The Ultimate Richard Pryor Collection Uncensored
Matthew Socey says the 13-disc set is a must-have for any serious fan of the comedy legend.
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The Ultimate Richard Pryor Collection Uncensored from Time-Life home video is a 13-disc set of Pryor at his best on television (as an artist and as a talk show guest), a few documentaries about the good, bad and ugly of his life and career.
A must-have for any Richard Pryor fan and a reminder that when on, he was the funniest person on the planet. This collection includes all three of his concert films plus the film “Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling,” which Pryor directed.
A sidebar about the films of Richard Pryor. There's some real good performances in his catalog (“Lady Sings the Blues,” “Which Way is Up?,” “Blue Collar,” “Greased Lightning”). There's also a lot of Pryor cashing in and coasting (most of the 1980s).
One of the problems with stand-up comedians making the transition to film is that even if the film is solely about them, the filmmaking process is a collaborative effort. Pryor was a hysterical storyteller and created great characters. but with the exception of playing three characters in “Which Way is Up?,” he is a part of a production. So the comic utilizes only a fraction of their talent, even when directors decide to just roll the camera and let someone like Pryor (or Robin Williams or Adam Sandler or Will Ferrell) do a bunch a stuff and take the funniest parts.
Obviously, I wish Pryor had trusted directors more and I wish he would have received “Superman 3” money for “Blue Collar.” While there's some fine films in his catalog, there could have been a lot more. Two of those fine films are in this collection.
“Richard Pryor — Live in Concert” (1979) was his first film version of his stand-up act. An comic and a film that every stand-up comedian and stand-up comedy broadcast owes a great deal of debt to this and “Live on the Sunset Strip” (we'll get to that).
One funny routine after another and still relevant today. The first R-rated version of "White people do this...black people do this..." Police brutality, boxing, the outdoors, funerals and sex. The highlights of this set involved two recent incidents in Pryor's life: Being arrested for shooting a car and suffering a heart attack. Comedy is defined as tragedy plus time. There was no "too soon" in Pryor's world. This and his next film were proof.
“Richard Pryor Live on the Sunset Strip” (1982) was highlighted by his trip to Africa and the much publicized incident of setting himself on fire due to his drug problem. If you thought he'd open up some fresh wounds in the first film, he goes even longer about this drug problem and the fire that came from it for the final third of the film. Brutally funny.
Note: For folks of a certain age, Pryor announced on this film that he would no longer use the N-word and this was the early 80s. This coming from a man who had two albums win Best Comedy Album Grammys (“That N's Crazy” and “Bicentennial N”").
“Richard Pryor: Here and Now” (1983) aka The Godfather III of his stand-up films and directed by Pryor. Shot in New Orleans, there's some decent material about the city and Pryor's current events. The man on Sunset Strip said he was doing Mudbone for the final time and who appears on “Here and Now?” Mudbone. There's also similar sounding material of audience members getting back to their seats (from Live in Concert) and there's stretches of the performance where Pryor responds to yelling members of the audience, who want to be roasted by Pryor.
It does lack the dark depth of the previous two films in which Pryor used his own personal demons for material. While nobody wished any further harm to Pryor for the sake of new material, “Here and Now”" is a major step down compared to the previous two.
“Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling” (1986) is the second film directed by Pryor. A "fictional" biopic of a comic's life rise and fall and rise, which sounds very close to Pryor's actual life. Raised in a brothel run by his family, having to change his stand-up material early in his career. His run-in with the local mafia. Jo Jo's success and downfall leads to him pouring rum on himself and setting himself on fire. Sound familiar? If you watched Live on the Sunset Strip, there really is no need to watch this film. For die-hard Pryor fans only.
Flaws with the two latter films aside, “The Ultimate Richard Pryor Collection Uncensored” is a must-have and a reminder of one of the funniest people, period.
Matthew Socey is host of Film Soceyology for WFYI 90.1 FM in Indianapolis