RIP MuthaFarker

I, being a middle class white male, don't have anything insightful to say about the passing of Richard Pryor, other than the world is now a little less of a funny place. Further proof that the good die young. Richard is now gone, but Carrot Top remains with us.

I'm also not old enough to have experienced some of the cultural significance of his stand up act, as it was happening. He opened the doors for every comic that chooses to talk about cultural issues now - but they don't even hold a candle to Mr. Pryor when it comes to pushing the boundaries of what 'could' be funny. It must have been one hell of a ride for him, and for those that got to see his work firsthand.

In looking for the text of the exchange from the skit on SNL (pictured above), I came across a quote of Mr. Pryor's. In 1998, Richard Pryor was awarded the first Kennedy Center Mark Twain Humor Prize. His acceptance response was released as follows:
"Two things people throughout history have had in common are hatred and humor. I am proud, that like Mark Twain, I've been able to use humor to lessen peoples hatred. I feel great about accepting this prize. It's nice to be regarded on par with a great white man. Now, that's funny."

As for the SNL skit, I found a clip of the exchange. Mr. Pryor is probably the only person that could have pulled this one off as well as he did. Eddie Murphy a close second, and Chris Rock a distant third. Everyone in the world would agree that this is f*cking hilarious, but yet, nothing close will make it on TV now.

RIP Richard.