John Amos, the television writer turned Emmy-nominated actor who played the stoic father in Bons moments before being fired from the historical sitcom for going against stereotypes and, admittedly, letting his character get the best of him, died. He was 84 years old.
Amos died Aug. 21 in Los Angeles of natural causes, his son, KC Amos, announced.
“It is with deep sadness that I share with you my father’s transition,” he said in a statement. “He was a man with the kindest heart and a heart of gold…and he was loved all over the world.” Many fans consider him their TV dad. He lived a good life. His legacy will live on in his outstanding works in television and film as an actor.
Amos, who played football at Colorado State University and attended training camps with the Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs of the American Football League, saw his career in showbiz take off after landing a job as WJM-TV meteorologist Gordy Howard. Le spectacle de Mary Tyler Moore.
The New Jersey native earned his Emmy nomination for playing Toby, the older version of Kunta Kinte, in the acclaimed 1977 ABC miniseries. Rootsand he had a recurring role as Admiral Percy Fitzwallace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on NBC. West wing.
His big screen career began with Melvin Van Peebles’ blaxploitation classic. The song Baadasssss by Sweet Sweetback (1971), and he plays the manager of a McDonald’s-type restaurant who hires an African prince (Eddie Murphy) and his right-hand man (Arsenio Hall) in Coming to America (1988).
Several years earlier, Amos had completed McDonald’s training program before appearing as an employee of the fast food chain in a well-known ’70s commercial (“Take a bucket and a mop, scrub the bottom and the top!” “) who he says helped his children go to college.
After appearing a dozen times as the good Gordy during the first four seasons of Le spectacle de Mary Tyler MooreBarrel-chested Amos was asked to read for the role of James Evans Sr., the husband of Esther Rolle’s Florida Evans and father of their three children, in a new CBS series, Of good moments.
The 1974-1979 show, created by Eric Monte and Mike Evans and developed by Norman Lear, was set in a downtown Chicago apartment located in the projects (think Cabrini-Green). A spin-off of Maud (himself a descendant of All in family), Bons moments was the first sitcom centered on an African-American family.
“Everyone knew who Norman Lear was,” Amos said in a statement. 2014 interview for the Television Academy Foundation. “I had seen the pilot episode of All in family and I thought, “There’s no way in the world they’re putting this on TV.” » » »… Indeed, it became a success.
“So I went in and read with Miss Rolle for Norman Lear, with just the three of us in her office. When we finished reading, Norman looked at Esther, and Esther looked at me and looked at Norman and said, “He’ll do just fine.” »
Amos starred on the show for three seasons, but he quickly disapproved of the silly, formulaic storylines that surrounded their eldest son on the show, JJ – played by comic Jimmie Walker – and he went public with his criticism.
“We had a number of differences,” he said. “I felt like there was too much focus on JJ in his chicken hat, saying ‘Dy-no-mite!’ every three pages. I thought my other two children could have achieved as much fame and mileage, one of whom aspired to become a Supreme Court justice, played by Ralph Carter, and the other, BernNadette Stanis, who aspired to be a surgeon.
“But I wasn’t the most diplomatic guy back then, and [the show’s producers] were tired of seeing their lives threatened because of pranks. So they said, “Why not kill him?” We can move on with our lives! “It taught me a lesson: I wasn’t as important to the show or to the Norman Lear projects as I thought I was.
James Evans Sr. was involved in a car accident in a two-part episode that aired in September 1976 to kick off the fourth season.
John Alan Amos Jr. was born on December 27, 1939 in Newark, New Jersey. Her father drove a tractor-trailer and worked as a mechanic, and her mother, Annabelle, was a housekeeper who eventually returned to school and became a nutritionist.
His mother was cleaning the house of a cartoonist who drew for Archie Comics, which led Amos and a friend to attend the taping of a radio show. The Archie Show at Radio City Music Hall in New York. “It blew my imagination,” he said.
“I was disappointed in a way, because none of them looked like Archie, Jughead, or Veronica… Some of the magic was gone, but the science of the industry became obvious to me.”
At East Orange High School, Amos drew caricatures and wrote columns for the school newspaper, played the role of a convict in a production of The man who came to dinner and he was a star running back.
Amos won football scholarships to Long Beach City College in California and then to Colorado State University, where the Rams had the longest losing streak in the country at the time.
