Richard Pryor Filmography

Bitter Jester

Synopsis: On the cusp of stardom, standup comic Maija DiGiorgio suffered an emotional breakdown while performing before a room packed with a number of the comedy industry's head honchos -- whom were on the receiving end of DiGiorgio's obscenity-laced outburst -- at the Aspen Comedy Festival. Subsequently Read More

Lost Highway

Actors: Bill Pullman, Patricia Arquette, Balthazar Getty, Robert Blake, Robert Loggia, Natasha Gregson Wagner

Synopsis: Five years after the critical and commercial disappointment of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, director David Lynch returned to the big screen with this cryptic thriller about confused identities and erotic obsession. Fred (Bill Pullman) is an avant-garde jazz saxophonist who shares a luxurious but Read More

Sam Kinison: Why Did We Laugh?

Synopsis: A gifted comic with a promising career, Sam Kinison died too young to realize his full comedic potential. This documentary recounts his chaotic life, his career, and the circumstances leading up to his death. Funny men Rodney Dangerfield and Richard Pryor appear to reminisce about their Read More

Mad Dog Time

Actors: Ellen Barkin, Gabriel Byrne, Richard Dreyfuss, Jeff Goldblum, Diane Lane

Synopsis: A group of mobsters fight for control in this satirical comedy-drama. Vic (Richard Dreyfuss) is a not-especially-stable crime boss who -- following a spell in a mental hospital after being diagnosed with schizophrenia -- is sent home and is ready to resume his place as supreme leader of the mob. Read More

Another You

Actors: Richard Pryor, Gene Wilder, Mercedes Ruehl, Stephen Lang

Synopsis: When con man Eddie Dash (Richard Pryor) is released from prison he's told to fulfill the required 100 hours of community service as the bodyguard/escort of a recently released mental patient (Gene Wilder). It's not too long before Wilder figures out a way to make a little dough at the expense of Read More

Harlem Nights

Actors: Eddie Murphy, Richard Pryor, Redd Foxx, Danny Aiello, Michael Lerner

Synopsis: Eddie Murphy, in addition to starring as Quick, the son of 1930s Harlem gambling-house proprietor Sugar Ray (Richard Pryor), also wrote and directed the film. The plotline details the combined efforts of Quick and Sugar Ray to prevent white gangster Bugsy Calhoune (Michael Lerner) from muscling in Read More

See No Evil, Hear No Evil

Actors: Richard Pryor, Gene Wilder, Joan Severance, Kevin Spacey, Kirsten Childs, Anthony Zerbe

Synopsis: The third pairing of comic actors Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder was much less successful than their previous team-ups, Silver Streak(1976) and Stir Crazy (1980). Wilder plays Dave, the deaf proprietor of a newsstand and employer of blind gambler Wally (Pryor). When Wally's bookie is shot and Read More

Moving

Actors: Richard Pryor, Beverly Todd, Dave Thomas, Dana Carvey, Randy Quaid

Synopsis: A transit engineer and his family must face the gargantuan task of moving from New Jersey to Boise, Idaho in this lively comedy starring Richard Pryor. It all begins after he gets a really great job out West. Unfortunately, his family is less than thrilled with the prospect. The furniture movers Read More

Critical Condition

Actors: Richard Pryor, Rachel Ticotin, Rubén Blades, Joe Mantegna, Bob Dishy

Synopsis: When a small-time businessman (Richard Pryor) needs a loan, he goes to a loan shark and ends up in jail on false pretenses. After feigning madness to get out, he is tossed into the mental ward of a hospital. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide Read More

The Best of Chevy Chase

Synopsis: "Good evening, I'm Chevy Chase-and you're not!" Maybe no one would want to be Mr. Chase these days (not with his recent string of box-office flops), but in 1975 and 1976, the world was Chevy's oyster. Those are the years that he rose to stardom on NBC's Saturday Night Live, and these are the years Read More

Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Dennis Farina, Wings Hauser, Richard Pryor, Debbie Allen, Art Evans, Fay Hauser, Barbara Williams

Synopsis: Popular African-American comedian Jo Jo Dancer is severely burned while free-basing cocaine. Producer/director/writer Richard Pryor insists that the movie is not autobiographical. While hovering between life and death, Dancer flashes back to his childhood, when he grew up in a brothel. Read More

