The next great podcast competition finalists are now set, we've sifted through thousands of incredible entries submitted on the creative platform Tongo.

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They'll need your support. Listen to next great podcast finalists now on the radio app or wherever you listen to podcasts, then go to next. Great podcast Dotcom to vote for your favorite to help us find the next great podcast. Are you dealing with best life burnout, constantly striving for more and quite frankly, over it, it maybe you just want more joy, peace and laughter in your life now? Well, then, let's go. Welcome to your new favorite podcast, Hot Happy Men, hosted by Meet Your Girl, Jerry Hall.

We are celebrating our magic in the middle of life's message. Don't miss our first episode on November 30th. Listen to the Hot Happy Mess podcast on the I Heart radio app on Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey fam, I'm Jada Pinkett Smith and this is the Red Tablecloth podcast. All your favorite episodes from the Facebook Watch show in audio produced by Westbrooke Audio and I Heart Radio.

Please don't forget to write and review on Apple podcasts on this red table talk, an incredible story of survival. You were found outside and trash and inspiring conversation with my good friend Tommy Davidson.

Do you say Mom saved your life? I just want to thank you. That's the reason why I'm here. Tommy is one of the most entertaining people you will ever meet. You may recognize him from in living color, dozens of movies or a stand up. But behind his laughter was a world of pain, one that I witnessed firsthand. And now he's come to the red table to tell us how he survived and thrived on my kids. He's a miracle.

He shouldn't be here.

What's that girl? Are you for the twins? Absolutely, absolutely. Well, this is going to go straight to the table. Don't start because I know you're about to I'm about to take when he said the cameras would be gone. Is this the red table?

This is the red table top actor comedian Tommy Davidson has been a family friend for more than 20 years. And I wanted him to come to the table to share his journey.

It has been one of ultimate survival against all odds. Tommy, I'm glad to be here.

Glad to be here. Anticipating being here. Has been a little bit hard for me because talking about this stuff, I never did.

You know, what's interesting is that I've known you a long time and aspect of this journey that I didn't know was the beginning of your story that you were found outside in trash.

Mm hmm. So it was an abandoned house. There's a woman she went in. There was no kids in there doing drugs and drinking.

But when she was leaving, she said something, told me to look under this tire that was in a pile of trash next to the house. She said, When I moved the tire, I saw your foot. When I move to trash, you were laying there, yeah, I had a torn red shirt, I had contusions in my skull like, yes, I've been hit and starved and.

Were you close to death? Yeah. They didn't think I was going to live. I was in a coma. Who knows how long I've been there dirty.

The stranger who found baby Tammy in the trash was Barbara Jean Davidson, a mother of two. As he clung to life in the hospital, Barbara made a decision that would change her life and his life forever.

She adopted Tommy and brought him home. My mom was my hero. She was like the most fierce protector. He was welcomed by his new brother, Michael, and sister Borough. Born just 35 days apart. Berlind Tommy were raised as twins and were inseparable. We shared a room until we were like 14 really is my rock. She's definitely my other half. They lived in an all white town. Tommy felt like he belonged from day one when she adopted this little black boy.

She's from Wyoming. How was it for the rest of her family bringing you into the fold?

I never felt for one minute that I was different at all. At all. Really interesting.

You know, I learned my colors from the crayons, so I know brown. Brown was a brown crayon. My sister was peach, right.

That thought I was a brown one of whatever we were right. Because I grew up on farms. The horse would have a colt. The horse could be a brown horse and have a black colt. Right. You know, or dog can be a brown dog or a white dog and have like a speckled one. Yeah, I have a brown one. Have a white one. Yeah. So I thought I was a brown one of whatever we were.

Right. My grandfather was the first one who started telling me about race. He was trying to prepare you.

I was playing with my cowboys and Indians and he said, I want you to know that the Indians are the heroes, you know, and I want you to know that all cowboys didn't kill Indians.

I'm a cowboy. Oh. You know?

And I was like, OK, right. One of the things that came out of my experience is that all white people are not the same. Right?

Yeah, but when I got to D.C., this is when it all changed because we moved into D.C. during the riots, we king got shot.

And every day after school grown white men were chasing me home, I would barely get in the house.

How old were you, Tom? I was five people were throwing in our window shooting and that's the first time I heard the word nigger. It was crazy. And that really hurt me. Yeah. I mean, that really, really hurt me because I know. What are what am I supposed to do? Choose sides or something, right? Yeah, I don't know anything about this. Like what the hell? It was like a bomb went off in my brain.

