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Cedric the
Entertainer
Date of birth: Apr. 24,
1964
Profession: Comedian; actor
Address: c/o Visions Management Group, 4579 LaClede Ave., #402, St. Louis, MO 63108
Over the past decade the portly, dapper, bespectacled Cedric Kyles-better known as Cedric the Entertainer-has become a familiar presence on the comedy
scene. He got his start in comedy clubs in the St. Louis, Missouri, area before landing a supporting role on the Steve Harvey Show and starring in his own program, Cedric the
Entertainer Presents, which aired on the Fox network in 2002 and 2003. Beginning in the late 1990s he participated in the enormously successful Kings of Comedy tour, and he was
seen in the 2000 Spike Lee film of the same title. Other films in which he has performed include Barbershop (2002), Intolerable Cruelty (2003), and several movies scheduled to
be released in 2004. In addition, Cedric's humorous TV ads for Bud Light beer have been seen by millions of viewers. In a profile of Cedric the Entertainer for Ebony (May
2002), Bobbi Roquemore wrote, "The name says it all. His routines as a stand-up comedian continue to make audiences double over with laughter. His acting takes on varying degrees of laughable . . . and
dramatic. . . . Cedric 'the Entertainer' is well on his way to becoming known as a modern-day, Hollywood version of a Renaissance man."
The performer was born Cedric Antonio Kyles on April 24, 1964 in Jefferson City, Missouri, to Rosetta Kyles, a public-school reading specialist.
As a child Kyles enjoyed entertaining his mother and her friends by dancing and singing, a talent that he hoped to develop later in life.
Comedy was not his focus when he was young, even though he was voted "most humorous" and "most popular" by his high-school classmates.
He told Tim Gordon for Reel Images Magazine (on-line), "I wasn't the class clown. My mom taught at the school district where I was being
educated, so they weren't going to allow for no class clown! She would have clowned me!" As a student at Southeast Missouri State University,
in Cape Girardeau, he joined the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity and graduated with a bachelor's degree in communications; his minor was in theater.
After college he worked for a time as a claims adjuster with the State Farm insurance company, while still hoping to be a singer.
All of that changed when Kyles was about 26, on the night his friends urged him to go on stage at a St. Louis comedy club. On that night regional
tryouts for the Johnny Walker National Comedy Contest were being held; Kyles, impressing the contest's representatives by dancing,
singing, and even reciting poetry, won the contest and walked away with $500. He went on to win the quarterfinals of the contest, in Chicago.
Boosted by that success, he began to appear regularly at comedy clubs in and around St. Louis. It was during this period that he became
known as Cedric the Entertainer. At one club, as he recalled to Mark Hinson for the Tallahassee [Florida] Democrat (November 14, 2003,
on-line), "The emcee used to introduce the next act by saying, 'So-andso the comedian will be out next.' He called everyone 'the comedian.'
I told him not to call me 'the comedian' because I do more than that. I said, 'Call me The Entertainer.' And it stuck." The performer is
known for a style of humor that is based on observation of everyday life and is relatively free of profanity. According to delafont.com, the Web
site of the Richard De La Font Agency, Cedric attributes his clean style
to his mother: "Mom came to many of my shows. So that affected a lot
of what I said."
In 1992 Cedric the Entertainer made his first television appearance,
on Showtime at the Apollo, a variety show filmed at the famed Apollo
Theater in the Harlem section of New York City. The Apollo audience,
known for voicing its opinions of performers-good or bad-in unambiguous
terms, responded positively to Cedric's routine. That warm reception
led to other TV appearances, on such programs as HBO's Def
Comedy Jam, the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and Politically Incorrect
with Bill Maher. Cedric won the Miller Genuine Draft Comedy
Contest in 1993; in the following year he was hired to host the BET
cable network's program Comic View. Also in 1994 he won BET's Richard
Pryor Comic of the Year Award.
In 1996 Cedric the Entertainer joined his friend and mentor Steve
Harvey as part of the cast of the WB network's Steve Harvey Show.
(Cedric had befriended Harvey in Dallas, Texas, years earlier, when the
headlining comedian at Harvey's club failed to excite the crowd, which
included Cedric-who persuaded Harvey to allow him to take the stage
for free. The audience responded to his routine with a standing ovation.)
On Harvey's sitcom Cedric played the lovable high-school sports
coach Cedric Jackie Robinson, a role for which he won four consecutive
NAACP Image Awards. Cedric parlayed his exposure on the successful
Steve Harvey Show into a starring role on a short-lived WB sitcom, Cedric
the Coach, in which he played the coach of the worst team in the
National Basketball Association. Cedric's film debut was in the road
movie Ride (1998); he later appeared in the comedy Big Momma's
House (2000), starring Martin Lawrence.
