heard from Hart since then.
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