Yeah. And I was somewhere playing. And there you go again, nigger. Get them to white teenagers chased me in. These big black dudes came out.

And white boys went the other way, and I've been black ever since. That that was the date, right? Oh, yeah, that was the day I was like, you know, they came out from nowhere, man. Right. And I said, yeah. I said, man, I guess I am black.

You know, look, you let me look into this and let me look into this. You know what I mean?

Yeah. So that was that was the moment that you identified that it stamped.

That's really interesting that she moved the entire family to D.C..

I remember we moved there. We had a little radio and ball of confusion with playing. It could have been something in a movie. And as people move in and people moving out. Yeah, yeah. All his color of skin. Yeah. One right one. Which is shocking. Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo. And confusion.

I was like, where are we? Did she ever explain to you why she did that? She made sure that I was in a black neighborhood, but for my brother and sister, it was her. Yeah, I think deep inside my mother, you know.

She did that for me. Yeah, she's black. I want to show my sister why you know, how to fight them. Yeah, and at the same time, I was like the hero of the neighborhood because I can sing really good. Right? Like, really good. Ever since I was like five.

So my mother would impress her friends. Right. You asked me to come over here, put me on a table, take a spoon, put tin foil on it, put on Jane, Jane, Jane is back.

But don't say it loud. I'm black and I'm proud. Right.

And I'm doing a Mustang and doing the pony and killing it.

I had Sly and the Family Stone, you know, different strokes for different folks and so on and so on.

And Scooby Dooby Dooby Shasha with the little girl, you know, I mean, I heard him every people like you had the coolest white mom. Oh yeah.

I know. There ain't no doubt about that.

My mom said, Tommy, you have a way of putting things that makes people happy so fast that all they can do is there. But I never thought it would lead to comedy.

Personal growth is challenging, but it doesn't have to be hard. When we lean into self enquiry and self discovery, we're able to love all the tiny little parts of life, even the pieces we don't want other people to know about. And that's what it's really about, right? Self-love, self acceptance, self discovery, excavation expansion. We are the powerful cocreator of our lives. All we need are the tools to get there.

I'm Debbie Brown, the host of the Dropping Gems podcast, a podcast about the depth and potential personal growth. No one's journey is the same as the next, but the magic of being human shows up and the things we have in common. Our capacity for love, pain, joy, sadness, togetherness and solitude are things that make us perfectly imperfect. And I want to explore with you how we can live our best through it all. New season of Dropping Gems is available.

Now listen. Dropping gems on the I Heart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Hello Earthlings. It's Kasher here, bringing you the devilish sounds and twisted treats of my new podcast Kesa and the creepy sound where I, your host Kesha, bring you into my twisted universe where the supernatural as well quite natural. Kesha and The Creepy's explores supernatural subjects and alternative lifestyles with today's most exciting pop culture guests and experts in the occult. You may know me from my party jams like tick tock.

We are who we are. But it's my curiosity for the unexplainable and mystical that drives these fascinating conversations that span non-traditional spirituality, psychedelic art and all things creepy. Listen and follow. And the creeps on the I Heart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcast.

At 22, Tommy went to an amateur mic night for the first time and killed it. His career took off. Eventually, his talent caught the eye of the Wayans brothers, landing him a coveted role on the iconic sketch series in Living Color.

His dream of making it big was finally coming true. He went on to star in dozens of films and TV shows. But despite all the money, fame and star treatment, Tommy was far from happy.

Tommy and I did two movies together, as you already know, Bamboozled and well the first time that we worked together and I really got to know you on the set of wew, I came out for a scene and you looked at me. You were like, something's wrong with you. So what are you talking about? Let's just get to work. You know, the million people around doing that camera action, you know, and standing around me, she said running around with you.

And I was like to start the day. She's like, nah, she said, come here. What's wrong with you? I said, my my mother contacted my real mother and, you know, she was on the phone. I got a chance to talk to her about. I'll deal with that.

She said, Oh, really? OK, hold on. That's a wrap, everybody. That's the day. All right, you go deal with that. All right. Later.

And it led from our conversation to me finally meeting my biological mom when he was 38 years old. Tommy met his birth mother for the first time all my life. I was mad at her. I always would say, where are you? I had a lot of resentment and anger for her abandoning me. Tommy continued to channel his pain into his performances, and then drugs led him to a tragic tipping point in his life. In his book, Living in Color, Tommy admits that his addiction undid everything he accomplished and nearly killed him.

One night at a girlfriend's house after ODing on cocaine. Paramedics rushed him to the hospital with no clothes on, strapped to a gurney. The fallout broken relationships with a string of women and four of his children.

