Tiffany Haddish has no time for haters…even the ones from her childhood.
The 43-year-old actress and comedian's new children's book—Layla, the Last Black Unicorn—draws inspiration from her own experiences growing up, including the not-so-nice memories of a childhood bully.
"You know, I get it. You didn't like me growing up, but a lot of people like me now," the comedian told E! News' Daily Pop hosts Justin Sylvester and Loni Love. "And you can be out there with the haters that keep watching and spending money on my movies, and my books, and my TV shows, and my clothing line that's about to come out, and you can keep following and watching all the things that I'm doing and just know, I was right, you was wrong."
At the end of the day, Haddish simply wishes her bully "all the joy and happiness she can handle," saying, "She was obviously an unhappy child. That's why she did what she did to me."
Haddish's younger audience can expect more literary content from her, as she signed a three-book deal with HarperCollins Publishers in October 2021. Layla, her first, debuted on May 10.
"It's inspired by my childhood and how different I was and how hard it was for me to fit in," Haddish said about Layla, the Last Black Unicorn. "Realizing that my differences can be my wins and it can help others, and so I wanted to share that with kids. Also, growing up, I didn't see too many books by Black female authors, so I thought this was a good way to start kicking that door open—even though there are a lot of books out by Black, female authors now, because I was a kid a very long time ago—but I figured I'd join the club."
And while she's still "here for the grown-ups," Haddish hopes her Hollywood journey will help inspire others to never give up on their dreams.
"I'm literally sitting in the house that I used to walk past as a young girl and say, ‘That's my house. That's my house.' I bought that house," she said on Daily Pop. "I bought this house off the Internet because that was my dream to, like, ‘That's my house.' And I got it. Everything I've ever wanted, for the most part—there's a few things I don't have—but I've achieved it. Did I think it was gonna happen? I wasn't sure, never was sure, but I always put the work in to get to it."
During her talk on Daily Pop, Haddish also had to weigh in on her "new boyfriend" Jesse Williams' recent nude Broadway performance video leak.
"First of all, I don't like how y'all looking at my man like that, out here goggling and googling over my man. That's my boo," she joked with Sylvester and Love about the Grey's Anatomy star. "Stop it. Okay, we've been in a relationship for one day now. I'm about to be at the play holding up reflectors and checking phones. Y'all got me messed up."
Luckily, Haddish knows the perfect way to shoot her shot with the single actor. "Don't Jesse got kids?" she asked. "I'm gonna send Jesse, his kids, a book or two with a little note in there from Auntie Tiff."
Check out her full interview in the clip above.
Layla, the Last Black Unicorn is available now where books are sold.