Nipsey Russell

Nipsey Russell (1918-2005) in 1976. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Nipsey Russell
Birth name	Julius Russell
Born	September 15, 1918(1918-Template:MONTHNUMBER-15) Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.
Died	October Template:Dda New York City, New York, U.S.
Medium	Stand-up comedy, television, film
Nationality	American
Years active	1950–1996
Influences	Michael Gough, Dean Martin, Pat Hingle, James Brown, Milton Berle, Foster Brooks, Orson Welles, Redd Foxx
Influenced	Michael Jackson, Mike Tyson, Nipsey Hussle, Bernie Mac

Julius "Nipsey" Russell (September 15, 1918 - October 2, 2005) was an African-American poet and comedian

Life

Overview

Russell is best known today for his appearances as a guest panelist on game shows from the 1960s through the 1990s, especially Match Game, Password, Hollywood Squares, To Tell the Truth and Pyramid. His appearances were distinguished in part by the short, humorous poems he would recite during the broadcast. These lyrics became so closely associated with Russell that Dick Clark, Bill Cullen, Betty White, and others regularly referred to him as "the poet laureate of television." He also had a leading role in the film version of The Wiz as the Tin Man. He was also a frequent guest on the long-running "Dean Martin Celebrity Roast" series.

Youth

Rusell was born in Atlanta, Georgia.

He went to Booker T. Washington High School in Atlanta and attended the University of Cincinnati for a single semester in 1943. He served as a medic in the United States Army during World War II, enlisting as a private on June 27, 1941, and returning from Europe in 1945 as a 2nd lieutenant.

He got his start in the 1940s as a carhop at the Atlanta drive-in The Varsity, where he increased the tips he earned by making customers laugh. He was discovered after he began performing in nightclubs in the 1950s. He subsequently made many "party albums," which were essentially compilations of his stand-up routines.

Early career

In the mid-1950s Russell joined forces with the popular movie comedian Mantan Moreland for a stage act, replacing Ben Carter as Moreland's dapper straight man. One of their bits was an old routine that Moreland and Ben Carter had performed in vaudeville and in Charlie Chan films. In the "interruption routine" (or "incomplete sentences") Moreland would engage Russell in conversation, only to be interrupted by Russell, who in turn was interrupted by Moreland:

Moreland: Guess who I saw? I saw old —

Russell: Is he back again? I thought he was —

Moreland: He was, but he got out.

Russell: Is that so?

Moreland: Yeah, he was over —

Russell: Is that so?

Soon the entire conversation was conducted in incomplete sentences, with each man anticipating or contradicting the other. Moreland and Russell's act can be seen in 2 all-black-cast compilation films, Rhythm and Blues Review and Rock and Roll Revue. Another variation of the "interruption routine" performed by Tommy Davidson and Savion Glover, was featured in Spike Lee's 2000 film Bamboozled.

In the late 1950s, Russell appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, which led to a supporting part as a New York policeman in the sitcom Car 54, Where Are You? in 1961. In 1965 he became a co-host of ABC's Les Crane Show. During the 1970s, he was a co-star in the ABC sitcom Barefoot in the Park and appeared regularly on The Dean Martin Show and The Dean Martin Comedy World. Scattered appearances on television series followed, as well as occasional guest-host stints on The Tonight Show during the Johnny Carson era. Russell also appeared frequently in Las Vegas; including a series of appearances with Sergio Franchi at the Frontier Hotel in 1978 and 1979, and with Franchi in 1979 at the Sands Hotel Copa Room.

Game show career

Russell became the first black performer to become a regular panelist on a daily network game show when he joined ABC's Missing Links in 1964. Another ABC show, Rhyme and Reason, had poetry for a premise, making Russell's participation a necessity:

Host: Conny Van Dyke looks like a girl I once dated...

Russell: And now, all my dreams are strictly X-rated!

Host: Jack said to Jill as they went up the hill...

Russell: We're not going for water — I hope you're on the pill!

In 1971 he started as a featured panelist on To Tell the Truth, which led to his being hired for The Match Game when Goodson-Todman Productions revived it two years later. He also served as panelist in 1968 on the syndicated version of What's My Line? Producer Bob Stewart featured him regularly as a panelist on Pyramid throughout its 1970s and 1980s runs. Russell would also host the short-lived 1985 game show Your Number's Up as well as the early-'80s revival of Juvenile Jury.

He was a trained dancer, influenced in his youth by legendary performer Jack Wiggins. Russell put these talents to use in the 1978 musical The Wiz as the Tin Man. He also appeared on the big screen in 1994's adaptation of Car 54, Where Are You?, reprising his role as Anderson, who had now been promoted from sergeant to captain.

Later career and death

During the 1990s, Russell gained popularity with a new generation of television viewers as a regular on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Russell would often appear during comedy sketches between scheduled guests and deliver his trademark rhymes.

