The Dion Waiters Award for Best Heat Check Performance
Deebo (Tiny Lister)
In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 00:39:05Read transcript
- The field is wide: Tiny Lister as Deebo, John Witherspoon, Bernie Mac, Faison Love (as transcribed), Paula J. Park (as transcribed) as Joy, Regina King, Stanley, little Chris and Smokey's mom, who is only in a couple of scenes asking Smokey to buy cigarettes and talking on the phone; Craig and Smokey are excluded as principals.
- One host would have said Joy for her iconic scene but after rewatching lands on John Witherspoon for the gun speech, that a gun does not make you a man and you fist fight, win or lose, and stay alive, which plays a little after-school but he goes for it; a John Witherspoon impression by Charity is teased.
- Red is argued for as the most thankless role, getting beaten up and clowned the whole movie, played well, with the touching scene of him sobbing at his car and pulling off.
- Witherspoon and DJ Pooh's Red are called great, but Deebo gets it: he has his own music, his name persists as a word for a bully, and he is so iconic that Tiny Lister throwing the detonator off the ship in The Dark Knight reads as Deebo moved to Gotham, arrested and folded into the Joker's plot.