Paul Mooney, the writer of famous The Richard Pryor Show, took his last breath on Wednesday. He was a comedian and actor as well. Cassandra Williams confirmed his demise to Variety. Mooney was 79 years old.
The comedian died due to a heart attack and was in Oakland, California, during his last moments.
A statement was released from the Twitter handle of the comedian sharing his death news. It stated that the family thanked everyone for all the love they poured on the great man.
Paul Mooney wrote several popular shows
Mooney was the main writer of the show named The Richard Pryor. He also collaborated on many comedy albums of Pryor And his famous live show Saturday night. There were a lot of shows such as Good Times, Chappelle’s Show, BET’s parody reality segment Real Husbands of Hollywood, The Larry Sanders Show, In Living Color, and Sanford and Son, which he had written.
Mooney used to do a lot of Stand-up comedy skits. He appeared as the character Sam Cooke in The Buddy Holly Story, Bamboozled directed by Spike Lee, Hollywood Shuffle, Bustin’ Loose, and Meet the Blacks, which came in 2016.
Mooney’s funny take on race
He played Negrodamus in the show of Dave Chappelle, which used to come on Comedy Central. It was a recurring appearance. The character was based on Nostradamus, the philosopher but makers shaped it as the black version of him. Negrodamus used to funnily answer why the white population was fond of Wayne Brady. He responded that it was because Bryant Gumbel used to appear similar to Malcolm X.
The material of Mooney concentrated on the race. His writings at 2006 and 2005 BET awards paid a funny address to black history. His humor ridiculed Lil’ Kim, Flavor Flav, Michael Jackson, Terrell Owens, Oprah Winfrey, Whitney Houston, and others.
Mooney’s memoir named Black Is the New White came out in 2007. He described his camaraderie with Pryor, the memorable moments and controversies that arose from the show in this book.