In early October, Tyler Perry made Hollywood yield the floor to Atlanta for the night. The world watched as Tyler Perry Studios opened its doors to Beyonc, Jay Z, Oprah Winfrey, Spike Lee, Ava DuVernay, Samuel L. Jackson and many other stars.

A red carpet greeted the movers and shakers of Black Hollywood as they took their first steps in. The studios house 12 soundstages named after icons Diahann Carroll, Denzel Washington, Oprah Winfrey, Halle Berry, Sidney Poitier, Della Reese, Spike Lee, Harry Belafonte, Cicely Tyson, Whoopi Goldberg and Will Smith. It also features a replica of the White House. Perry even dedicated plaques of stars and a walk of fame to several actors in his previous projects, actors who rarely get their due credit from other Hollywood bigwigs.

The opening was nothing short of an ode to Black excellence. It was poetic. It was historic.

While everybody was fighting for a seat at the table talking about #OscarsSoWhite, #OscarsSoWhite, I said, Yall go ahead and do that, he said at the BET Award s, just months before he opened his studio. But while youre fighting for a seat at the table, Ill be down in Atlanta building my own.

Perry did what he said he would. He didnt wait for a seat. He built a table, one 330 acres in measure, on the land where Fort McPherson, a former military base once was. He became the first Black person to outright own a major film studio lot. Its located near Georgia State Route 166, the highway exit where he used to sleep in his car when he was homeless and hustling to break into the industry. And its big enough to fit Disney, Paramount and Warner Brothers studios combined.