Lily Tomlin

Actors: Lily Tomlin, Jane Wagner, Peggy Feury

Synopsis: Lily Tomlin is more than a filmed record of the comedienne's stage show The Search for Signs of Life in the Intelligent Universe. The film follows Tomlin and her collaborator Jane Wagner as they put together their production, wandering up hill and down alley in search of comic inspiration. Seldom Read More

Pryor's Place, Vol. 1

Pryor's Place, Vol. 2

Synopsis: This video consists of two episodes featuring comedy star Richard Pryor and the Krofft puppets. The first episode, "High Noon," teaches kids how to deal with confrontations and bullies. The second episode, "Kimosabe Blues," highlights the importance of friendship, fairness, and resolving issues. Read More

Brewster's Millions

Actors: Richard Pryor, John Candy, Lonette McKee, Stephen Collins, Jerry Orbach

Synopsis: The seventh cinema adaptation of the venerable stage farce Brewster's Millions stars Richard Pryor as Montgomery Brewster, a third-rate baseball player. Much to his amazement, Brewster discovers that he is related to deceased millionaire Rupert Horn (Hume Cronyn, who appears only in a videotaped Read More

Pryor's Place, Vol. 3

Synopsis: Two episodes of legendary comedian Richard Pryor's Emmy award-winning children's series are featured in this video. In the first episode, entitled "Sax Education," Little Richie loses his friend's saxophone and learns what it means to be responsible. In "Too Old Too Soon, Too Smart Too Late," Read More

Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever

Richard Pryor: Here and Now

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Richard Pryor

Synopsis: This entry in Pryor's comedy-concert film series, Richard Pryor: Here and Now goes so far as to include hecklers who bedevil Pryor all through his performance. The most memorable bits involve Pryor's R-rated comments regarding the Reagan administration; the concert was filmed in New Orleans. ~ Hal Read More

Superman III

Actors: Christopher Reeve, Richard Pryor, Jackie Cooper, Marc McClure, Annette O'Toole, Annie Ross

Synopsis: In a major departure from the tone of the preceding two Superman adventure films, this mix of vile deeds and fantasy heroics drops the "S" out of cosmic and goes for comic instead. Right at the starting gate, Gus Gorman (Richard Pryor) and a subsequent slapstick sequence upstage (Christopher Reeves Read More

Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip

Crew: Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Richard Pryor

Synopsis: Just recovered from his notorious free-basing accident, Richard Pryor made a notable return in the much-acclaimed Live on the Sunset Strip. His comments on that event, as well as his notorious comments on sex, politics and race, pepper the 82-minute concert film. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide Read More

The Toy

Actors: Richard Pryor, Jackie Gleason, Ned Beatty, Scott Schwartz, Teresa Ganzel, Wilfrid Hyde-White

Synopsis: In The Toy, director Richard Donner and screenwriter Carol Sobieski update the 1976 Pierre Richard farce Le Jouet as a vehicle for comedian Richard Pryor. Pryor stars as out-of-work journalist Jack Brown, who's hit with the sudden realization that his idle book writing won't pay a 10,000-dollar Read More

Some Kind of Hero

Actors: Richard Pryor, Margot Kidder, Ray Sharkey, Ronny Cox, Lynne Moody

Synopsis: Richard Pryor gives a compelling performance in Some Kind of Hero, playing a Vietnam veteran who tries to readjust to civilian life. Pryor plays Eddie Keller, who has just spent five years in a North Vietnamese prisoner-of-war camp. Most of the time there, Eddie was able to hold his own against Read More

Bustin' Loose

Crew: Producer

Actors: Richard Pryor, Cicely Tyson, Alphonso Alexander, Kia Cooper, Edwin de Leon

Synopsis: It's The African Queen meets Richard Pryor in this schmaltzy and salty attempt by Pryor to appeal to the family crowd. Pryor plays Joe Braxton, an inept burglar whose parole officer Donald (Robert Christian) wants to help out. Knowing that Joe is an excellent mechanic, he refers him to Vivian Read More

Wholly Moses!

