00:00We are here for real reasons, real conversation, but I would like to welcome the woman whose album is the inspiration for this conversation.
00:08If there's anybody who's proven her strength throughout her life and her 25-year recording career, it is Mary J. Blige.
00:20From her 1992 debut, What's the 411? Yes, stand up to her current chart-topping album, Strength of a Woman.
00:28Mary has always spoken openly and honestly with us.
00:34She has always been the real deal with us.
00:38And she's done it in so many ways that we can relate to, which is why I love her and I want you to be happy and stand on your feet and let's praise the greatness that is Mary J. Blige.
00:58There you go.
01:07Okay.
01:08I think it's that one.
01:09Go with that.
01:10Mary, yes.
01:12How y'all doing?
01:14Is this how it goes?
01:15Yeah, I think I said, well, they told us it was a lot of seeds.
01:18I'm just going to be honest.
01:18I was like, I got lost when I came out, so we'll figure it out.
01:21He said the left, so I'm on my left.
01:22Okay, my left.
01:23Yeah.
01:23All right, so what's new?
01:31All of this, everything is new.
01:33I mean, the album.
01:35The album.
01:36Yes.
01:37You know, that's really it right now.
01:41That's it.
01:42Mary J., what's new?
01:43Oh, just another album I dropped on the world.
01:47I said in the intro, we love you for many reasons.
01:50And you're special and you've transcended all categories of music for many reasons.
01:57And it's because you are so awesome.
01:58You are Mary.
02:00Thank you so much.
02:01This new album, take me through the journey that got us to this point.
02:09Oh, boy.
02:11That's why we love you.
02:14Well, the journey that got us here, you know, every woman can relate to a woman out there fighting for her marriage, fighting for her life, fighting for her marriage.
02:27And this, I was coming from a perspective when I first started writing this album.
02:32I was trying to save my marriage.
02:35And I was working really hard.
02:36And you know me, I said, when I said, and I can't be without you, I really felt I really meant that.
02:42I wouldn't have said it because, you know, there's a lot of layers to me that have been peeled back in this relationship.
02:47And when I said to the world that I found someone, I really thought I did.
02:53So I was really trying to fight really hard for my marriage at the beginning of the process of writing this album.
02:59But then it failed.
03:01So a lot of those songs, not only trying to fight for my marriage, just trying to fight for my life because inside of this marriage, I was, you know, I just got, you know,
03:13you get torn down and you forget who you are and you don't think you're anything because of the mental abuse that you suffer.
03:22So I was trying to save my life by writing songs like Indestructible, like I can't be destroyed.
03:28So I wrote that song before I even started going through all of this mess.
03:33And when it all blew up in my face, it was nothing I could do because, you know, everything was just there.
03:41I didn't have to channel anything.
03:43I was already deceived.
03:44It was already embarrassing.
03:46It was already humiliating.
03:47It was already what it was.
03:48So I had to take something so dark and nasty and turn it into something positive to save my life.
03:54And, you know, it is what it is.
03:57And I don't know if people have seen the last eight years of my life or the last five years of my life, but it's been hell and it's been ugly and it's been public and it's been nasty.
04:09So in the midst of all that and the stuff that people don't even know about, fighting for my life, fighting for my marriage, fighting for my morals and everything,
04:16I had to find, I discovered my strength, my strength, my real strength as this woman.
04:29You've chosen to be so open and take us through this experience.
04:35Why?
04:35Why?
04:36Why?
04:37You said it was embarrassing.
04:38You're fighting for your life.
04:39It's not just a career.
04:41This is your life.
04:42Why share it with us?
04:43Well, because I believe that I wasn't given this career or this job as a singer or this gift from God to sit down and say, well, I'm going to suffer in front of the world and silence and die.
05:00And it's therapeutic for me as well.
05:04So that's, you know, that's why it's not just for me.
