Jokes My Father Never Taught Me: Life, Love, and Loss with Richard Pryor [Hardcover]

Rain Pryor (Author), Cathy Crimmins (Collaborator)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 31, 2006

This is a loving yet brutally honest memoir by the daughter of comedy legend Richard Pryor. Rain Pryor was born in the idealistic, free-love 1960s. Her mother was a Jewish go-go dancer who wanted a "tribe of rainbow children," and her father was Richard Pryor, perhaps the most compelling and brilliant comedian of his era. In this intimate, harrowing, and often hilarious memoir, Rain depicts a disturbing childhood in the shadow of her celebrated father. Rain's memoir is a complicated all-American tale. Her home life was infused with drugs and sex; at age eight she sat down to Thanksgiving dinner with the words, "Daddy, the whores need to be paid." "Jokes My Father Never Taught Me" is both lovingly told and painfully frank: the story of a girl who grew up adoring her father even as she feared him - and feared for him, as his drug problems grew worse. In 1980, he was nearly killed in a "revolutionary suicide attempt. And in his later years, as he succumbed to multiple sclerosis, Rain saw her father reduced to watching the Comedy Channel for hours on end. Rain Pryor's book gives an unprecedented look at the life of a legend of comedy, told by a daughter who both understood the genius and knew the man.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Here's a rambling, warts-and-all look at life with Richard Pryor, the beloved comedy iconoclast whose public success masked a private life brimming with alcohol, drugs, violence and paranoia. Written by his 37-year-old daughter, this family biography chronicles her first meeting with her father at age four, Richard's role as a wayward family man (he had seven children by a number of different women), his struggle with MS, and his 2005 death. Amid less interesting snapshots of her own life-including her work as an actress-Pryor offers a bold but sympathetic portrait of her "misogynistic, mercurial, unpredictable, and violent" father that's as fascinating as it is conflicted: "That was life with Richard Pryor. Sex and violence, punctuated by rare moments of family happiness." In addition, Pryor takes readers behind the scenes of Richard's career; into the "weird sort of Richard Pryor Fan Club" made up of ex-wives, ex-girlfriends and their children; and down Richard's frightening path to debilitating illness. Vital, entertaining and appalling, Pryor has fleshed out a familiar dysfunctional family refrain-"It was a lot easier to love him if you didn't know him"-with bravery and wit.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Rain Pryor is an actor, singer, producer, and comedian. She and her father, Richard Pryor, are the only father and daughter ever to have headlined at the Comedy Store on Sunset Strip. As a young girl she was a regular on the hit ABC series Head of the Class, and she starred on the Showtimes series Rude Awakening and has performed in theater productions nationwide. Rain is most proud of the hit one-woman show she wrote and co-produced based on her own life, Fried Chicken and Latkes, for which she was nominated for four NAACP Theater Awards

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: HarperEntertainment; First Edition first Printing edition (October 31, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061195421
• ISBN-13: 978-0061195426
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,394,452 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't put it down...., December 19, 2006

By 

tkay (Tuscaloosa, Alabama) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jokes My Father Never Taught Me: Life, Love, and Loss with Richard Pryor (Hardcover)

I can't remember the last book I read that made me laugh as well as cry. This is a good'un: a must have for any Richard Pryor fan. And if you weren't a Rain Pryor fan before, you will be after reading this. I am proud of Rain and she should be proud of herself. She really did her thing on this one. She didn't hold back, she let it all out. This book is not sugar-coated at all. She's brutally honest just like her dad.

This book was so moving to me because I can relate to Rain in several different ways. My father was also abusive. My father abused alcohol and drugs and went on violent rampages. My father also believed that money was equivalent to an apology or an expression of love. Rain recalled that a good solid hug would have been much better than a new car. I can definitely relate to that. My father also ended up wheel-chair bound and died from a debilitating disease (Parkinson's). It's not easy watching someone you love deteriorate like that no matter how bad of a parent they were. And like Rain, no matter what my father did, I still loved him very much.

