Amy Kaufman: Kevin Hart doesn't have a brand. He is the brand
LOS ANGELES — Kevin Hart wet the bed last night.
He had spent his 44th birthday slamming back shots of tequila and partying with Ludacris at a nightclub until 4 a.m. A few hours later, he awoke in his palatial Las Vegas hotel suite and asked his wife who had thrown water on his side of the mattress. She suggested that it was in fact he who had soiled the linens.
"And I'll be damned," Hart says.
He's still in Vegas, recounting the incident to five of his closest friends. Plus a live audience of 100 or so at a sports bar, where the group is recording a live version of their weekly podcast, "Straight From the Hart," which airs on the comedian's SiriusXM channel.
"You know," one of Hart's buddies says, "there is such a thing as being too honest."
"I have no problem being honest," Hart fires back. "That's the thing that people are afraid to do in these times."
Presumably, this is why he is allowing a journalist to shadow him during Hartbeat Weekend, a four-day, alcohol-fueled extravaganza highlighting the many facets of Kevin Hart.
Headquartered at Vegas' Resorts World, the July 6-9 gathering is a mini-festival with 19 events curated by the comedian and underwritten by his company, Hartbeat Ventures. There will be performances from his favorite acts (Jack Harlow, T.I., J. Cole), pool parties, the inaugural taping of a relaunch of BET's iconic "ComicView" — which his Hartbeat company is behind — and a couple of shows by Hart himself. Attended by about 50,000 fans — who pay for one-off tickets to most of the events — it is an attempt to synthesize the various entities under the umbrella of Hart's rapidly expanding business ecosystem.
Ostensibly, that's why I'm here. Not to witness Hart drink until he blacks out — which will occur — but to observe his self-described transition from celebrity to brand.
It's been a complex journey. There was a time, according to his friends, when Hart kept much of his wealth in cash because he feared the stock market was a Ponzi scheme. Even as he built and invested in a slew of companies, the public still identified him as an actor or stand-up comic — not an entrepreneur.
Just last month, a clip of Jason Bateman went viral in which the actor questions why Hart appeared on ABC's "Shark Tank."
"Were you pitching something or judging?" Bateman asks during an episode of