Actors: Dudley Moore, Laraine Newman, James Coco, Paul Sand, Jack Gilford

Synopsis: A broadly farcical comedy that attempts to ape the wickedly funny, Bible-spoofing humor of the previous year's Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979), this all-star rib-tickler top-lines Dudley Moore as Herschel, a historical also-ran whose life so closely parallels that of Moses that Herschel begins Read More

In God We Trust

Actors: Marty Feldman, Peter Boyle, Louise Lasser, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Richard Pryor

Synopsis: Comedian Marty Feldman directed and co-wrote this satire of the less-scrupulous side of organized religion. Brother Ambrose (Marty Feldman) is a monk who has spent nearly his entire life within the walls of his monastery and knows little of the outside world. However, when he learns that the Read More

Stir Crazy

Actors: Gene Wilder, Richard Pryor, JoBeth Williams, Georg Stanford Brown, Craig T. Nelson, Miguel Angel Suarez

Synopsis: After the excellent audience response to their teaming in Silver Streak, Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor reunited for this zany comedy. Wilder and Pryor play a couple of out-of-work numbskulls who take a promotional job that requires them to dress up like gigantic woodpeckers. Unfortunately, a pair Read More

The Muppet Movie

Actors: Jim Henson, Frank Oz, Charles Durning, Dave Goelz

Synopsis: Kermit the Frog and Fozzie Bear, from of the large crew of loveably fuzzy characters created by puppetmaster Jim Henson, have embarked on a quest for stardom. They take a trip to Hollywood, riding in or on a wide variety of vehicles along the way. They begin their journey on a bicycle pedalled by Read More

Richard Pryor: Live in Concert

Synopsis: Richard Pryor was one of the most influential comedians of the 1970s. Here, in his first concert film, he is at his caustic, gritty best. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

The Wiz

Actors: Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Nipsey Russell, Lena Horne, Richard Pryor

Synopsis: Sidney Lumet's The Wiz is the film version of the popular Broadway musical that retells the events of L. Frank Baum's classic novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz through the eyes of a young African-American kindergarten teacher who's "never been below 125th Street." Leaving a large family dinner to Read More

California Suite

Actors: Alan Alda, Michael Caine, Bill Cosby, Jane Fonda, Walter Matthau, Richard Pryor, Maggie Smith

Synopsis: Playwright Neil Simon turned to the hotel setting he used so successfully in his stage-play (later a movie) Plaza Suite to explore four more human dramas in his play California Suite, which was adapted into this quite successful movie. In the first episode, the divorced couple of Bill and Hannah Read More

Blue Collar

Actors: Richard Pryor, Harvey Keitel, Yaphet Kotto, Ed Begley, Jr., Harry Bellaver

Synopsis: Paul Schrader's directorial debut examines the trials of Detroit autoworkers living at the mercy of a heartless corporation and a corrupt union. Surviving from paycheck to paycheck, Checker Cab assembly linemen Zeke (Richard Pryor), Jerry (Harvey Keitel), and Smokey (Yaphet Kotto) scrape by and Read More

Which Way Is Up?

Actors: Richard Pryor, Lonette McKee, Margaret Avery, Morgan Woodward, Marilyn Coleman

Synopsis: This Americanized remake of Lina Wertmuller's The Seduction of Mimi offered audiences the novelty of seeing Richard Pryor performing three different roles in the same film. Which Way Is Up? tells the tale of Leroy Jones (Pryor), a poor orange picker who gets fired from his job when he accidentally Read More

Greased Lightning

Actors: Richard Pryor, Beau Bridges, Pam Grier, Cleavon Little, Vincent Gardenia

Synopsis: Based on the life story of NASCAR auto racing champion Wendell Scott, this film, starring Richard Pryor as Scott, covers his struggles -- from the end of World War II to 1971-- to overcome racism and gain the freedom to demonstrate his winning auto-racing skills to everyone. He is not without Read More

The Richard Pryor Special?

Actors: Richard Pryor

The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings

Actors: Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones, Richard Pryor, Rico Dawson, Sam "Birmingham" Briston

Synopsis: Based on the novel by William Brasher, The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings is set in the segregated south of 1939. African-American baseball pitcher Bingo Long (Billy Dee Williams), tired of being jerked around by the less-than-ethical managers of the Negro League teams, forms his Read More

Silver Streak

Actors: Gene Wilder, Jill Clayburgh, Richard Pryor, Patrick McGoohan, Ned Beatty

Synopsis: While taking a train trip from L.A. to Chicago, mild-mannered George Caldwell (Gene Wilder) makes the acquaintance of Hilly Burns (Jill Clayburgh). As they indulge in a brief bit of spooning, Hilly tells George that her boss is on the verge of exposing a group of vicious art forgers. Later that Read More