What was the thing that got you into the heavier stuff the first time you did cocaine? I was 16. I gave it to me. Everybody had it right all the time. And I said, OK. I'm not try and I was like, this is kind of dandy. This is Zanón, right? I think nothing about it. Right. And it just became one of the things. One of the things.

Yeah, no, it became the thing. Right. It got really, really bad. Yeah.

You know, I lost a marriage a lot.

You know, it was just it just one of those things that just kept on going. Kept on going. That's when Spike actually called my mother. He asked me, you know, because I went to him and said, hey, I'm having a hard time here. So he went on and told me about his father, how his father was strung out for years and what it did to his family. And the main thing was to gather my strength.

He said, I have a selfish motive, I need you in this movie, but most of all, you know, you need to be OK for your family, for you. You were kind of in and out of rehab.

The whole world that I thought was.

It wasn't. Yeah, yeah. Because I had it all backwards. Right. Yeah. See, what I was thinking is, is if I just could be successful. If I just could get this right, I was thinking, you know, I'm to give me an Oscar, an Emmy and all that stuff, you know, I'm going to get that stuff and I'm going about right. They became that, you know, get the house and have this and have the money and have the then everything is going to be cool.

So I would do that and then it would fall and I would do that. And then it would fall. And then I would do. And I couldn't understand why. Why am I not making this connection?

When I became addicted to drugs, you know, I was a functioning addict.

Just the same with those kinds of successes are the kinds of things that keep you in denial about who you are and where you really are.

Yeah, I call it being a functional addict. You know what I'm saying, right? Yeah. Hit bottom. Yet where was the point that you hit your body in Philadelphia?

I did a show. I was going on stage that night.

My talent was gone. Wow. So what do you mean by that, like that thing that came out of my mouth so naturally was gone? It's like Bond, it was more than that. I wouldn't consider that a bomb. What I would consider that is a solid message.

If I gave it to you, I can take it from you. Now, are you on my team? Yeah, he stripped you and so that was in front of 5000 people the next day.

I didn't want to go to a dollar, an AA meeting, but I went and there was a guy in there and he was talking about how he is going to the NFL and how drinking and stuff like that took all of it from him. What he said that got my attention was he said all my life I thought that people were stabbing me in my back. And I turned around to see that I'm the one with the knife in my mind.

And I was like, it's me. Yeah, it's me.

It's not if the wife, my ex-wife or you do. This is not if if you treat me right, it's not if racism was not, it was me. Yeah.

Do you say mom saved your life. Right.

And you call me and I called you and then I was going oh yeah, I was in Pittsburgh and you was like, hey, what's up?

You are you. And I was like, yeah, I'm, I used to hold on then bam the ghost came over.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Because by that time you had already been exposed to the brand. Right. I had this.

But it's a process, it's something that had to take had to take its hold. Right. Know. And I just want to thank you because it saved my life. And that was one of the many things that happened that that are the reason why I'm here. Wow. When your mother passed, she can hardly talk. You know, and she's really worried about me all those years, but then I was doing fine, but it was still hard to really trust that I to be OK because she's passing away now.

In 2006, Tommy lost his beloved adoptive mother, the woman who rescued him from the trash to a rare form of cancer.

When my mom passed away, I realize that I am my mother's greatest accomplishment. She shaped me and she knew that she was sending out into the world somebody who can give love. And that's my purpose. So when I'm asked, what's your greatest accomplishment? It's being Barbara Davidson's youngest son, Tommy. The last thing I did was seeing her.

Your mom? Yeah, and she's love, I think she's like, I can see why I can say I saying Kenny Loggins song, uh, we lawa.

Take the time to find its way to you as soon as you no longer try suddenly to be staring in your eyes. Don't forget it if you let it come to you. That was my last words there, right?

I'm Stephanie Rule, MSNBC anchor and host of the podcast Modern Rules from NBC, Think and I Heart Radio. The new season of my podcast is back with more probing conversations that get at the heart of the issues that are keeping us up at night from sex and dating during covid to the stark reality that the gender gap is a lot wider than we thought and the true ramifications of misinformation.

These ideas, that coronavirus is really just about government control, that it's infringing on civil liberties. All of these ideas are similar ideas to the anti vaccine movement.

So where do we go from here? Join me, Stephanie rule for the second season of Modern Rules. Listen on the radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Beyond the Beauty, a podcast from My Heart Radio, I'm your host, Bobby Brown. I've been in the beauty industry for a long time and I've learned a lot. I have watched makeup, skincare and beauty change more than I ever could have imagined. This season on Beyond the Beauty, I'm exploring the beauty industry past and present.

