Scoey Mitchell, the actor best known for his work on the one-season run of the sitcom “Barefoot in the Park,” died on March 19 in Torrance, Calif., his brother, Billy Mitchell, confirmed to Variety. He was 92.
In a Facebook post Monday, Mitchell’s brother wrote, “He sacrificed much in the struggle to get Blacks behind the camera, into production and into positions that are taken for granted today. It’s important to remember those few that opened up the doors for so many.”
Born as Roscoe Mitchell Jr. on March 12, 1930, in New York, he began his career as a stand-up comedian in nightclubs. One of his first jobs was on “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour” in 1967, which was followed by dozens of comedic television appearances, including on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” “The Tonight Show” and “The Carol Burnett Show.” Before making the switch to acting, Mitchell had a spot on the...
In a Facebook post Monday, Mitchell’s brother wrote, “He sacrificed much in the struggle to get Blacks behind the camera, into production and into positions that are taken for granted today. It’s important to remember those few that opened up the doors for so many.”
Born as Roscoe Mitchell Jr. on March 12, 1930, in New York, he began his career as a stand-up comedian in nightclubs. One of his first jobs was on “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour” in 1967, which was followed by dozens of comedic television appearances, including on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” “The Tonight Show” and “The Carol Burnett Show.” Before making the switch to acting, Mitchell had a spot on the...
- 3/24/2022
- by Sasha Urban
- Variety Film + TV
Paul Mooney, the comedian, writer and actor known for his close collaborations with Richard Pryor and Dave Chappelle, has died at the age of 79. Mooney died Wednesday at 5:30 a.m. at his home in Oakland, California, his representative confirmed to the Hollywood Reporter. No cause of death was provided.
Mooney’s official Twitter wrote to fans following news of the comedian’s death, “Thank you all from the bottom of all of our hearts …you’re all are the best!…… Mooney World .. The Godfather of Comedy – One Moon Many Stars!
Mooney’s official Twitter wrote to fans following news of the comedian’s death, “Thank you all from the bottom of all of our hearts …you’re all are the best!…… Mooney World .. The Godfather of Comedy – One Moon Many Stars!
- 5/19/2021
- by Daniel Kreps
- Rollingstone.com
The great Larry Wilmore joins us to share some very personal double features.
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
1917 (2019)
Animal Crackers (1930)
Duck Soup (1933)
My Little Chickadee (1940)
A Night At The Opera (1935)
A Hard Day’s Night (1964)
The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
The Parallax View (1974)
Singin’ In The Rain (1952)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Planet of the Apes (1968)
Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
Jaws (1975)
The Stepford Wives (1975)
The Party (1968)
The Return of the Pink Panther (1975)
The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)
Richard Pryor: Live In Concert (1979)
Richard Pryor: Live And Smokin’ (1971)
Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling (1986)
Dolemite Is My Name (2019)
Lenny (1974)
The Human Centipede (First Sequence) (2009)
Lolita (1962)
Caligula (1979)
The Night of the Iguana (1964)
The Elephant Man (1980)
What Would Jack Do? (2020)
Blue Velvet (1986)
The Apartment (1960)
Some Like It Hot (1959)
Double Indemnity (1944)
The Sting (1973)
Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid...
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
1917 (2019)
Animal Crackers (1930)
Duck Soup (1933)
My Little Chickadee (1940)
A Night At The Opera (1935)
A Hard Day’s Night (1964)
The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
The Parallax View (1974)
Singin’ In The Rain (1952)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Planet of the Apes (1968)
Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
Jaws (1975)
The Stepford Wives (1975)
The Party (1968)
The Return of the Pink Panther (1975)
The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)
Richard Pryor: Live In Concert (1979)
Richard Pryor: Live And Smokin’ (1971)
Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling (1986)
Dolemite Is My Name (2019)
Lenny (1974)
The Human Centipede (First Sequence) (2009)
Lolita (1962)
Caligula (1979)
The Night of the Iguana (1964)
The Elephant Man (1980)
What Would Jack Do? (2020)
Blue Velvet (1986)
The Apartment (1960)
Some Like It Hot (1959)
Double Indemnity (1944)
The Sting (1973)
Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid...
- 3/10/2020
- by Kris Millsap
- Trailers from Hell
Comedian Eddie Murphy has landed his dream role - portraying late, great funnyman Richard Pryor in a new biopic.
The Beverly Hills Cop actor has reportedly signed up to star in Richard Pryor: Is It Something I Said? - a project being put together by Dreamgirls director and 2009 Oscars producer Bill Condon.
And Murphy, whose early stand-up routines included impersonations of the comedic icon, is allegedly so keen to play his hero he has waived his usual multi-million dollar fee.
Pryor's career highs and lows, including his well-publicised battles with alcohol and drug addiction and his struggle with multiple sclerosis, will feature heavily in the project. The comedian, 65, died after suffering a heart attack in 2005.
He starred in and directed 1986's Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling - a story loosely based on his own life. But Condon's film - with a relatively small budget of $25 million (£17.7 million) - will be the first Pryor biopic to make it to the big screen.
The Beverly Hills Cop actor has reportedly signed up to star in Richard Pryor: Is It Something I Said? - a project being put together by Dreamgirls director and 2009 Oscars producer Bill Condon.
And Murphy, whose early stand-up routines included impersonations of the comedic icon, is allegedly so keen to play his hero he has waived his usual multi-million dollar fee.
Pryor's career highs and lows, including his well-publicised battles with alcohol and drug addiction and his struggle with multiple sclerosis, will feature heavily in the project. The comedian, 65, died after suffering a heart attack in 2005.