The film The Original Kings of Comedy (2000), directed by Spike
Lee, was shot entirely on location in Charlotte, North Carolina, and
captured performances by the comedians in the Original Kings of
Comedy tour, the highest-grossing comedy tour of all time: Harvey,
Bernie Mac, D. L. Hughley, and Cedric the Entertainer. Michael
O'Sullivan wrote for the Washington Post (August 18, 2000) that Cedric
was "easily the best thing about Kings, especially when the dapper
and roly-poly clown launches into an inspired parody of break dancing
or when he delivers one of his wry nuggets inspired by the flotsam of
pop culture."
On the merits of his success with The Original Kings of Comedy,
the Anheuser-Busch brewing company chose Cedric to appear in the
TV ad for Bud Light that aired during the 2001 Super Bowl. The ad,
in which he played a man so excited to be on a date that he dances,
accidentally shakes up his beer, then sprays it on his female companion,
was so successful that USA Today (January 30, 2001) called the performer
"Madison Avenue's MVP." Cedric was hired to tape several
more commercials for Anheuser-Busch, which ran regularly and made
him one of the most visible comedic personalities in the media.
As a result of that exposure, the Fox network offered Cedric his own
TV show. The sketch comedy/variety program Cedric the Entertainer
Presents, which premiered on September 18, 2002, co-starred Wendy
Raquel Robinson, Shaun Majumder, and Amy Brassette and found Cedric
playing a host of off-beat characters, including the outspoken Mrs.
Cafeteria Lady and the Love Doctor, a smooth-voiced marriage counselor.
Critics found the show to be uneven-wildly funny in some instances
and plodding in others-with some suggesting that the performers
would benefit from better writing. In June 2003 Fox executives
decided not to renew the show for another full season, though new installments
of Cedric the Entertainer Presents aired during the fall.
On the big screen Cedric played Ray Harris in the movie Serving
Sara (2002), with Elizabeth Hurley. The film Barbershop (2002),
which starred Ice Cube, found Cedric playing a barber named Eddie,
an opinionated old-timer who never seems to give anyone a haircut. Ice
Cube's character, Calvin, decides to sell the barbershop, a place that
provides a group of inner-city Chicago residents with an oasis from
their troubles; over the course of the day in which the movie is set, Calvin
undergoes a spiritual awakening and realizes the value of the shop.
Barbershop was the top-grossing film at the box office for two weeks
in a row. It was also the focus of controversy, with several civil rights
activists objecting to Eddie's comments about Martin Luther King Jr.
and Rosa Parks. Cedric told Jet (September 16, 2002), "Eddie is very
opinionated, usually shooting off his mouth with some half-truths or another.
With that I saw a lot of comedic and dramatic opportunity, and
I knew I'd have a lot of leniency with this character. Eddie has been
there through generations and is the elder statesman of the shop. He's
there to explain the significance of the barbershop in the neighborhood
and to teach the young barbers. Basically, Eddie enjoys the social atmosphere
of the place. It's his country club." Regarding the controversy
surrounding the film, he said to Mark Hinson, "It was a little surprising,
to say the least, and it did get a little out of hand. I didn't expect to end
up on Larry King Live defending myself when I took the part." In 2003
Cedric appeared in Joel and Ethan Coen's film Intolerable Cruelty,
which stars George Clooney and Catherine Zeta-Jones. In 2004 he will
be seen in the films Flash, The Honeymooners, Johnson Family Vacation,
and Barbershop 2. Cedric the Entertainer has lent his deep voice
to several animated or nonhuman movie characters, such as those in
Dr. Doolittle 2 (2001), starring Eddie Murphy, and Disney's Ice Age
(2002). He also has a recurring voice role as Bobby Proud in the Disney
Channel's animated program The Proud Family.
Cedric the Entertainer is married to the former Lorna Wells, with
whom he has a son, Croix Alexander; he also has a teenage daughter,
Tiara, from a previous relationship. In 1995 he started the Cedric the
Entertainer Charitable Foundation, which seeks to broaden the cultural
horizons of inner-city youth. In 2002 he published Grown-A$$ Man,
a collection of essays combining humor and social observation. -L.A.S.
SUGGESTED READING:
Ebony p90+ May
2002
Jet p32 May 28, 2001,
p58 May 12, 2001
Washington Post III
p1 Aug. 19, 2000
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