Goodbye, Mr. Roundtree

I first encountered this news last evening, and hoped that by morning it would be revealed as fiction. No such luck. From Variety:

Richard Roundtree, an icon of Blaxploitation film who starred as detective John Shaft in [film director] Gordon Parks’ 1971 action thriller, died Tuesday afternoon after a short battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 81 years old.

His death was confirmed by Patrick McMinn, his manager since 1987. “Richard’s work and career served as a turning point for African American leading men in film,” McMinn said ... “The impact he had on the industry cannot be overstated.”

Roundtree was a leading man from the very start of his lifetime in screen acting. After beginning his career in modeling, he secured “Shaft” at the age of 28, marking his feature debut. The MGM release earned $12 million in ticket sales off of a $500,000 production budget, helping to save the studio from bankruptcy. A breakthrough hit, “Shaft” set the tone for a prolific decade of Blaxploitation filmmaking and demonstrated Hollywood’s historical failure to consider Black talent and the moviegoing audiences that they could reach.

The Guardian goes on to note that “Throughout his more than four decade career in Hollywood, Roundtree played numerous roles in films and television shows including the 1977 limited series Roots and 1974’s Earthquake in which he played motorcycle daredevil Miles. Among his more poignant films was 1996’s Once Upon a Time … When We Were Colored, the story a tight-knit Black community confronting the racism of post-war Mississippi. … Roundtree worked regularly until the end, with 159 acting credits to his name plus three upcoming projects yet to be released, according to IMDB.com.”

But certainly the most substantive Roundtree obituary comes from Steve Aldous, author of The World of Shaft (2015), who remembers this performer as “the epitome of cool. A humble man and an underrated actor, he was a huge inspiration and helped pave the way into Hollywood for many black actors and technicians.” You can (and should) read his account of Roundtree’s career highs and lows here.

READ MORE: “Richard Roundtree, Star of Shaft, Dies at 81,” by Anita Gates (The New York Times); “Shaft Star Richard Roundtree, Considered the First Black Action Movie Hero, Has Died at 81,” by Jonathan Landrum Jr. (Associated Press); “Richard Roundtree: How Shaft’s ‘First Black Action Hero’ Changed Culture for Ever,” by Steve Rose (The Guardian); “The Late Great Richard Roundtree,” by Terence Towles Canote (A Shroud of Thoughts).