Hey, folks. This is a post I will refer to as "Out of the Bin", where I discuss DVDs straight out of...well, my own DVD bin. I do these reviews because I'm that fucking bored and the same time I want to be a show off as well. I promise the readers this a few days ago that I would review a DVD and I have it right now. First off let me talk about one man; a hysterical personally who influenced countless other comedians and continues to leave his mark as a king of comedy to this day with his profanity-ridden observations and social commentary. This man in question is Richard Pryor.
Richard Franklin Lennox Thomas Pryor (
goddamn that's long!!) had branched out as a seminal comedian throughout the 60s and 70s with his brand of stand-up acts and series of albums such as "Live & Smokin'" and "Is It Something I Said", leading to film roles and writing gigs for television, such as Sanford and Son. It all paid off with a television special on NBC that became such a critical and ratings success that the network offered Pryor a chance to host and star in his own sketch comedy show. Thus giving us The Richard Pryor Show.
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The show suffered a lot from through it's short run: it ran against Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley, two of ABC's top-rated sitcoms, a lot of executive meddling and time slot issues that provoked Pryor to quit before production began, and of course the restriction of Pryor's "Motherfucker"-heavy blue humor, which was a pending destruction of this series. Pryor acknowledges this in an cold opening that was cut from the air, featuring the comedian, in a close up, talking about how he would never give anything up for his humor to be displayed properly, leading the camera to pull back to reveal his nude, dickless body, as a way of showing how the network "emasculated" him in terms of toning his humor down. The close-up of Pryor's akward face has provided the show's title card above.
The restrictions reared it's ugly head and did no justice to some of the skits, in particular, one where Pryor, as Santa Clause, saying some raw things regarding Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, which was repeatedly blocked out with the word "censored" against a black background and completed with the audio "bleep". With no deleted material involving this skit surfacing, we, the viewers, are pretty much left to use our imaginations. (I assumed he said Rudolph was a crackhead, as he finished that statement off with "Why do you think he's nose is so red?" ) While the rating were poor, Pryor decides to put the show to rest after finishing only four episodes rather than 10 as he was obligated to do according to his contract. The show was released on DVD for the first time in 2004, which I have on me right now.
The show at best was decent, if pretty uneven in concept, as we get occasional dramatic skits and extended musical acts to act along the existing comedic material; the results kinda come off as jarringly mismatched rather than unpredictable than what Pryor and co intended it to be. For instance there's one skit starting off with Richard doing a hilarious Little Richard impression, which is randomly interrupted by a white noise that fades in on a woman sitting in a chair, telling a story about her first lesbian experience, which is, of course, ridden with the censored bars at each mention of the event. Then it resumes to Pryor's Little Richard performace. That came completely out of nowhere and added absolutely nothing. Another odd, but notheless powerful, skit involves richard going into a gun store to purchase a gun, only to hear several guns talking to Rich in need of being bought. The collection of voices drove Richard out because of the evil and ills of possessing gun control. What made it powerful is the one gun telling Rich, with an innocent, child-like voice, that it didn't mean to hurt people. Like the bit with the woman telling her story, it seriously lacked a laugh track, but for more important reasons. It was a funny concept that took a dramatic turn; representing the social commentary Pryor was also known for, although it was a stark constrast to his stand-up act about how he shot up his car while drunk.
Of course, some good laughs abound as well; with Pryor portraying a cowboy who gets shot repeatelly in the gunfight while struggling to pull his pistol out, a samurai spouting out side-slitting Japanese gibberish, and Santa in the aforementioned censored skit. The first episode has a funny one involving a bar similar to the Cantena (I think that's how you spell it) from Star Wars, complete with the creatures and everything. All Rich does is interact with them like regular people in a way, saying to one big alien that he "looked like a nigga from Detroit I knew". Then some comedy could fall into "Your Milage May Vary" territory (that's TV Tropes talk). Like one skit where Pryor portrays a death metal rocker.
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He starts growling, chanting and kissing on a groupie. He exclaims, mid lyric, "I'm gonna kill all of you", then proceeds to pull out a machine gun and slaughters his audience. It's funny if you're into that type of dark humor and disturbing with the silent overview of the corpses. All Rich, as the rocker, says after all of this is "Far out". Indeed. In-fucking-deed.
The DVD is a must have regardless of the restrictions and some of the half-brained skits. The three disc set come with all four episodes and the tv special that inspired them. Along with it is a bonus script containing unfilmed skits, deleted scenes, an extended roast, the alternate series opening, Q&As and a monologue with Pryor as his popular alter-ego Mudbone that cannot be missed. If you come across it on Amazon or ebay, give a shot if you're interested.. Overall it's a 7.2/10.
I'll have more DVD reviews in the future. 'Til then, laters. :-D
The Richard Pryor Show is courtesy of Burt Sugarman INC, Indigo Productions, and Image Entertainment DVD.
