Comedian Chris Rock talks to Jane Hutcheon about starting in comedy, his father's influence, Eddie Murphy, Madagascar and his new film 'Top Five'.
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On his father: "Sometimes tragedy can be the best thing. Would I feel the need to have the drive I do if he was alive? Cause, you know, he was my safety blanket," said Rock.
"For a guy that has been doing this a long time I am not really resting. And part of that is just trying to recreate the security I had as a child.
"And that's never going to happen, but I can do it for my kids ... It is what it is."
On Eddie Murphy: "Everybody needs to see a version of themselves do something, it's just good, it makes you feel like you can do it," Rock said.
"And Eddie Murphy was the first version of myself that I saw succeeding at comedy.
"There's no Justin Bieber of comedy, it's just not this thing that you master at a young age."
On Top Five: "The character Andre Allen is kind of a mix of a lot of guys, there's a little Eddie Murphy in that, a little Chris Tucker in that, there's a little Kevin Hart in that, a little Jamie Fox, you know, it's like a lot of guys."
Rock's main aim in Top Five was to create a realistic tone to challenge his self-described style of broad-range "jokey" acting in other comedy flicks.
"So I wanted to create a tone that was more aligned with my stand-up tone," he said.
"And I think ... you get the same feeling from watching this movie as you get from when I do stand up."
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