I'm reflecting on my own experiences and I'm talking to some of the biggest and brightest names in beauty today. From celebrity makeup artist to brand founders, we have the household names and the up and comers who are changing the game today. Listen to the brand new season of Beyond the Beauty on the I Heart radio app, Apple podcast. Wherever you listen to your favorite shows, join me as we all learn about the real meaning of beauty. It sounds like to me that there was a lot that happened during your addiction journey.

Are you still in that process of, like, repairing that with your kids?

Yeah, one of the things that's come with my life is not to apologize, but to atone. Mom and a friend of mine taught me that because I didn't know what a tone meant.

Yes.

Yeah, because apology doesn't mean anything if your behavior stays right. So she explained it to me. She said apologies, saying sorry but sorry runs out.

Yeah. Like old cartridge. Yeah, sure it does.

But to atone for something is to change the behavior. Absolutely. Our atonement and our healing came from me watching her be a maternal support and grandmother to my children that she might not have been for me as a child.

But she was right there all the time, making survivor sacrifices to be there for me and for my children in the way that really just dissolved anything that had happened in the past.

And so I understand that atonement because she was a new person.

It wasn't even anything to talk about, you know what I mean? But what I tell you, what has been really painful for me in our journey, too, is the sea.

Jada's relationship with her children and realize all that she missed with me. That has been. Extremely, extremely painful for me to I mean, I'm happy for it, and I'm so proud of her, but, you know, and the loss is just as much mine. As it is worth. It's difficult. It is, I hope. For you that there will be an opening in some way. To really have a deep healing with your kids. Because it ain't gonna happen overnight, I'm better now because we I mean, we I think we still struggle.

You know, it's just such a process.

And I just don't think I'll ever in my oldest daughter, you know, she you know, I not in her right now. Right. I mean, so that's OK.

Yeah, it's OK. I found a picture of us so I took it to her. But yeah, I said, this is who we are. Yeah.

You know, I mean and just let it let it be. Let it be. It takes time and those openings occur. Right.

So what words of wisdom would you have for people that are going through a heart, any kind of struggle right now?

Have courage enough to trust someone. With your secrets, oh. And let them help you. Oh, so let them help you. Because it takes a lot of courage to do that. It does, you know, because are you going to love me the same if I tell you some of the stuff I really did? Yeah.

And you'd be surprised that they will. They will.

You'll be surprised that, you know, that one opens up. Yeah. Yes.

Many people have a whole nother world that opens up, you know, and I never really thought about how much help. Helps until I needed it. Yeah, the one person Tommy says helped him through all his hard times is his beloved twin sister, Berl, even though they now live on opposite coasts. BERLIND Tommy still talk every day, but has been over a year since they last saw each other.

Man as my twin. Know how to get to that chair. How can we bring a chair out? It's about. Welcome. All right, y'all asked for it. Hi, nice to meet you. Welcome to the 24 year. Is so nice to meet you. I heard that you guys are how far apart my twins at just thought it was so interesting that you guys were raised as twins in the same grades, same grade, seventh grade, seventh grade.

That has to be a trip.

Well, you know, you're all I have and all I've had. So you mean the world to me? You're everything. Really everything I protected growing up and everything that was important to me was you.

Wow. Linda Krier in the family, so wow. Would you say that in seeing. Tommy, now and everything you've seen him come through, would you say that you proud of your brother? Oh, my God, yes. Yeah, he has been through everything. Yeah. Like you. When he's not here, he shouldn't be here right now. This right here.

You know what we've been through, you know, for us to be sitting here. She man, she was all I had an. I tell you what, it has been wonderful just to have the opportunity to see you guys together.

If you ever feel like your brother out there for real, for real.

Thank you so much for coming and blessing the table. Thanks, guys. Thank you so much. This is good. This was beautiful. Hey, Hayati family, join our red tabletop group on Facebook to become part of the conversation and be sure to follow the show page to catch up on all our episodes. Yeah, I said before, you don't know how when we have black men come to the table and ask about their story, we don't have it often.

And it brings our humanity because people just look at our men going through and they don't know why. Right. They don't hear the stories in order to understand where men are coming from.

To join the red table, talk family and become a part of the conversation, follow us at Facebook. Dotcom slash, red tabletop. Thanks for listening to this episode of Red Tablecloth podcast produced by Facebook Watch Westbrooke Audio and I Heart Radio.

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