Richard Pryor: Live in Concert

A contemporary review of 1979's Richard Pryor: Live In Concert could not have foreseen the staying power of this historic performance. Decades later, our viewing experience is heightened by our awareness of Pryor's later misfortunes, and the disappointing resurrection of old hatreds by demagogues determined to exploit America's racial divide.

Pryor's transformative performance gives a tantalizing glimpse of a more harmonious America, one that could have been but did not come to pass. People on both sides remain unable to overcome their self-identification first by race, and then a long way lower down the list, by shared citizenship. Through a series of spot-on skits that reveal our culture-centric absurdities, Pryor effectively communicated our shared humanity. He showed us what might have been.

Today's viewer of this classic will detect the transformation of the mixed and initially apprehensive audience into a unified body, brought together by laughter not at Pryor's illustrations of the other side's haplessness, but of their own.

By so convincingly showing us what might have been, today's viewers now realize that Pryor was not merely the Black comedian whose career followed Cosby's unctuous panderings and pre-dated Eddy Murphy's wisecracks. He was on a different plane entirely, a visionary who like Lenny Bruce who forced us to acknowledge the self-diminishment of our lives that is the consequence of giving in to our fears.

Now considered by many to be the greatest stand-up performance ever captured on film, the venue, lilly-white Long Beach CA, provided just the right atmosphere for Pryor to drive home his humor to a near-equally mixed audience by race.

At the beginning, the viewer can sense a subtle unease among the audience, perhaps brought on by concern that Pryor's central theme, about how strange it is to be Black in America, could lead to a bad vibe in the room and even animosity.

Pryor picks up on this the moment he walks onstage. Through a spontaneous improvisation of a white man requesting his reserved seat be vacated by the Black man occupying it, Pryor's impersonation of both characters proves to be a metaphor for the chasm that exists between the races, affecting even the most mundane interactions. Disarmed and intrigued, the audience now understands that this night will be about the comedy of being human, about foolish is their behavior when people play into their respective stereotypes, meaning that ultimately the joke is on them.

By expressing the triumph of shared humanity over the damage done through obsessive self-identification with "our people," Pryor's humor illuminates the folly of prejudice through biting insight and some brilliant physical comedy. Viewers of the film were provided moments of audience reaction, and as it turned out, people laughed loudest when Pryor delivered a spot-on depiction of THEIR race's stereotypes. By the end of his never- flagging 70-minute performance, he had brought together those hundreds of people who at the beginning seemed so far apart. Pryor delivered a performance for the ages, one from which we still can learn - and laugh.

I can't express how dazzlingly brilliant this routine is. The jokes, the faces, the mime, the banter, ad-libs - everything amazes. This is the 'Citizen Kane' of routines and many comedians since have taken inspiration from it including Eddie Murphy (esp.) Chris Rock and Eddie Izzard.

Yes it is profane, but if you are stupid enough to watch a Pryor stand- up without being prepared for extreme 'vulgarity' then frankly you deserve to be offended. The language, although extreme isn't that shocking (even the now dreaded 'N' word) because it is all part of Pryor's 'jive' and would be poorer without it.

Watch this and see a master at the top of his game.

Richard Pryor is without a doubt one of the best stand-up performers to ever grab a mike, because he breaks the performance wall, and just has a conversation with the audience, which is rare for a comic to do. He talks to the audience, and involves them in the show, and the things he talks about on stage are not really jokes, but his retelling of certain life events that he has had, and you get the feeling that you would be hearing the same thing if you were just sitting alone with him in a room, and that is what makes his comedy so good, that conversational quality. No other comic that I can think of has done that with such a level of success that Pryor did...he was a real natural.

As far as profanity goes, Pryor doesn't use it to shock, he just talks that way naturally, and so the cursing doesn't stick out that much. Still, if you're easily offended by such language, then avoid it, but you are only robbing yourself of seeing a legend working his magic.

This was the first time a stand-up comedian was filmed doing his act, and most people predicted that it would fail. Bill Sargent had the idea of filming Pryor's act, but since most of the industry thought it would flop, they had trouble getting anyone to distribute it, so a few mavericks in the industry distributed it themselves. It was cheap to make, all the profits would be gravy, and the men who made it believed that people would respond to Richard Pryor's act. Video was just coming out and would soon be a force, and Pryor was at the top of his game, and the gamble paid off. Now we take for granted watching stand-up comedy on TV and everywhere else, but at the time bringing a comedy routine to the big screen, especially one as raunchy as Pryor's, was considered a huge risk.

But Pryor is on fire in front of his audience. He's honest and raw, and doesn't pull any punches. And because of that you'll laugh so hard your gut will bust. But when you watch this film it is of interest to realize that at the time it was filmed there was no "Def Comedy Jam." There was no Bill Cosby "Himself." That all came after this. Richard Pryor and a few daring producers brought this genre to life with this one act, and had it not been so incredibly good, it might not have become the money making and entertaining part of the industry that it is today.

When you watch this you can know you're watching the first and the best.

As others have said, this is the best stand-up performance ever recorded. It sounds like an exaggeration, but it's not. Pryor is a comedic genius, and you can see his influence in every comedian since. He sets the standard. His facial expressions, acting abilities, delivery, etc., are all top-notch, and he can make even mundane topics such as walking through the woods pee-your-pants hilarious (in fact, he spends a long time talking about the woods, which is a bit puzzling, but hey, it's funny). He also covers completely unrelated topics such as dogs, drugs, family life, boxing, and sex... all the while being hysterically funny. The guy is amazing, and I recommend this to anyone who enjoys stand-up comedy.