By: Lynn Barker
We sit down with the rapper/actor to talk dating, music, movies and more!
Cute rapper/actor Shad “Bow Wow” Moss starred in the film Lottery Ticket last year. Now, the 24-year-old co-stars in Tyler Perry’s film Madea’s Big Happy Family and he really gets to display his dramatic acting abilities along with some Madea-style humor.
We’re sitting in Bow Wow’s hotel suite in Beverly Hills. While his staff and friends work on several computers looking through a list of songs on the star’s upcoming eighth album, we talk “Madea” and ask who is on his new record with him. He tells us about getting through his tough, rebellious teen years and what just drives him crazy/angry on a date. Check it out.
Kidzworld: This film is all over the map emotion-wise; very funny and, at times, very sad. You cry on screen. How do you, as an actor work with that contrast?
- Bow Wow: It’s easy. It’s just the craft of acting. That’s just a part of the job to show range and be diverse. That’s just something that I know is expected with this game and you never know when someone is gonna call on you to do that and I’m always ready at all times. To me, nothing is ever too far-fetched.
Kidzworld: Your character Byron in this film has a real gold-digger girlfriend. What would you say to a friend who loves a gold-digging girl? Should be keep trying to please her or just move on?
- Bow Wow: Well, as a friend you step in and your first initial reaction is to tell him what you feel is best but also, he’s a grown man so if he feels he’s got it all done then you just have to let them figure it out on their own sometimes. A hard head makes a soft behind so sometimes, you’ve got to let him to just jump in that water and get bit. Then he’ll come runnin’ for help.
Kidzworld: Have you been bitten by the gold-digger girls?
- Bow Wow: I haven’t and, knock on wood, that’s a good thing. Let’s not give ‘um no ideas!
Kidzworld: Madea has her own tough love thing going. She can get pretty brutal. Have you gotten that tough love from friends or family and, if so, how did you respond to it?
- Bow Wow: No. Well, I guess that mid-teenager thing you go through when you start smellin’ yourself a little bit, I think every teenager does that, I’ve done that. Me and my mother, we’ve had that, but I feel like the rough times make you stronger and keeps you guys (family) together. I feel like every person who is close to you should see every side of you; your good side, bad side, ugly side. That’s the only way you are gonna really, for sure, know somebody. I know that has brought me and my mother closer or my friends closer. If you argue, if you fall out, it’s all about being loyal and truthful and doing it in a loving way.
Kidzworld: What could a girl do on a date that would just make you want to say “Okay! That’s it. I’m going home!”
- Bow Wow: Asking me too many questions or asking me to do something for her. Like “Can you do this or can you wear this?” Just pressuring me too much. “Can you take a picture for this person”. Automatically, you are just done. Or if she starts talking about my work. You can talk about it but it’s how you do it. When somebody says (overly-excited voice) “Oh my God, I liked it when you did blah blah in Madea’s Big Happy Family, I was like….” I’m like “Oh my God, I don’t wanna hear it”.
Kidzworld: You don’t know if they really mean it or they are just trying to get something from you.
- Bow Wow: Exactly!
Kidzworld: On the other hand, what could a girl do or be like that would make you say “Oh yeah! I’m gonna stick with this one”.
- Bow Wow: Be fun. Have a down to earth personality, cool, calm, good energy and a lot of keepin’ it real.
Kidzworld: Who have you discovered musically recently that you just love and are listening to a lot?
- Bow Wow: Snoop, my Uncle Snoop.
Kidzworld: But you didn’t just discover him.
- Bow Wow: (Laughs) There’s nobody I just discovered but I listen to a lot of Snoop.
Kidzworld: Don’t you have a new, eighth album coming out soon? How has your music evolved? What is really new on there?
- Bow Wow: It’s very mature. My fans have grown up now. I know I still have younger fans, but the hardcore fans are now 22, 23, 24 years old. I’m 24 so their lives have changed just like mine and now it’s time for me to put my story on music and tell it like it is. Just a lot of meaningful records, more records that can help get you through rough times. Very serious subjects. Every one is different. One deals with peer pressure. I tell the story of make-believe characters but they’re in real situations. About one person who had a chance to become something but, instead, decided to do (something else). And this is where he ends up.
Kidzworld: Like your character Byron in “Madea” only he makes the good choice.
- Bow Wow: Yeah. I have feel good records out, It’s very in depth. As of right now, the title is still “Underrated” but I’m still trying to fiddle with everything. We’ll see.
Kidzworld: First Single?
- Bow Wow: I don’t know yet. You see I have two computers here (We look at the friends/assistants going over song titles online).
Kidzworld: Who collaborates with you on the album?
- Bow Wow: I collabed with Chris Brown who has been like a brother to me, I’ve collabed with Snoop, Fabulous, Talib Kweli who is an underground Hip Hop legend. I’ve collaborated with Nelly, with T-Pain. All on this album. I work with so many people.
Kidzworld: What advice would you give to a music artist or actor who came up like you did but they have people pulling them in all different directions?
- Bow Wow: Be true to what you want to do. Later on, you have to be happy doing this. That’s something I tell myself all the time. I live in my own world.
Kidzworld: What do people around you do that ticks you off?
- Bow Wow: Like when people rush me, that’s one thing I hate is to be rushed. I always tell people that a wise man said, “It’s not what you do, it’s how you do it”. There is a way you can rush somebody without panicking. That’s something I don’t like. If you do that to me, I’m not gonna move. I’m gonna take more time. If you come up to me and say (quietly), “Can you come do this for five minutes, bro?” then I’m more likely to be like “Okay, cool”. If you’re like “Oh my God! We gotta go! We gotta go!” I don’t like that. That energy is bad.
Kidzworld: What is coming up for you?
- Bow Wow: I just got done doing a movie called Recalled just finished that in New York prior to be going on Tour. I play an Army guy named Reyes and I go AWOL which is the wrong thing to do. I just got back from Australia last night. I don’t know how I’m here today but I’m fresh off tour and right into this “Madea” thing and then right after this I have another movie I’m gonna shoot in Toronto in another month and I just inked a deal with Ice Cube to star in my own TV show, a sitcom and Cube and I will be producing that and I’ll be in it.
Kidzworld: That’s a lot of work!
- Bow Wow: Yeah, so if you see a lot of gray hairs coming a little early, you’ll know why.
