Remembering Richard Roundtree: 1942-2023
We celebrate the life and career of screen icon Richard Roundtree, best known for his role as John Shaft in Shaft.
Richard Roundtree, a trailblazing Black actor who played the private eye John Shaft in the “Shaft” films of the 1970s and also took on dramatic roles dealing with race relations in America, died aged 81, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
Roundtree died at his home in Los Angeles of pancreatic cancer, the Reporter said, citing his manager, Patrick McMinn.
“Richard’s work and career served as a turning point for African-American leading men in film. The impact he had on the industry cannot be overstated,” McMinn said in a statement, according to Variety, another show business trade publication.
Roundtree shot to fame with the 1971 Blaxploitation movie “Shaft” about a private detective in the Harlem section of New York, and he reprised the role in a number of sequels and a short-lived network TV series.
Actor Richard Roundtree was born on July 9, 1942 in New Rochelle, New York to John and Kathryn Roundtree. Roundtree attended New Rochelle High School, where he played on the school’s nationally-ranked football team. In 1961, Roundtree earned an athletic scholarship to attend Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois, but he left school in 1963 to pursue a career as an actor and a model.
In 1963, Roundtree was hired by Eunice Johnson of Ebony magazine to model in the Ebony Fashion Fair. Roundtree went on to join the Negro Ensemble Company in 1967, where he played the role of boxing legend Jack Johnson in the company’s production of The Great White Hope.
Author: Seyi Awoleye
Los-Angeles, USA
seyiawoleye@yahoo.com