“God kept telling me, ‘I don’t want you to play football,’” he said. “The direction I was getting from above was to be a performer, a writer, something I had always done and was easy for me.”
Still, Amos didn’t give up on his dream of playing professional football by signing his first free agent contract with the Broncos. (One of his training camp teammates was Ernie Barnes, whose painting, Sugar shackappears in the opening credits of Bons moments.)
Amos played or attempted to play with numerous teams, including the Norfolk Neptunes of the Continental Football League and the British Columbia Lions of the Canadian Football League.
After the Chiefs cut him a second time, coach Hank Stram allowed him to read a poem about broken dreams to the players — and he received a standing ovation. “It was the first time my peers confirmed to me that I could write material that could evoke emotions in people,” he said. “It was very rewarding, much more than running away from a tackle or trying to blitz.”
(Amos would play a retired player suffering from injuries from his years in the NFL in the HBO series. dancers.)
In Vancouver, Amos did stand-up and met a television writer who encouraged him to come to Los Angeles, where he landed a writing job and starred in a syndicated television variety show hosted by Al Lohman and radio personality Roger Barkley. (Also making their debuts on this program: McLean Stevenson, Craig T. Nelson and Barry Levinson.)
This then led him to write and star in sketches for the 1969 CBS variety program. Le spectacle Leslie Uggams. Two producers there, Lorenzo Music and Dave Davis, were helping develop a series for Mary Tyler Moore and thought he would be great for it.
“They very easily could have said, ‘Well, [Gordy] can be a sports presenter. It would have been [as easy as] I fell off a log,” he recalls. “I liked the fact that he was a meteorologist; this implied that man could think.
During the 1973-74 season MaudAmos appeared in three episodes as Florida’s husband, organizing the launch of Of good moments.
James Evans struggled to find full-time employment, but “he provided his family with whatever employment he could find.” We managed to survive and America loved the show. This was close to the way most Americans lived at that time.
In his interview with the TV Academy Foundation, Amos became emotional as he noted that “young men, in their 30s and 40s, of every ethnicity imaginable, came up to me and said, ‘You are the father I never had.’ »
After his departure Bons momentsLear’s company hired him to play a congressman in the pilot of a new show called Onwards and upwards. But he would also leave this project.
Amos had traveled to Africa several times, including spending months in Liberia “to indirectly absorb the culture of the continent I came from”, when he was approached to appear in Roots.
“It was exactly what I needed,” he said. “It took on the bad taste of Bons moments from my mouth – not that Bons moments Everything was going wrong, but the circumstances in which I left and the acrimony between Norman Lear and me… I realize that a lot of it was me. I was not the easiest man in the world to live with or lead. I challenged everyone. [Roots] It was revenge, an immense feeling of satisfaction.
He and Lear eventually got over it, and Amos starred for the producer in a short-lived sitcom in 1994, 704 housesabout a liberal family living in Archie Bunker’s former home in Queens.
Amos also had recurring roles on other television shows like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Airon which he played Will Smith’s stepfather; Hunter; The neighborhood; Men in the trees; All about the Andersonsas the father of Anthony Anderson; and the Netflix drama The Ranch.
His film CV also included The greatest athlete in the world (1973), Let’s do it again (1975), The Beastmaster (1982), Die Hard 2 (1990), Ricochet (1991), Mac (1992), Night trap (1993), For better or for worse (1995), The players club (1998), Coming to America 2 (2021) et Because of Charley (2021).
In 1972, he appeared on Broadway in Difficult to get helpdirected by Carl Reiner.
While struggling to find work in the 1990s, Amos wrote and starred in the one-man play Halley’s Cometabout an 87-year-old man who ruminates on the state of the world while waiting in the woods for “the comet” to arrive. He toured across the United States and to several overseas cities with this piece for more than two decades.
Most recently, he and his son made the documentary America’s Father.
In addition to KC (nicknamed in reference to Amos’ time with the Chiefs), survivors include his daughter, Shannon, both from his first marriage to Noel “Noni” Mickelson. THR’Gary Baum wrote in November about his children’s acrimonious relationship.
Amos was also briefly married to actress Lillian Lehman, who played Andre Braugher’s mother in Men of a certain age.
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