In my own personal life, I've had to find ways to deal with the pressures 
In recent years former stand-up comic Martin Lawrence has been a bad, bad boy - arrested numerous times for brawling, and carrying a loaded weapon. Unfortunately, his CV is as dodgy as his rap sheet. After the international flop that was National Security and the loathsome Black Knight, Lawrence re-teams with clean-cut buddy Will Smith for Bad Boys II.
How did you feel re-visting this character after eight years?
It was a challenge. It was a lot of fun to try and figure out if we could get the characters in sync, and get them to relate the way they did years ago. It was a lot of fun for me.
What about the story?
For me the story was cool. In my own personal life, I've had to find ways to deal with the pressures. For my character to sit down and talk to a counsellor was cool for me too, you know?
Michael Bay certainly put you through your paces in this movie, didn't he?
The action sequences weren't easy, but we survived it. The car chases, the stunts, all that stuff. When you're working for Michael Bay and Jerry Bruckheimer, you're like a kid who gets to play cops and robbers on the biggest level.
Did you ever find yourself in any real danger on the set?
We did a scene where one of the cars flips over my head, and that was real scary. I was very nervous, very nervous. It was scary, but Mike's not going to put us in a situation that's very dangerous.
What took so long for a sequel?
We were trying to find a good script. Then we had Jerry Bruckheimer, Michael Bay, Will, and myself all trying to get our schedules together. That's not really easy, you know? We could have rushed into a sequel, but we didn't want to give audiences just anything. We wanted to give you something that was worth it. If it's worth it, it doesn't matter about the time scale. They're interesting characters, and me and Will have a wonderful chemistry together.
Where does that come from?
Having a great deal of respect for each other, and that's a good thing.
