Chris Rock has spent the better part of a decade turning his real life into material.
This week, the comedian and actor stopped joking around the edges of his expensive divorce and said the quiet part out loud.
He said the money isn’t what it used to be, and there’s one job that could fix it all. And, no, it’s not headlining a stadium tour. Or another Netflix special. And it definitely isn’t hosting the Oscars.
The 61-year-old sat down in a new interview to talk about the most serious swing of his career, and somewhere in the middle of it, he stopped selling the new project.
Instead, he started lobbying a studio for a check on the record, citing his ex-wife’s settlement as the reason.
The job in question is a talking zebra he last voiced 14 years ago. Rock played Marty in all three “Madagascar” films between 2005 to 2012. And to say he’s been waiting for a call to reprise his role would be an understatement.
“I played Marty the zebra in ‘Madagascar,’” he told Variety. “Everybody is really good. It’s probably the biggest movie I’ve ever been in.”
Then came the pitch, hilariously delivered like a man reading a hostage note. “We only did three. There’s five Ice Ages. Five! OK? I need another ‘Madagascar.’”
Rock didn’t reach for anything creative when he explained the urgency for a fourth installment. Instead, he made it clear it was for financial purposes.
“Do you understand I got divorced?” he said. “I don’t have ‘Madagascar’ money anymore.”
He kept going. “You know we did three of them. I pray to God we do one more,” Rock added. “In a world where they’re rebooting everything, let’s do ‘Madagascar.’” He even name-checked the competition: “Weren’t there like a Toy Story 4 or 5? Why can’t we figure this out?”
Fans online immediately clocked the mix of comedy and openness.
“When your ex takes half but DreamWorks didn’t call back yet,” one person wrote under a clip of the interview posted on X.
“Divorce took the lion king money AND the madagascar money apparently,” another added.
“Madagascar Money is a pretty funny way to put it lol! Hopefully the call comes through, those movies definitely have a way of bringing the whole crew back together,” a third said.
And one commenter skipped the discourse entirely with five words: “I like to move it,” referencing a famous phrase from the family movie.
The split he’s referencing rearranged his finances a decade ago. Rock married philanthropist Malaak Compton-Rock in 1996.
The two separated in 2014, Rock filed in 2015, and the case was finalized and sealed in 2016 after nearly two decades of marriage. They share two daughters, Lola and Zahra, both now grown. Zahra just graduated from USC with honors in May.
The settlement terms were never made public. But outlets that include HELLO! have claimed a figure in the neighborhood of $40 million. It was also claimed the pair had a prenuptial agreement with a sunset clause that had already expired by the time the marriage ended, leaving his wealth fully exposed.
Rock has never pretended otherwise. He branded his 2017 Total Blackout run “the alimony tour,” and the Netflix special that came out of it, “Tamborine,” was the first time he publicly picked apart his own role in the marriage ending.
The irony is that the “Madagascar” money was real money. The trilogy, which paired Rock with Ben Stiller, David Schwimmer and Jada Pinkett Smith, pulled in roughly $1.9 billion worldwide, and with the 2014 spinoff “Penguins of Madagascar” the franchise cleared $2.2 billion. DreamWorks once had a fourth film penciled in for 2018 before quietly pulling it off the release calendar.
The interview wasn’t even supposed to be about cartoons. Rock was there to promote “Misty Green,” his newest directorial project starring Rosalind Eleazar, Adam Driver, Daniel Kaluuya and Anna Kendrick.
He might be chasing awards season, but he still found time to lobby DreamWorks for that “Madagascar” check. Whether the company is listening is another matter. Rock, for his part, has made the ask as plainly as he can.
It would also be interesting to see whether Jada would consider reprising her role, considering her history with Rock.
