"I try to always step up to the plate, be professional, be good at what I'm doing and deliver on the character."
Martin Fitzgerald Lawrence (Born April 16, 1965 in Frankfurt, Germany) is a German-born American actor and comedian. He began his career as a stand up comedian and gained notoriety in the 1990s after a successful run on Star Search. He has branched into acting, directing, producing and writing. However, he seems to be typecast quite a bit as most of his film roles are either as policemen, con artists, or in the case of Blue Streak - both.
Roles Of Note:
- House Party (1990): Bilal
- Boomerang (1992): Tyler
- Martin (1992-1997): Martin Payne
- Bad Boys (1995): Marcus Burnett
- Nothing to Lose (1997): T-Paul
- Blue Streak (1999): Miles Logan/“Detective Kevin Malone”
- Life (1999): Claude Banks
- Big Momma's House (2000): Malcolm Turner
- Black Knight (2001): Jamal Walker
- What's the Worst That Could Happen? (2001): Kevin Caffery
- Bad Boys II (2003): Marcus Burnett
- Rebound (2005): Roy McCormick/Preacher Don
- Open Season (2006) : Boog (voice)
- Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (2008): Dr. RJ Stevens
- College Road Trip (2008): James Porter
Associated Tropes:
- The '90s: Easily one of if not the best American comedians of the 1990s.
- Ax-Crazy: He started to be viewed in this light in the middle of his career after a couple of bizarre dangerous incidents that he even made fun of in his stand-ups.
- Deadpan Snarker: His career is full of these type of characters he is one himself while performing stand up. His most notable snarker characters is the title character in Martin and his character Marcus in the film series Bad Boys.
- Disguised in Drag: His movie Big Momma's House plot revolves around this.
- The Casanova: His character on A Thin Line Between Love And Hate.
- Cluster F-Bomb: When he is doing stand up comedy.
- Everything Is Racist: Did a bit on this on his stand up movie You So Crazy.
- Large Ham: He is known for being one of the most eccentric comedians of all time and his title character in the tv series Martin fulfills this trope completely.
- Malcolm Xerox: Played this type of character twice one in the movie Boomerang as Tyler and one in National Security.
- Mammy: His character Malcolm invoked this while being in disguised as one in the Big Momma House film series.
- Meaningful Name: He was named after Martin Luther King Jr. and President John F. Kennedy.
- N-Word Privileges: Uses them frequently while performing stand up comedy.
- Prison Rape: Made a joke of this in his You So Crazy Stand-Up Comedy movie.
- Stand-Up Comedy: Where he started his entertainment career and is known as one of the greatest comedians of all time.
- Sassy Black Woman: The character he played in his tv seriesMartin Sheneneh Jenkins exaggerates this trope.
- The Napoleon: Few of his former cast mates note he is like this in real life but he play this role a few times in media. His most notable character that fits this trope is the titular character of Martin and Marcus from the Bad Boys film series.
- Uncle Tom Foolery: He demonstrated this type of character occasionally in movies like National Security Nothing To Loose and in the latter part of the Bad Boys film series.
