Mr T, the Eighties icon of The A-Team and Rocky fame, has condemned a new Netflix documentary about his rise and fall – while literally promoting the documentary. Few stars are more synonymous with a specific moment in time than Mr T, who wore outrageous jewellery, had a hairstyle modelled after West African Mandinka warriors, and would use his ubiquitous catchphrase – “I pity the fool!” – to declare war against his enemies on screen and, in real life, warn children against the dangers of drugs in a series of public service announcements throughout the 1980s. But after his heyday Mr T largely vanished from screens, making only sporadic public appearances and hosting short-lived reality TV shows – among them a home improvement series titled I Pity the Tool that only broadcast a single episode.
Now he’s back with his own Netflix documentary charting his life and career, next week’s Untold Mr T: I Pity the Fool, but has used a rare interview to express his displeasure for it. You build me up, then you try to punk me out. I said: ‘Wow man, I’m more than that.’ Two days they interviewed my pastor, and he gets 30 seconds [on screen] … That’s what we call, in the black community, a white man wanting to change the story and control the narrative.
If you don’t know me, you’re gonna think I’m some monster.” Mr T, now 74, is a born-again Christian, and suggested that the documentary does not adequately show his charity work with the United States Army or the Make-a-Wish Foundation, and incorrectly states that his career dwindled due to bad business decisions. I was already walking away … Like the poem says, if you can walk with kings and queens and not lose your common touch then you will be a man, my son. How many people have sold their soul to the devil, chasing money?
I’m not chasing the dollar. I never did.” He also denied claims made in the documentary by his former agent that his career choices were misplaced – specifically his role as a Bearded Lady in a surreal 1993 comedy movie titled Freaked. New subscribers only. £9.99/mo. after free trial.
Plan auto-renews until cancelled. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent. He wants to cut Mr T down.” He added that the documentary has “an agenda” by contrasting footage of himself in his typical regalia and then dressed up as a bearded woman.
What a joke!” The Independent has reached out to Netflix for comment. Mr T, whose real name is Laurence Tureaud, played the tough-talking BA Baracus in The A-Team from 1983 to 1987, and parlayed his celebrity into political advocacy and charity work. He released a motivational video aimed at young people in 1984, titled Be Somebody... or Be Somebody’s Fool!, and was the face of First Lady Nancy Reagan’s notorious anti-drugs campaign Just Say No.
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