Sunday Papers Made Room on Front Page for Comic Actor
The death of actor and comedian Richard Pryor was front-page news in most Sunday newspapers, despite the death the same day of Eugene J. McCarthy, the former senator from Minnesota who ran for president to challenge the Vietnam War.
Pryor’s death trumped McCarthy’s in most of the papers, according to a survey of front pages posted on the Newseum’s Web site, though many accommodated both. Outside of Minnesota, however, papers that made a choice chose Pryor.
“Richard Pryor was just more of a household name to more of our readers,” Dennis Durkee, managing editor of the Scripps Howard Treasure Coast newspapers in Florida, told Journal-isms, “and he had a career that we all followed.”
The Scripps Howard group of four papers in three Florida counties — including the Vero Beach Press Journal and the Stuart News — gave Pryor’s death their display position, dominating the front page. “We had an enterprise centerpiece ready to go for Sunday,” Durkee said. “It was a look at emergency rooms in local hospitals.” After news of Pryor’s death broke late Saturday afternoon, “We thought we could present it in a very visual way. We try not to give readers yesterday’s news today, but today’s news today or tomorrow’s news today. The copy editors are always eager to rearrange the text and display it very visually.” Pryor’s “was a well-known face. . . . We thought our readers would be interested.”
Another paper that gave Pryor a front-page splash (PDF) was in his hometown, Peoria, Ill. “Tears of Laughter” read the Journal Star headline. “Peoria mourns passing of homegrown comedic legend.” It showed a seated Pryor waving goodbye, hoisting a flower after a 1992 performance at Washington’s Constitution Hall.
“This is his hometown,” Anthony Smith, assistant city editor, told Journal-isms. “Pryor was the greatest comedian of all time. He deserves it, and since I’m in charge. . . .” For Monday’s paper, he said, the front page will feature local columnist Phil Luciano discussing Pryor’s love-hate relationship with the city.
More papers featured photographs of Pryor with referrals to stories inside than started their obituaries on the front page.
But many did start them there, including some where staff writers wrote appreciations or obituaries on deadline. Among them was the Miami Herald (PDF), which ran an appreciation by syndicated Herald columnist Leonard Pitts Jr., in prime position — down the right-hand column of Page One, followed by a similar appreciation of McCarthy.
Ohio’s Akron Beacon Journal carried an appreciation stripped under the paper’s nameplate, “Comedians will carry on his style,” by columnist George M. Thomas.
At the Chicago Sun-Times (PDF), Pryor’s image popped up over the name of the newspaper, with a photo nearby of celebrity film critic Roger Ebert and the accompanying headline, “Ebert on Pryor’s Death; 3A.”
At the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, staff writer Joanne Weintraub wrote a front-page obituary, “Pryor took comedy to the edge; Comic giant faced race issues head-on.” It referred to a blog entry by Metro columnist Eugene Kane.
Veteran feature writer Lynell George wrote the front-page obituary in the Los Angeles Times, picked up by several papers; Washington Post film critic Desson Thomson wrote a Style section appreciation to accompany a front-page obit by Matt Schudel. The Dallas Morning News ran an obituary by Chris Vognar.
McCarthy received a front-page obituary in the New York Times, but for Pryor, the paper used a large photo to refer to an obituary inside. The author was Mel Watkins, former editor and writer for the New York Times Book Review who has written books about African American humor and its practitioners.
The following papers gave Pryor’s death arguably the lead position Sunday: Miami Herald; Scripps Howard Treasure Coast papers; Peoria (Ill.) Journal Star; Anchorage Daily News; Stockton (Calif.) Record (PDF); Burlington County (N.J.) Times; Poughkeepsie (N.Y.) Journal (PDF); Akron Beacon Journal (PDF); Fort Worth (Texas) Star-Telegram.
These had a story elsewhere on the front page: Annison (Ala.) Star; Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser; Torrence (Calif.) Daily Breeze; Los Angeles Daily News; Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, Ontario, Calif.; Santa Rosa (Calif.) Press-Democrat; Sacramento Bee; Santa Barbara (Calif.) News-Press; Washington Post; Bradenton (Fla.) Herald (PDF); Lakeland (Fla.) Ledger; Panama City (Fla.) News Herald; Fort Myers (Fla.) News-Press; Palm Beach (Fla.) Post; St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times; South Florida Sun-Sentinel; Columbus (Ga.) Ledger-Enquirer; Marietta (Ga.) Daily Journal.
