Pryor Commitment

I always have a lot of e-mails asking me about Pryor's Place, a Saturday morn show I worked on back in 1984. It starred Richard Pryor and an amazing array of guest stars and it got great reviews, Emmy nominations and pretty darned good ratings. This recent article attempts to answer the oft-asked question, "Well then, how come it only lasted one season and thirteen episodes?"

My answer for that is pretty simple: Richard Pryor agreed to do the series and then suddenly had other things — especially a movie he directed, starred-in and co-wrote called Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling — that he decided he'd rather do. In fact, halfway through the production of the first and only season of Pryor's Place, Mr. Pryor suddenly made that decision and he had to be cajoled, begged and lightly-threatened to get him to finish the thirteen we did.

The above-linked article will tell you more about the series but it doesn't give enough credit to writer Lorne Frohman or any at all to writer-producer Carl Kleinschmitt, who was very much involved. I already wrote most of what I recall about the series here but if I remember anything else of interest, I may write more about it someday.