He starred in and directed 1986's Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling - a story loosely based on his own life. But Condon's film - with a relatively small budget of $25 million (£17.7 million) - will be the first Pryor biopic to make it to the big screen.
- 2/28/2009
- WENN
Richard Pryor, one of the most groundbreaking comedians of the late 20th century, died Saturday morning of a heart attack at his home in the San Fernando Valley; he was 65. Pryor had been suffering from multiple sclerosis for years, and according to his wife Jennifer Pryor, passed away very quickly with little suffering. Born in Peoria, Illinios, Pryor reportedly grew up in a brothel run by his grandmother, and was performing at as young an age as 7, when he played drums for a nightclub. After graduating high school and serving two years in the army, Pryor began his comedy career in the 60s, working in nightclubs and earning a reputation for himself. Soon talk show and variety show appearances led to small parts in movies throughout the late 60s and early 70s, with a noteworthy supporting role opposite Diana Ross in Lady Sings the Blues (1972). He also wrote for a number of television shows, including Sanford and Son, and worked on the script for Mel Brooks' Blazing Saddles. Pryor skyrocketed to fame, however, on the strength, appeal, and hilarity of his stand-up performances, which challenged the establishment at a time when censorship laws still held sway, and his explicit, profane routines, centering on racial and sexual topics and everything in between, won him both controversy and fame. He also became a highly popular (and highly paid) actor in the 70s, with hit films such as Silver Streak to his credit and a controversial TV show on NBC. His biggest film success, though, was with a concert film of his stand-up routines, and Richard Pryor: Live in Concert (1979) remains one of his best and one of the most influential comedy films of all time. Just as his fame reached its zenith in 1980 (the year the hit film Stir Crazy was released), Pryor almost lost his life in a notorious drug-related accident, as he suffered burns on over 50% of his body while freebasing cocaine at home. The incident began Pryor's long road to recovery, and he talked and joked freely about it in his next concert film, Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip. Free to make whatever films he liked, Pryor signed a $40 million, five-year contract with Columbia Pictures in 1983, which took him from cult hero to mainstream star, though the movies, including Superman III, The Toy and Brewster's Millions, diluted his considerable talent. He had more critical, if not commercial, success with two autobiographical-influenced films, Some Kind of Hero and Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling, a thinly fictionalized biopic. By the late 80s, though, Pryor's films were becoming bigger and bigger failures, and he all but retired from performing in the 90s, after he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis; in 1990 he suffered a massive heart attack and underwent triple bypass surgery. He made a brief appearance in the film Lost Highway, and did a guest stint on Chicago Hope, which earned him an Emmy nomination, but rarely worked; in 1998, he received the first Mark Twain Prize for humor from the JFK Center for the Performing Arts. He married six times, and had two sons and three daughters, including actress Rain Pryor. Pryor is survived by his wife Jennifer, who was his fourth wife and whom he remarried in 2001. --Prepared by IMDb staff...
- 12/10/2005
- IMDb News
Richard Pryor, one of the most groundbreaking comedians of the late 20th century, died Saturday morning of a heart attack at his home in the San Fernando Valley; he was 65. Pryor had been suffering from multiple sclerosis for years, and according to his wife Jennifer Pryor, passed away very quickly with little suffering. Born in Peoria, Illinios, Pryor reportedly grew up in a brothel run by his grandmother, and was performing at as young an age as 7, when he played drums for a nightclub. After graduating high school and serving two years in the army, Pryor began his comedy career in the 60s, working in nightclubs and earning a reputation for himself. Soon talk show and variety show appearances led to small parts in movies throughout the late 60s and early 70s, with a noteworthy supporting role opposite Diana Ross in Lady Sings the Blues (1972). He also wrote for a number of television shows, including Sanford and Son, and worked on the script for Mel Brooks' Blazing Saddles. Pryor skyrocketed to fame, however, on the strength, appeal, and hilarity of his stand-up performances, which challenged the establishment at a time when censorship laws still held sway, and his explicit, profane routines, centering on racial and sexual topics and everything in between, won him both controversy and fame. He also became a highly popular (and highly paid) actor in the 70s, with hit films such as Silver Streak to his credit and a controversial TV show on NBC. His biggest film success, though, was with a concert film of his stand-up routines, and Richard Pryor: Live in Concert (1979) remains one of his best and one of the most influential comedy films of all time. Just as his fame reached its zenith in 1980 (the year the hit film Stir Crazy was released), Pryor almost lost his life in a notorious drug-related accident, as he suffered burns on over 50% of his body while freebasing cocaine at home. The incident began Pryor's long road to recovery, and he talked and joked freely about it in his next concert film, Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip. Free to make whatever films he liked, Pryor signed a $40 million, five-year contract with Columbia Pictures in 1983, which took him from cult hero to mainstream star, though the movies, including Superman III, The Toy and Brewster's Millions, diluted his considerable talent. He had more critical, if not commercial, success with two autobiographical-influenced films, Some Kind of Hero and Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling, a thinly fictionalized biopic. By the late 80s, though, Pryor's films were becoming bigger and bigger failures, and he all but retired from performing in the 90s, after he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis; in 1990 he suffered a massive heart attack and underwent triple bypass surgery. He made a brief appearance in the film Lost Highway, and did a guest stint on Chicago Hope, which earned him an Emmy nomination, but rarely worked; in 1998, he received the first Mark Twain Prize for humor from the JFK Center for the Performing Arts. He married six times, and had two sons and three daughters, including actress Rain Pryor. Pryor is survived by his wife Jennifer, who was his fourth wife and whom he remarried in 2001. --Prepared by IMDb staff...
- 12/9/2005
- WENN
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