Also, Des Moines Register; Portland (Maine) Press-Telegram; Sun Journal, Lewiston, Maine; Baltimore Sun; Journal-News, White Plains, N.Y.; Charlotte Observer; Durham (N.C.) Herald-Sun; Raleigh (N.C.) News & Observer; Dover-New Philadelphia (Ohio) Times Reporter; Allentown (Pa.) Morning Call; Harrisburg (Pa.) Patriot-News; Johnson City (Tenn.) Press; Abilene (Texas) Reporter; Austin American-Statesman; Beaumont (Texas) Enterprise; Dallas Morning News; Herald-Journal, Logan, Utah; Burlington (Vt.) Free Press; Daily Press, Newport News, Va.; Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch; Tacoma (Wash.) News Tribune; Spokane (Wash.) Spokesman-Review.
The Tacoma headline (PDF) was, “He’ll certainly test heaven’s bleep button.”
Newsday and the New York Daily News, tabloids that do not run stories on the front page, featured Pryor’s photo prominently.
The following papers had no mention of Pryor on the front page. And most did not mention McCarthy, either:
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette; Highland Today, Sebring, Fla.; Rome (Ga.) News-Tribune; Honolulu Advertiser; Rockford (Ill.) Register-Star; Topeka (Kan.) Capital-Journal; Wichita Eagle; Bowling Green (Ky.) Daily News; Worcester (Mass.) Telegram-Gazette; Jackson (Miss.) Clarion-Ledger; Winston-Salem (N.C.) Journal; Tulsa (Okla.) World; Providence Journal; Rapid City (S.D.) Journal.
Black Entertainment Television “reported the news over the weekend with on-screen informational crawls, and then actual news brief coverage,” spokesman Michael Lewellen said.
Debra L. Lee, BET president and CEO, issued this statement:
“Richard Pryor was the last of a great breed of Black comedians who taught us how to laugh at ourselves. He was willing to push the envelope of language, content and race in his humor during an era when most shied away from those subjects. But Richard did so in a manner that still made us laugh while at the same time teaching us something about humanity, and even his own personal downfalls. There is no legitimate comedian in the profession today â?? Black or White â?? who has not been touched or in some way inspired by Richard Pryor. Richard’s style was all his own, and it will never be duplicated.”
Coverage of Pryor’s death exceeded that accorded most other notable African Americans this year: actor Ossie Davis, lawyer Johnnie Cochran, singer Luther Vandross; publisher John H. Johnson and playwright August Wilson. The death of civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks came closest to being universally commemorated.
- Deborah Mathis, BlackAmericaWeb.com: Richard Pryorâ??s Gift to Blacks? Making Us Laugh to Keep From Crying
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How Pryor Came to Regret Ever Having Used “N” Word
It was in 1979, after a trip to Kenya, that Richard Pryor renounced the “N” word with which he had become so closely identified. He related the experience in his 1995 autobiography, “Pryor Convictions”:
“From the moment we touched down at the small airport in Mombasa, I sensed something extraordinary. Through the jet lag, I knew something was different but couldn’t articulate it. . . .
“The next day we went to Nairobi, where the sensation of being in Africa grew even stronger. Something was indeed different, exciting, alive, but radically so. . . .
“By the time I sat my ass down in the hotel lobby, I knew what I was feeling.
“‘Jennifer,’ I said,” referring to his wife. “‘You know what? There are no niggers here.’
“She glanced around the hotel lobby. It was full of gorgeous black people, like everyplace else we’d been. The only people you saw were black. At the hotel, on television, in stores, on the street, in the newspapers, at restaurants, running the government, on advertisements. Everywhere.
“‘There are no niggers here,’ I repeated. ‘The people here, they still have their self-respect, their pride.’
“I left enlightened . . . I also left regretting ever having uttered the word ‘nigger’ on a stage or off it. It was a wretched word. Its connotations weren’t funny, even when people laughed. To this day I wish I’d never said the word. I felt its lameness. It was misunderstood by people. They didn’t get what I was talking about.
“Neither did I.
“I wished that I’d kept my mouth shut.
“But that was a hard thing to do. An impossible thing to do.
“It wasn’t too late, though.
“And so I vowed never to say it again.”