Russell's final TV appearance was as a panelist on a game show-themed week on the final season of the Tom Bergeron version of Hollywood Squares.

He died in 2005 at the age of 87 in New York City, after suffering from stomach cancer. His ashes were scattered into the Atlantic Ocean.

Writing

During his appearances on game shows, at some point in the broadcast the host would give the floor to Russell, who would recite a self-penned poem from memory, looking straight into the camera. These poems from 1980s episodes of The $25,000 Pyramid and The $100,000 Pyramid and even one from the 2004 Hollywood Squares are typical of his style and wit:

The girl who would make my life complete

need not be young and fair;

Just be a nymphomaniac

and a multimillionaire.

(To which Betty White replied, "I'm not a multimillionaire but one out of two ain't bad.")

What is the secret of eternal youth?

The answer is easily told;

All you gotta do if you wanna look young

Is hang out with people who are old.

If you ever go out with a schoolteacher,

You're in for a sensational night;

She'll make you do it over and over again

Until you do it right.

There's something we see today on TV

That's never been seen before

A bunch of religious millionaires

Asking for money from the poor

Dolly Parton had a chest cold

And it was a fatal day

She took off her shirt to be examined

And the doctor passed away.

The young people are very different today;

And there's one sure way to know;

Kids used to ask where they came from;

Now they'll tell you where you can go!

I got a new girlfriend,

No guy could ask for more,

She’s deaf, dumb, oversexed

And owns a liquor store!

Those who think of women as the weaker sex

Just can't see the trees for the woods

Cause no matter how loudly a rooster may crow

It's the hen who delivers the goods.

Before we lose our autonomy

And our economy crumbles into dust

We should attack Japan, lose the war

And let Japan take care of us.

The opposite of 'pro' is 'con'

This fact is clearly seen

But if 'progress' means move forward

What does 'Congress' mean?

Hurricanes are named after women

Because they start on the very same plan

Start up over nothin', make a whole lotta noise,

And can't be controlled by man!

What would you say makes the hair grey

Before you submit any bids

Grey hair is hereditary

And you get it from your kids.

Washington threw a silver dollar

Across the Potomac one day

Since then politicians in Washington

Have been throwing our money away.

I am a bachelor, and I will not marry

Until the right girl comes along

But while I'm waiting, I don't mind dating

Girls that I know are wrong.

Pyramid is the best show on TV.

Dick Clark is surely the best emcee.

They won the Emmy, they pay a high fee

How 'bout a few bucks for the audience and me?

Show business should really change its style

From the vulgar and the crude.

People on stage should be properly dressed.

The audience should be nude.

More people are killed on the roads

Than they are on the battlefield.

It's not the tiger in the tank,

It's the jackass behind the wheel.

When Russell appeared on Family Feud during a special game show emcee week, he had 2 poems to give:

Playing Family Feud today

Are some talented women and men;

Lost their jobs giving money away,

So now, they're trying to win!

Each day we turn another page.

You know you're reaching middle age

When your pimples and your rashes

Turn to wrinkles and hot flashes.

When Russell hosted Your Number's Up, he started the day with his poems, including this example from the premiere episode:

If you owe too much on American Express,

And your Diner's Club notes are too hard,

Take a loan on your Visa,

And pay it off with your MasterCard.

and on the finale:

The strong take from the weak

Thus fortunes rise and fall

The wise take from the strong

Internal Revenue taketh from all.

The reason the marriage never works out

When May gets married to December

Is the sweet young thing has never learned how

And the old goat doesn't remember

In 1984, Russell hosted an unsold pilot for a revival of Jackpot again he used several rhymes including:

They just made a movie about a mermaid

I don't understand the reason why

Not enough woman to make love to

And too much fish to fry

Said Mr. Rabbit to Mrs. rabbit

"This lovin' ain't nothing but a habit"

Said Mrs. Rabbit to Mr. Rabbit

"Shoot the habit to me Rabbit"

If you get your baby a waterbed

It could be very grim

You'll never know if he's wetting the bed

Or the bed is wetting him

Nipsey Russell's Funny Poems

(on children):

If they don't walk and talk by the time they're two

We worry we fret and we frown

But after that time it's all we can do

To make them shut up and sit down

See also

• List of U.S. poets

External links

Audio / video

• A Tribute to Comedian Nipsey Russell – audio clip from NPR's All Things Considered, October 4, 2005
• Nipsey Russell at YouTube

About

• Rhyming Funnyman Nipsey Russell Dies - Washington Post
• Nipsey Russell, a Comic With a Gift for Verse, Dies at 80 [sic] – New York Times
• Nipsey Russell at the Internet Movie Database
• Nipsey Russell at Find a Grave