As Empire prepares to return later this month, Jussie Smollett visited Stephen Colbert Wednesday night and talked about his real family versus his TV family. Now, just like the Lyon family on Empire, the Smollett family sticks together. And Jussie Smollett says he thinks his real-life family would definitely open up a can of whoop ass on the Lyon family.
“We would beat the Lyons’ ass,” he said during his appearance on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. “Terrence [Howard] and Taraji [P. Henson] right now are probably like, ‘Oh, word?’ but I’ll tell you why. The Lyons are constantly at each other’s throats. We have a unified situation. And yes, Lucious would possibly pull out a gun and shoot you in the eye, but that’s not the point. My older brother has arms the size of my thighs, so we would be all right. And I sure could beat Jamal’s ass down.”
And that’s how the Smolletts roll.
Smollett also spoke about his early years as a kid actor, along with his sister Jurnee Smollett-Bell, who’s currently starring in WGN’s Underground. When the siblings were younger, they both starred in the family sitcom On Our Own, and that was all the work of their mother, who got tired of chauffeuring her kids to different jobs and told them they had to do a job together or not work at all.
“The next thing we know, we’re in a meeting with ABC. I mean, all these old-ass white men. So we went in, and I don’t know why, but we went in and sang ‘Shut ’Em Down’ by Public Enemy,” Smollett said. “But yo, they loved it. Apparently they wanted to shut it down, too. But then I guess they didn’t like it anymore because they canceled us. They shut us down.”
Empire returns March 30 on Fox.