Michael Richards

Richards worked across stand-up comedian, actor, film producer, screenwriter and singer and 4 further recorded occupations. This article rests on 1 catalogued composition, 72 published texts and 26 scholarly references drawn from named institutional registers. Every statement below returns to a source shown in the evidence panel; where the record is silent or divided, the article says so instead of resolving it.

• Name — Michael Richards • Birth Name — Michael Anthony Richards • Born — 24 July 1949 • Birthplace — Culver City, California, U.S. • Occupation — * Actor • comedian • Years Active — 1979–present • Education — Los Angeles Valley College California Institute of the Arts The Evergreen State College (BA) • Children — 2

• Illustration — Richards as a senior at Thousand Oaks High School in Thousand Oaks, California (1967) Richards was born in Culver City, California, to a Catholic family. He is the son of Phyllis (née Nardozzi), a medical records librarian. As a child, Richards was told his father was William Richards, an electrical engineer, who died in a car crash when Michael was two. He later learned his mother's pregnancy was the result of a sexual assault and that she considered abortion and adoption before deciding to raise him as a single mother. Richards was also raised by a grandmother who suffered from schizophrenia. Richards graduated from Thousand Oaks High School. In 1968, he appeared as a contestant on The Dating Game but was not chosen for a date. He was drafted into the United States Army in 1970. He trained as a medic and was stationed in West Germany, where he was a member of a theatrical group called The Training Road Show. He became interested in performing after taking a theatrical class in seventh grade. After being honorably discharged, Richards used the benefits of the G.I. Bill to enroll in the California Institute of the Arts and earned a Bachelor of Arts in drama from the Evergreen State College in 1975. He also had a short-lived improv act with Ed Begley Jr. During this period, he enrolled at Los Angeles Valley College and continued to appear in student productions.

• Illustration — Richards in 1983 Richards got his big TV break in 1979, appearing in Billy Crystal's first cable TV special. In 1980, he began as one of the cast members on ABC's Fridays television show, where Larry David was a fellow cast member and writer. It included a famous instance in which Andy Kaufman refused to deliver his scripted lines, leading Richards to bring the cue cards on screen to Kaufman, who responded by throwing his drink into Richards's face, causing a small riot (Richards later claimed he was in on the joke). The film Man on the Moon featured a re-enactment of the Andy Kaufman incident where Richards was portrayed by actor Norm Macdonald. In 1981, he appeared in the It's a Living episode "Desperate Hours". In 1986, Richards had a minor role in the cult satirical TV miniseries Fresno, playing one of a pair of inept criminal henchmen. That same year he auditioned to play Al Bundy in the TV series Married... with Children, but he was passed over for Ed O'Neill. In 1989, Richards had a supporting role in "Weird Al" Yankovic's comedy film UHF as janitor Stanley Spadowski. On television, he appeared in Miami Vice as an unscrupulous bookie; in St. Elsewhere as a television producer making a documentary about Dr. Mark Craig; in Cheers as a character trying to collect on an old bet with Sam Malone; and made several guest appearances with Jay Leno as an accident-prone fitness expert.

