Tyler Perry responds to criticism of Spike Lee "Madea" with Chris Wallace

Tyler Perry has long taken on his star character, Madea, and the stereotypes some think she upholds - but he defends himself...especially against Spike Lee.

The movie studio mogul sat down for an interview with Chris Wallace on his new program on HBO Max -- "Who's Talking to Chris Wallace" -- which has been pulled from CNN+... and reused on their main streaming app.

Chris asks Tyler for a review Lee once gave him when describing his Madea movies -- in which he called the character and/or those movies "coonery buffoonery" in 2009.

From Spike's point of view...Madea is a caricature of black people, women in particular, and he thinks it's a cheap, over-the-top imitation that Tyler has very successfully monetized. There are at least 10 films of him in which the character appears.

While TP was quoted as saying that Spike can "go to hell", he is a bit more nuanced in explaining why he loves the character and the thought behind his makeup. He says Madea represents the women he grew up with, whose stories he wanted to convey in a humorous way...with a touch of truth. In other words, he seems to see it as a tribute.

Tyler also invokes Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance to reinforce his point... noting that this conversation happened long before Spike's salvo.

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Now it should be noted...this old beef, while still being discussed today, seems to be long gone and buried. In 2019, when Tyler opened...