Happy Birthday Tyler Perry!

Written by Kirk Baird

Filmmaker Tyler Perry is a cottage industry in media, with successful plays, films, and TV shows, which he writes, directs, produces and often stars. In celebration of the auteur’s 43rd birthday today, some highlights from his film, TV, and stagework:

Tyler Perry: The Plays (2007): A collection of Perry’s first seven plays, including Madea's Family Reunion; Madea Goes to Jail; Why Did I Get Married?; Diary of a Mad Black Woman; Meet the Browns; and I Can Do Bad All By Myself.

House of Payne, Volumes 1-8: an award-winning sitcom about a multigenerational working-class family as they experience all of life's struggles with faith, love, and, most importantly, humor.

Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad All by Myself (2009): After Madea catches some children looting her home, she turns them over to their Aunt April, a nightclub singer who wants nothing to do with her late sister's kids. The hard-living singer discovers the importance of family with the help of a handsome Mexican immigrant.

Tyler Perry’s Daddy’s Little Girls (2007): Monty is a blue-collar worker trying to gain custody of his children from his ex-wife and her boyfriend. Julia is a hotshot attorney who has offered to help Monty with his case. Can these two people from different backgrounds find love with each other?

Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married? (2007): A story about the difficulty of maintaining a solid love relationship in modern times. Over the weekend, husbands and wives take a hard look at their lives, wrestling with issues of commitment, betrayal, and forgiveness as they seek a way forward.

Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Big Happy Family (2011): Madea, everyone's favorite wise-cracking, take-no-prisoners grandma, jumps into action when her niece, Shirley, receives distressing news about her health. All Shirley wants is to gather her three adult children around her and share the news as a family. It's up to Madea, with the help of the equally rambunctious Aunt Bam, to gather the clan together and make things right the only way she knows how: with a lot of tough love, laughter, and the revelation of a long-buried family secret.