Taraji P. Henson On ‘I Can Do Bad All By Myself’ [VIDEO EXCLUSIVE]

What I love about Tyler Perry is his process. It's very reminiscent of my training at Howard [University] and it's hardcore. I think that's why I've developed such a tough skin for the industry because of my training from Howard. They didn't tiptoe around the bushes. If you sucked, they told. If you hit a wrong note you would be replaced in an instant so Tyler works like that. He's sorta in the scene with you. It's very rare that he sits in video village which is down the hall and around the corner. He's right in the scene, he's looking at his little monitor, and he looks at you, he looks at the monitor and he yells 'Cut!' and you either sell him on it or you don't. And he'll let you know, he'll say 'I don't believe you.' To me that translates as 'dig deeper' and I love that about him because he won't allow me to use my wicked bag of tricks, cause I do have a wicked bag of tricks. That will work and do the job just fine, but I always promised myself that if I ever got complacent and comfortable I'd just walk away from the business, I'd retire cause I love what I do and I wanna stay passionate and driven for the craft of acting.

I loved working with Medea. I love that character. It was hard to keep a straight face. He'd stand there, and he has on these saggy boobs, big padded butt, wig, makeup and nail polish and talking like Medea, and all of sudden he's like, [deep voice] 'Cut!' And I'm like, 'Wait a second dude! If you are going be dressed like Medea and can you at least talk like her? Because you are confusing me here!'

I think she's an amazing artist and then I just got to know her and she just shines. And it makes me understand why I love her music so much. Doing my scene with Mary, she was very nervous, understandably so, acting is not her first profession. She started getting nervous and she clammed up. So Tyler came over and whispered to me, 'Just give it to her. Go off the script, and let her have it.' And I'm like, 'I canâ