Car Wash

Actors: Franklyn Ajaye, Sully Boyar, Richard Brestoff, George Carlin, Irwin Corey

Synopsis: Michael Schultz directed this kinetic, hyperventilating comedy (scripted by Joel Schumacher) concerning the crazed events that go on within a single 10-hour period at a Los Angeles car wash. The cast of colorful car-wash employees includes Lonnie (Ivan Dixon), an ex-con; Duane (Bill Duke), a Read More

Saturday Night Live: Richard Pryor

Actors: Richard Pryor, Gil Scott-Heron

Synopsis: This 1975 episode of Saturday Night Live is guest-hosted by Richard Pryor--who appears in a samurai sketch with John Belushi--and features two songs by musical guest Gil Scott-Heron, and a terrific short film by Albert Brooks. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide Read More

Adios Amigos

Actors: Fred Williamson, Richard Pryor

Synopsis: One of the first efforts of actor/producer/director Fred Williamson's Po' Boy productions, Adios Amigo costars Williamson with Richard Pryor. Playing a couple of inept western outlaws, Williamson and Pryor mastermind several failed crimes, ranging from a real estate scam to a statecoach holdup. Read More

Blazing Saddles

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens, Harvey Korman, David Huddleston, Mel Brooks, Alex Karras, Madeline Kahn

Synopsis: Vulgar, crude, and occasionally scandalous in its racial humor, this hilarious bad-taste spoof of Westerns, co-written by Richard Pryor, features Cleavon Little as the first black sheriff of a stunned town scheduled for demolition by an encroaching railroad. Little and co-star Gene Wilder have Read More

Uptown Saturday Night

Actors: Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby, Harry Belafonte, Calvin Lockhart, Flip Wilson, Richard Pryor

Synopsis: Uptown Saturday Night is a delightful comedy directed by and starring Sidney Poitier. Steve Jackson (Sidney Poitier) is a factory worker. One evening, when boredom gets the best of him, Steve and his pal Wardell (Bill Cosby) decide to go to an underground gambling club to have some fun. While they Read More

Hit!

Actors: Billy Dee Williams, Richard Pryor, Paul Hampton, Gwen Welles, Warren Kemmerling

Synopsis: In Sidney J. Furie's interminable caper film, Billy Dee Williams is a federal agent who takes matters into his own hands after the government refuses to do anything about French drug trafficking. After his daughter dies of an overdose of heroine and the authorities seem unconcerned, Nick Allen Read More

The Mack

Actors: Max Julien, Richard Pryor, Don Gordon, Carol Speed, Roger E. Mosley

Synopsis: A box-office success during the early '70s, this blaxploitation flick traces the life of a Bay Area pimp facing drug dealers, crooked cops and fellow pimps ready to settle a few scores. Richard Pryor makes a small appearance as Slim. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide Read More

The Lily Tomlin Special, Vol. 1

Synopsis: This award-winning special from comedienne Lily Tomlin features her characters Edith Ann and Ernestine, as well as guest appearances by Richard Pryor and Alan Alda. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide Read More

Some Call It Loving

Actors: Veronica Anderson

Synopsis: After a man living in Los Angeles purchases a sleeping beauty from a carnival, he wakes her and finds she is not what he expected. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide Read More

Sanford and Son: Sanford and Son and Sister Makes Three

Crew: Teleplay By

Actors: Redd Foxx, Demond Wilson, Ja'net DuBois, Emily Yancy

Synopsis: Fred Sanford (Redd Foxx) panics when his son Lamont (Demond Wilson) falls in love with Alice (Emily Yancy), the daughter of Fred's old flame Juanita (Ja'net DuBois). The reason? Juanita has just told Fred that Alice is his own daughter. This episode was co-written by comedian Richard Pryor and Paul Mooney Read More

Lady Sings the Blues

Actors: Tracee Lyles, Diana Ross, Billy Dee Williams, Richard Pryor, James Callahan, Paul Hampton

Synopsis: Diana Ross plays the magnificent, tragic song stylist Billie Holiday, who while writhing in a strait jacket in a prison cell, awaiting sentencing on drug charges, reflects on her turbulent life. Raped in her youth by a drunk (Adolph Caesar), then compelled to work as a domestic in a Harlem Read More