05:08So when you talk about the pain of the last few years, you and I know when people see television and they see the lights, the glamour, you're beautiful, you're talented, they think you have it all.
05:20But you still have to go home and deal with being just Mary.
05:25I have to go home and deal with just being Mary.
05:29I have to go home and deal with things that people don't even, a lot of things people don't know.
05:32You know, it's not, I work really, really hard, so hard for everything.
05:38Nothing is given to me and people don't want to give me anything.
05:41So I have to bust my behind and really be appreciative and find confidence so I can continue, you know, confidence in myself so I can continue to do what I do.
05:52But you project such confidence.
05:54I mean, you are, as I keep saying, this authentic woman and you project confidence.
06:01How is it when you have this public Mary, but then behind the scenes you're trying to find that strength of the woman you are?
06:08Well, because when mentally you've been, how can I say it, beaten down, manipulated,
06:17you, if in front of the world, you know, you have to, especially when you're in a relationship,
06:24you're trying to protect the person and you're trying to hold yourself together.
06:29So when you've been beaten down mentally, you go home and you suffer and you deal with that because you,
06:36I'm sorry, I'm not speaking for everybody else, but I was beginning to think I was nothing.
06:41You know, I was beginning to think those things.
06:42People will say, how's that possible, that Mary J, and you know that my sister was murdered.
06:48I speak out for domestic violence awareness.
06:51I think a lot of women don't get that it doesn't matter economic.
06:55It doesn't matter race.
06:56It doesn't matter where you're from.
06:57You can find yourself in these situations that make you feel like you're nothing.
07:03Well, that's because being Mary J. Blige, the celebrity, is secondary.
07:08I'm a human being at first, and I, I suffer just like everybody else.
07:14How did you pull yourself through it?
07:17How did you see the light in the middle of the darkness?
07:21Um, prayer.
07:23And I, what I did was, I, I, I prayed consistently, you know, in my little prayer closet consistently.
07:32You have a prayer closet.
07:33You know.
07:34A little space.
07:35Yeah, a little space, and, um, I didn't give up on myself.
07:39When I was told I was fat, or I wasn't optimal, or I wasn't fine enough, I went hard to see if I could be fine enough.
07:48So, I'm a little, you know, some, some of, I mean, you gotta have a, I had a little vanity in there.
07:53I was like, I'm going hard.
07:54I gotta, I gotta save myself.
07:55I can't just, you know, you know, I wanna look good.
07:59I wanna look good.
08:00Well, you did a great job.
08:00I wanna look good for him.
08:01I wanna look good, you know.
08:02So, so, yeah, I mean, yeah.
08:05I wanna talk to you, not only about the movie, but I told Mary behind the scenes two things.
08:09So, she just got her hair braided for the first time in how many years?
08:12It's been about 25 years to 30.
08:14And I'm getting mine braided on Monday.
08:16So, I'm like, does it hurt?
08:17I want, we, we're like, okay, we want longer braids.
08:19So, we're, in addition to exchanging, uh, braid stories.
08:22I told Mary she had me polish off a bottle of red wine the other night.
08:25Her new movie, thanks for the red wine.
08:27So, mud bound is, it's, it's phenomenal.
08:32When I tell you, you need to see this film for so many reasons.
08:36It's a part of our history, our black history, our American history.
08:40But you, it's a role of a lifetime for you.
08:44Well, thank you.
08:44And I have to give a real big thank you to Dee Reese because people don't, people don't come to me with, you know,
08:53amazing offers for movies and things like that because I'm not, you know, a seasoned actress.
09:00But Dee came to me and she believed in me.
09:03She gave me a chance to show her that I could do it.
09:06And so, thank you, Dee Reese, for the opportunity and the chance of, you know, to do this movie.
09:12And Dee is going to join us.
09:14The film is phenomenal.
09:16You've got to see it.
09:16And you can just have a Mary J. weekend.
09:19Listen to the album, watch the film, and just wrap yourself in Mary J.
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