Religious Rhetoric in Tyler Perry’s Play Madea’s Family Reunion

Tyler Perry is an African-American media phenomenon producing, directing, writing, and acting in gospel musical stage plays and movies. He hit the American national scene in 2005 when the film adaptation of his gospel play Diary of a Mad Black Woman debuted in movie theaters. The purpose of this paper is to examine Tyler Perry’s play Madea’s Family Reunion, which traveled around the country in 2002-2003, to describe the intersections of and relationships between African-American popular culture, religion, and rhetoric. I will argue that the songs in Madea’s Family Reunion are rhetorical forms of religious expression within an African-American Christian and performative context. I will draw upon Laurent Pernot’s discussion of four rhetorical forms of religious expression for my analysis.

As African-American popular culture, gospel musical stage plays focus on the idioms and practices of black American Christian churches and the intimate and romantic lives of single, heterosexual women and married black women (Williams and Coleman). Perceived to be pleasurable and good by its primary audience—African-American women (Pollard 65-6; Robertson), gospel plays consist of personas, arts, and rituals, express African-American beliefs and values, and are affected by production and dissemination practices and media industry controls and regulations. The focal comedic character in Madea’s Family Reunion is “Mabel Simmons,” or “Madea,” played by Tyler Perry; her comic foil is neighbor Deacon Leroy Brown.

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