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I had one drama teacher who was amazing, Ms. Perkins. She really tried to inspire me and get me going.

Even at Westchester High in West LA, I was class clown.

I went to acting school in New York City for two years. I studied with Stella Adler.

I took a couple of creative writing classes with Joyce Carol Oates at Princeton University, and in my senior year there, I took a long fiction workshop with Toni Morrison. I fell in love with it.

I made a living out of being a class clown.

I was a total theater geek in high school, no question. I was cast in 'Godspell' freshman year - with Vanessa Williams, by the way. She and I are still friends. We went to high school together.

I was the class clown so I was used to performing and fooling around in front of my friends.

I was part of a group called Casanova Fly, doing bouncer work, attending college and working in a pizza shop when I first met producer Sylvia Robinson who came into the pizza shop where I was flipping the dough. I was rapping in the park in Englewood, and she heard about what I was doing.

I wasn't a class clown, I just found at an early age that I was able to make people laugh. So I mostly wrote funny stuff instead of writing what I was supposed to be writing.

Nearly everyone I met, worked with, or read about was my teacher, one way or another.