*After being job-shamed online for bagging groceries at Trader Joe’s, former “Cosby Show” star Geoffrey Owens has returned to TV, and describes a new role written for him as “incredible.”
“There’s no job that is better than another. They might pay better, have better benefits, but actually, it’s not better,” Owens said last month on “Good Morning America,” after a photo of him bagging groceries at went viral.
Tyler Perry was one of several Hollywood A-listers who was moved by his hustle and reached out to offer support… and a job!
“There is a little sense of mischief, I think, to Tyler as well as generosity because, you know, I had just said, ‘I don’t think I would really feel comfortable getting offered work, you know, because of the situation,'” Owens said. “And darn. What does he do? He offers me work.”
The movie mogul wrote a new character for Owens to play in his drama series “The Haves and the Have Nots.”
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“I said, ‘Hmm, I got something for you. I’ll write a senator in, make you a senator in this,'” Perry told “GMA.”
“I called him up and the next week I had written him into 11 shows,” he added. “But when he showed up the first day, I saw him in costume, I had 20,000 more ideas running in my head for him.”
Perry said he knows firsthand what it’s like to have to work hard for everything.
“To get this place, just to have seen both sides of this, has been really incredible,” he said. “And that’s why I feel like … I’m the guy for the underdog.”
He added: “Sometimes things just don’t work out. And that’s OK. That’s OK. You do what you have to do in between to get to the point until it gets there.”
Returning to set and having a character specifically written for him by Mr. Perry is “incredible,” Owens said. “I don’t think that’s ever happened to me before,” he added. “I’m really proud and excited to be part of his world, basically. He’s so inspiring.”
Since his Trader Joe’s photo went viral, Owens said he’s received tons of TV offers and an outpouring of support from the acting community.
“Maybe this is the cause that’s actually going to bridge the divide in our country,” he said. “Maybe this is it. This is the way that we come together.”
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