• Illustration — Richards with Jerry Seinfeld at the 44th Primetime Emmy Awards in 1992 In 1989, Richards was cast as Cosmo Kramer in the NBC television series Seinfeld, created by fellow Fridays cast member Larry David and comedian Jerry Seinfeld. Although it got off to a slow start, by the mid-1990s it had become one of the most popular sitcoms in television history. It ended its nine-year run in 1998 at No. 1 in the Nielsen ratings. In Seinfeld, Kramer is the neighbor across the hall of the show's eponymous character, and is usually referred to only by his last name. His first name, Cosmo, was revealed in the sixth-season episode "The Switch". Richards won more Emmys than any other Seinfeld cast member, taking home the award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series in 1993, 1994, and 1997 for his role as Kramer. When referring to speculation that he would launch a spin-off to Seinfeld about Kramer, Richards said he was not interested in doing so. During the run of Seinfeld, Richards made cameo appearances in several TV shows; he played himself in Episode2 of Season1 "The Flirt Episode" (1992) of the HBO series The Larry Sanders Show. He also had a cameo role in the comedy thriller film So I Married an Axe Murderer, credited as "insensitive man". In 1996, Richards made a cameo in Epcot's Ellen's Energy Adventure, where he portrayed a caveman discovering fire. He played radio station employee Doug Beech in Airheads, and co-starred with Jeff Daniels as an actor pretending to be a lawyer in 1997's Trial and Error. He also made guest appearances on Miami Vice, Night Court and Cheers. In 2000, two years after the end of Seinfeld, Richards began work on a new series for NBC, his first major project since Seinfelds finale. The Michael Richards Show, for which Richards received co-writer and co-executive producer credits, was conceived as a comedy/mystery starring Richards as a bumbling private investigator. When the first pilot failed with test audiences, NBC ordered that the show be retooled into a more conventional, office-based sitcom before its premiere. After a few weeks of poor ratings and negative reviews, it was canceled. Critics said the show was too "Kramer-esque" and Richards invoked the so-called "Seinfeld curse" as to why the show failed. According to an interview with executive producer David Hoberman, ABC first conceived the series Monk with Richards in mind for the titular role; an Inspector Clouseau–like character suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder. Richards ultimately turned down the role. Starting in 2004, he and his fellow Seinfeld cast members provided interviews and audio commentaries for the Seinfeld DVDs. Richards stepped down from providing audio commentary after Season5, though he continued to provide interviews.

During a performance on November 17, 2006, at the Laugh Factory in Los Angeles, Richards launched into a rant using racist epithets and remarks in response to repeated heckling and interruptions from a small group of Black and Hispanic audience members. Richards was recorded shouting "He's a nigger!" several times and making references to lynching, Planet of the Apes, and Jim Crow laws. Kyle Doss, a member of the group that Richards addressed, said the group had arrived in the middle of the performance and were "being a little loud". According to Doss: The incident remained unknown to the larger public for three days until a cellphone video filmed by a member of the audience was obtained and released by TMZ. On November 20, after the video made rounds around the news, Jerry Seinfeld invited Richards to appear via satellite during a broadcast of the Late Show with David Letterman, where Richards was recorded saying: "I'm not doing too good. I lost my temper on stage, I was at a comedy club trying to do my act and I got heckled and I took it badly and went into a rage. And uh, said some pretty, uh, nasty things to some Afro-Americans." Many studio audience members, thinking Richards was performing a bit, laughed as he gave his explanation and apology, leading Seinfeld to reprimand them, saying: "Stop laughing. It's not funny." Richards said he had been trying to defuse the heckling by being even more outrageous but it had backfired. He later called civil rights leaders Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson to apologize. He also appeared as a guest on Jackson's syndicated radio show. Doss stated that he did not accept Richards's apology, saying: "If he wanted to apologize, he could have contacted... one of us out of the group. But he didn't. He apologized on-camera just because the tape got out." Richards's popularity among the general public declined after the tape was released. A Gallup poll conducted in late November found that only 41 percent of Americans still held a favorable view of Richards. By contrast, other Seinfeld cast members' favorability ratings were in the 70s and 80s. The same poll also found that 45 percent of non-whites expressed a negative view of Richards due to the incident. The incident was parodied on several TV shows, including Mad TV, Family Guy, South Park, Extras, Monday Night Raw and Smiling Friends. In the ninth episode of the seventh season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Richards appeared as himself and poked fun at the incident. In 2008, rapper Wale referenced the incident and used recordings of the incident as well as Richards's apology, in the song "The Kramer" on The Mixtape About Nothing album. One year after the incident, Richards voiced the character Bud Ditchwater in the animated film Bee Movie, which starred and was produced by Jerry Seinfeld. In 2009, Richards and the other main Seinfeld cast members appeared in the seventh season of Curb Your Enthusiasm. In 2012, he appeared in the comedy web series Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, hosted by Seinfeld, in which he remarked on the 2006 incident. In the episode, Richards explained that the outburst still haunted him and was a major reason for his retirement from stand-up.