Sanford and Son: The Dowry

Crew: Teleplay By

Actors: Redd Foxx, Demond Wilson, Albert Reed, Marguerite Ray, Gladys Perry

Synopsis: Fred's cousin Grady (Albert Reed) pays a visit, accompanied by his new wife Margaret (Marguerite Ray) and stepdaughter Betty Jean (Gladys Perry). Anxious to divest himself of the corpulent Betty Jean, Grady offers a dowry of 10,000 dollars to any eligible bachelor that will take her off his hands. Read More

Wattstax

Actors: The Staple Singers

Synopsis: This is a filmed documentary of a black music festival held on August 20, 1972 at the Los Angeles Coliseum, sponsored by Stax Records and Schlitz Beer. The L.A./Watts riots demonstrated the community's urgent needs to the black show-business community. All the proceeds from the concert and this Read More

You've Got to Walk It Like You Talk It or You'll Lose That Beat

Actors: Bob Downey, Suzette Green

Synopsis: This satire follows the exploits of a young hippy who goes looking for Life's meaning in Central Park. There he is accosted by a corpulent black woman while he watches a young man moon an old woman while she curses at him. He then goes on to have more adventures that lead him to marry a kindred Read More

The Partridge Family: Soul Club

Synopsis: The Partridges come to the rescue of brothers A.E. and Sam Simon (Richard Pryor, Louis Gossett Jr.), the owners of an inner-city Detroit nightclub called the Fire House. Seems that local loan shark Heavy (Charles Lampkin) is living up to his name, exerting pressure to put the Simons out of Read More

Richard Pryor: Live & Smokin'

Synopsis: Richard Pryor's performance at the New York Improv on April, 29th, 1971 features the comedian giving his thoughts on sex, drugs, and race relations. Included is "Wino Preacher & Willie the Junkie," showcasing Pryor in the irreverent style that parlayed his career as a stand-up comic into a Read More

Dynamite Chicken

Actors: Joan Baez, John Lennon, Richard Pryor, Andy Warhol

Synopsis: This film contains a collection of commercials, interviews, and music featuring Joan Baez, Richard Pryor, John Lennon, Yoko Ono, Lenny Bruce, Andy Warhol, and Allen Ginsberg. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide Read More

The Phynx

Actors: Michael Miller, Ray Chippeway, Dennis Larden, Lonny Stevens, Lou Antonio

Synopsis: Have you ever longed for the day when James Brown, Martha Raye, and Col. Harland Sanders would appear in a movie together? Well, that's barely the tip of the improbable casting iceberg in this bizarre cold-war spoof. The leaders of the American intelligence organization the S.S.A. ("Super Secret Read More

Young Lawyers

Black Brigade

Synopsis: With The Mod Squad sweeping the Tuesday night TV ratings in 1968, producers Aaron Spelling and Danny Thomas hoped to get another multiracial adventure series on the air A.S.A.P. Carter's Army was the 72-minute pilot for this project. Set during World War II, the film stars Stephen Boyd as an Army Read More

The Green Berets

Actors: John Wayne, David Janssen, Jim Hutton, Aldo Ray, Raymond St. Jacques

Synopsis: The Green Berets is an exciting war film that was lambasted by critics who at the time of its release opposed the war in Vietnam. Wayne's role is similar to his part in The Longest Day (1963), but it was evident to the worldwide public that the same bravado that flew well in World War II Read More

Wild in the Streets

Actors: Shelley Winters, Christopher Jones, Diane Varsi, Ed Begley, Sr., Hal Holbrook

Synopsis: A rock star decides he'd rather rule the free world than just sell records in this ambitious fusion of political satire and teen exploitation. Teenage rebel Max Flatow (Christopher Jones) has grown tired of life in suburbia with his domineering mother (Shelley Winters) and weak-willed father (Bert Freed Read More

The Busybody

Actors: Sid Caesar, Robert Ryan, Anne Baxter, Kay Medford, Jan Murray

Synopsis: A nosey housewife (Marguerite Viby) takes on extra responsibilities when her husband (Buster Larsen) hurts his back while reading the Sunday paper. When she finds a dead body in the upstairs office, she calls the police. The detective (Ole Monty) is summoned, and he discovers the woman is his old Read More

Comedy Store 20th Birthday

Actors: Richard Pryor