I know Richard is looking down on her beaming with pride. While he never recovered from his troubled childhood, she did. And she did it with grace and a forgiving spirit. Bless her heart, with two unstable parents, it's amazing what's she's done with her life. Though she dabbled with alcohol and drugs, she never became an addict. She was also blessed to find a good husband unlike many daughters of abusive fathers. Hats off to you Rain!

This book is definitely a page-turner, as a matter of fact, I didn't put it down once I started reading it. I read the whole thing in one sitting. An easy read, this book is also filled with some really nice photos. And the photos are not only in the middle of the book, they're placed here and there throughout the book which is very nice. There's a touching photo of Rain and her father taking a nap together. She looks just like her dad and she's funny just like him too.

This book also revealed Jennifer Lee's true colors. Jennifer was Richard's last wife, wife #5 and wife#7. I was convinced she really loved Richard, had forgiven him for the way he'd treated her and wanted to take care of him in his time of need. That would explain her marrying him when he was wheel-chair bound, nearly in a vegetative state and dependent on her for his survival, right? WRONG! She had dollar signs written all over her. I once admired her for trying to keep some dollars coming in for Richard. She helped to get his TV show released on DVD, she helped put together his 9 CD box set and she also appeared on his Comedy Central Special, "I Ain't Dead Yet." But I guess I didn't stop to think that by being his wife/caretaker, she got to cash some chips in too for herself. She did a good job handling Richard's business affairs but she was wrong for keeping him away from his children. She also had him change his will shortly before he died which left the bulk of his estate to her. Now I'm not saying she shouldn't have gotten anything, but she shouldn't get everything. Richard's daughter Elizabeth is contesting this in court. I hope she wins. Shame on you Jennifer.

If you're a fan of Richard or Rain, you won't be disappointed with this one. Rain has a beautiful spirit and like her father, she has a special way of touching people with her words. You go Rain!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Life with Pryor ain't no joke !, November 28, 2006

By 

a reader "bookreader" (Oakland, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jokes My Father Never Taught Me: Life, Love, and Loss with Richard Pryor (Hardcover)

Rain Pryor's book was hard to put down. As intimate as it was, I wanted even more details of her life, and I wanted to book to be longer. She inherited her Fathers incredible sence of humor, which I could not get enough of. Her strength and forgivness amazing me though. How can you forgive two Parents that were totally abusive in everyway ? Its tough, and Rain is one tough cookie ! In her book she describes Mamma , Richard Pryors Grandmother as teaching her that "Your Daddy beats you cuz he loves you" "Get over it" And she calls this good advice, was she serious or sarcastic ? I think accepting this kind of child abuse, perpetuates it.This scene was after Rain was sexually molested my a relative, and good ol' Richard stepped in to beat the hell out of Rain, for being molested ! "To teach her a lesson for flaunting her stuff " Richard Pryor being raised in a whorehouse run by this Mamma, he himself only saw sex and whoppin's, he had no chance. It fueled his true comic genius, sure, But, when is all this abuse going to stop? especially in the Black community, were Black comics think child Whoppin's are just hilarious? I see it everyday. Rain said "you have to let go", I agree, but until child abuse can be seen for what it is, Parents are going to get away with it, for cultural reasons. Rains Mother was the Mother from hell also, but she tried and admitted to Rain that she was "messed up" and on Richards death bed she told him Rain was the best we ever created, Rain heard this and it really helped her. Also one day close to the end Richard told Rain that he was so sorry for everything he put Rain through, and touchingly gave her, as an adult, a Teddy bear, his way of making amends.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Surprisingly good!, January 8, 2007

By 

Mom of 2 (Mission Viejo, CA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Jokes My Father Never Taught Me: Life, Love, and Loss with Richard Pryor (Hardcover)

Without even taking into account the quality of most "offspring of celebrity" books, this was a very good read! It was touching and insightful, not just a wild and shocking account of Richard's life. (which by all accounts would have filled a book easily) I would recommend it for anyone who likes entertainment/show business memoirs.