In 2013, Richards was cast to play Frank in the sitcom Kirstie, costarring Kirstie Alley and Rhea Perlman. It premiered on TV Land on December 4, 2013 and was canceled after one season. In 2014, Richards appeared as the president of Crackle in a trailer for Season5 of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. In 2019, Richards played Daddy Hogwood in the romantic comedy Faith, Hope & Love starring Peta Murgatroyd and Robert Krantz. In June 2024, Richards released a memoir titled Entrances and Exits.

Richards and his first wife, a family therapist, were married for 18 years. They have one daughter, born in 1975. They separated in 1992 and divorced the following year. Through their daughter, Richards has two grandchildren. In 2010, Richards married Beth Skipp, his girlfriend of eight years. They have one son, born in 2011. Richards is a Freemason. Richards revealed in his 2024 memoir Entrances and Exits that he survived stage 1 prostate cancer in 2018 via the surgical removal of his entire prostate.

• Year — Title — Role — Notes • 1980–1982 — Fridays — Various roles — 54 episodes; also writer • 1982 — Faerie Tale Theatre — King Geoffeey — Episode: "The Tale of the Frog Prince" • 1983 — Herndon — Dr. Herndon P. Stool — Television film • 1984 — Faerie Tale Theatre — Vince — Episode: "Pinocchio" • At Your Service — Rick the gardener — Television film • Night Court — Eugene Sleighbough — Episode: "Take My Wife, Please" • The Ratings Game — Sal — Television film • 1984–1985 — St. Elsewhere — Bill Wolf — 5 episodes • 1985 — Tall Tales & Legends — Sneaky Pete — Episode: "My Darlin' Clementine" • Cheers — Eddie Gordon — Episode: "Bar Bet" • Scarecrow and Mrs. King — Petronus — Episode: "Car Wars" • Slickers — Mike Blade — Television film • It's a Living — Hager — Episode: "Desperate Hours" • Hill Street Blues — Special Agent Durpe — Episode: "An Oy for an Oy" • 1986 — Miami Vice — Pagone — Episode: "The Fix" • A Year in the Life — Ronnie — 3 episodes • Fresno — 2nd henchman — 5 episodes • 1987 — Jonathan Winters: On the Ledge — Various roles — Television special • 1987–1988 — Marblehead Manor — Rick — 11 episodes • 1989 — Camp MTV — Stanley Spadowski — Television film • 1989–1998 — Seinfeld — Cosmo Kramer — Main role; 178 episodes|178 episodes • 1992 — Dinosaurs — Director — Voice Episode: "Wesayso Knows Best" • Mad About You — Cosmo Kramer — Episode: "The Apartment" • The Larry Sanders Show — Himself — Episode: "The Flirt Episode" • 1996 — London Suite — Mark Ferris — Television film • 2000 — David Copperfield — Mr. Wilkins Micawber — Television film • The Michael Richards Show — Vic Nardozza — 7 episodes; also co-creator, writer, and executive producer • 2009 — Curb Your Enthusiasm — Michael Richards — 3 episodes • 2012–2014 — Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee — Himself / Dick Corcoran — 4 episodes • 2013–2014 — Kirstie — Frank — 12 episodes

Michael Richards was born on 24 July 1949 in Culver City.

• Year — Association — Category — Performance — Result — References • 1995 — American Comedy Awards — Funniest Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture — Unstrung Heroes • 1995 — Funniest Supporting Male in a Television Series — Seinfeld • 1996 — Funniest Supporting Male in a Television Series • 1993 — Primetime Emmy Awards — Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (episode: "The Junior Mint" + "The Watch") • 1994 — Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (episode: "The Sniffing Accountant" + "The Opposite") • 1995 — Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (episode: "The Jimmy" + "The Fusilli Jerry") • 1996 — Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (episode: "The Pool Guy" + "The Wait Out") • 1997 — Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (episode: "The Chicken Roaster") • 1997 — Satellite Award — Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy — Seinfeld • 1994 — Screen Actors Guild Awards — Outstanding Ensemble in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (season 6) • 1995 — Outstanding Ensemble in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (season 7) • Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series • 1996 — Outstanding Ensemble in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (season 8) • Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series • 1997 — Outstanding Ensemble in a Comedy Series — Seinfeld (season 9) • Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series