Richard Roundtree Biography, Life, Career and Death

Richard Roundtree Biography, Life, Career and Death, Richard Roundtree star of Shaft died on October 24, Richard Roundtree was an actor who became the first Black action star when he played an ultra-cool private detective in “Shaft.”

Birth Name Richard Arnold Roundtree
Died:  24 October 2023 Los Angeles, California, USA
Details of death: Died at his home in Los Angeles of pancreatic cancer at the age of 81. (Matthew Perry (1969-2023) Find a Grave Memorial and Burial Details)
Height 6′ 2″ (1.88 m)

Richard Roundtree Family

Spouses Karen Michelle Ciernia(September 1980 – 1988) (divorced, 3 children) Mary Jane Grant(November 27, 1963 – December 13, 1973) (divorced, 2 children)
Children John James Kelli Roundtree Tayler Roundtree
Parents John James Roundtree Kathryn Roundtree

Richard Roundtree Net worth and Salary

Inchon (1982) – $200,000 Earthquake (1974) – $50,000 for 10 weeks, Shaft’s Big Score! (1972) – $50,000 and Shaft (1971) – $12,500. He had a net worth of $2 million at the time of his death.

Richard Roundtree Biography

Education

Richard Arnold Roundtree was born on 9 July 1942, in New Rochelle, New York, to John Roundtree and Kathryn Watkins. Roundtree attended New Rochelle High School, where he graduated in 1961. He subsequently attended Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois,^[8] but eventually dropped out of college in 1963, in order to begin his acting career.

Life and Career

Richard Roundtree shot to fame as the ultra-hip, flamboyantly-dressed not to mention charismatic private eye John Shaft. The film Shaft (1971) spawned a genre, two sequels and a series. It made Roundtree a household name, and, for a while, one of the hottest box-office stars in Hollywood. As New York Times reviewer Vincent Canby put it: “Shaft is the sort of man who can drink five fingers of scotch without gagging or his eyes watering. He moves through Whitey’s world with perfect ease and aplomb, but never loses his independence, or his awareness of where his life is really at.” Rather aptly, Roundtree has been described as blaxploitation’s James Bond.

Richard Roundtree Fame and success

did not come at once. The son of Kathryn (a nurse and/or maid), and John Roundtree (employed variously as a garbage collector and caterer), Richard was born in New Rochelle, New York. During high school, he excelled at football and duly won an athletic scholarship at Southern Illinois University. However, he dropped out in 1963 and worked a succession of different jobs, including as janitor and salesman. He became a fashion model after being signed by Eunice Johnson of Ebony Magazine, later posing as an advertising model for a brand of hair grease and for Salem cigarettes. Deciding to give acting a go, Roundtree returned to New York to take drama lessons. In 1967, he joined the acclaimed Negro Ensemble Company, working alongside people like Robert Hooks, Rosalind Cash and Moses Gunn. He was soon cast in several off-Broadway productions and had a first headlining role as boxing legend Jack Johnson in The Great White Hope.

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In 1971, Roundtree, then a virtual unknown in show biz, ignited the screen as the macho sleuth Shaft. Slickly directed by Gordon Parks and filmed on location in Harlem, Greenwich Village and Times Square, the picture was a tangible box-office hit, which satisfied both black and white audiences alike and likely saved a struggling MGM from impending bankruptcy. Shaft can also be said to have spawned the blaxploitation action genre of the 70s. Roundtree went on to star in two less successful sequels (Shaft’s Big Score! (1972) and Shaft in Africa (1973)) and a series. He reprised his character for a 2000 motion picture which starred Samuel L. Jackson as John Shaft’s nephew.

Down the line, Roundtree portrayed a few other robust characters: a Union army deserter teaming up with a crippled Indian to escape a sadistic bounty hunter in Charley-One-Eye (1973), a professional jewel thief in Diamonds (1975) (alternatively titled ‘Diamond Shaft’– a curious coincidence), a treasure hunter in Day of the Assassin (1979) and a Zimbabwean guerrilla in Game for Vultures (1979). By the mid-80s, however, the actor found himself increasingly relegated to the supporting cast as conventional establishment figures, often police or army officers.Television afforded him several good roles, notably in the Emmy Award-winning miniseries Roots (1977) and as former slave-turned gunslinger Isaiah “Ice” McAdams in Outlaws (1986). He subsequently had recurring roles in the cast of the soap Generations (1989) (as a doctor), the drama Being Mary Jane (2013) (as the titular talk show host’s dad) and (as a grandfather) in the sitcom Family Reunion (2019).

Richard Roundtree Award

Roundtree’s accolades have included an MTV Lifetime Achievement Award for Shaft in 1994, a Peabody Award in 2002 and a Black Theater Alliance Award Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010.

Richard Roundtree Health Problems and Death

Though diagnosed with male breast cancer in 1993 and having undergone both chemotherapy and a double mastectomy, Roundtree bravely soldiered on in his chosen profession and continued to act on screen right up to his death from pancreatic cancer on October 24 2023, at the age of 81.