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Samuel "Sam" Burl Kinison (December 8, 1953 – April 10, 1992) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. Kinison was infamous for his extremely vitriolic humor. A former revival-style preacher, he performed stand-up routines that were most often characterized by intense ranting punctuated by his trademark ("primal") scream.
in Yakima, Washington, Kinison was the son of a Pentecostal preacher.
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Quotations
YOU FUCKING WHORE!!! You used me! You never loved me! I hope you slide under a gas truck and taste your own blood! DIE! DIE! DIE! I want my records back! I want my fucking records back!
Louder Than Hell.
Encyclopedia
Samuel "Sam" Burl Kinison (December 8, 1953 – April 10, 1992) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. Kinison was infamous for his extremely vitriolic humor. A former revival-style preacher, he performed stand-up routines that were most often characterized by intense ranting punctuated by his trademark ("primal") scream.
Early life
Born in Yakima, Washington, Kinison was the son of a Pentecostal preacher. His father pastored several churches around the country, receiving little income. Sam later attended high school in East Peoria, Illinois. He also lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma for a while with his parents. He followed in his father's footsteps as a Pentecostal preacher before becoming a comedian. Recordings of his sermons reveal that he used a "fire and brimstone" style, punctuated with shouts similar to the ones he would later use in his stand-up routines. He attended Pinecrest Bible Training Center in Salisbury Center, New York. He was forced to leave preaching when he divorced his first wife, at which time he took up comedy as a profession.
Career
Kinison's appearance on HBO's Rodney Dangerfield's Ninth Annual Young Comedians Special in the summer of 1984 is widely considered to be his breakthrough performance. Later, during Kinison's appearance on Late Night with David Letterman, Letterman's introduction of Kinison warned his audience: "Brace yourselves. I'm not kidding. Please welcome Sam Kinison."
Kinison played on his former role as a Bible-preaching evangelist, taking satirical and sacrilegious shots at The Bible, Christianity and famous Christian evangelist scandals of his day. Kinison's daring comedy helped shoot him to stardom. On several videos of his stand-up routines, a shot of his personalized license plate reveals the words "EX REV," a play-on term standing for "ex reverend."
Kinison was associated with the Los Angeles rock music scene and was occasionally accompanied by a touring band. He also gained a reputation as having a prodigious appetite for drugs and alcohol.
In 1988, Kinison recorded a novelty version of The Troggs' "Wild Thing." The record didn't make the Billboard Hot 100, but the video was a hit on MTV, as it featured cameos of Rodney Dangerfield, as well as many well-known rock musicians, including Steven Tyler and Joe Perry from Aerosmith, Slash, Billy Idol, Steve Vai, Dweezil Zappa, Richie Sambora, and Tommy Lee, and a raunchy "roll on the mat" dance with Jessica Hahn. In the video, Kinison played a custom Kramer guitar with a skull identical to the design used by Nikki Sixx on one of his Kramer bass guitars during the Girls, Girls, Girls era.
During one notable The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson performance, he delivered what began as a straightforward version of Elvis Presley's Are You Lonesome Tonight, which descended into angry ranting during the spoken breakdown, and then segueing back into a straightforward sung ending.
Some of Kinison's most spontaneous moments came during his frequent appearances on The Howard Stern Show. He made an angry phone call on-air to Bobcat Goldthwait, and he embarrassed comedienne Judy Tenuta to the point of driving her off the show. His most notorious stunt resulted in an on-air feud with Stern: he made an on-air promise to bring to the show members of the band Bon Jovi, with whom Stern was feuding, but they did not show up, nor did Kinison. Stern's reaction was swift and vindictive, and Kinison eventually apologized, but not before comedian Gilbert Gottfried and Stern savaged an emotionally charged phone call between Stern and Kinison, in which both stars used the words "man" and "dude" so often that the playback was used as a bit on the show.
Stern and Kinison eventually made up and paired on Stern's pay-per-view special, U.S. Open Sores. In the mid-1990s, Stern purchased the movie rights to Kinison's biography 'reported that HBO would make Brother Sam with Kinison being played by Dan Fogler.
In 1991, Kinison starred in the Fox Network TV show Charlie Hoover, in which he played the inner voice of the title character, appearing as a 12" man. The show lasted only seven episodes before being canceled.
Death
Six days after he married his girlfriend Malika Souiri, Sam Kinison was killed when his white 1989 Pontiac Turbo Trans Am was struck on U.S. Route 95, four miles (6 km) north of Interstate 40 and several miles west of Needles, California, by a pickup truck driven by an intoxicated 17-year-old male.
His wife survived the accident. Kinison was later found to have traces of cocaine, prescription tranquilizers, and codeine in his bloodstream.
Kinison is interred with family members at the Memorial Park Cemetery in Tulsa, Oklahoma. His grave marker gives his full name, the dates of birth and death, and an unattributed quote, "In another time and place he would have been called prophet."
Trivia
Kinison made an appearance on Married With Children as an angel during a Christmas episode.
- In Pauly Shore's movie Pauly Shore Is Dead, the closing shot is an epitaph to Kinison. Kinison also "appears" several times in the movie to give Pauly advice; Kinison's voice was provided by Craig Gass.
- In the early 1980s, Blackie Lawless was so inspired by Kinison's routine at the Troubadour that he proceeded to write the lyrics for the debut single of W.A.S.P., Animal (Fuck Like a Beast), based on it.
- Heavy metal band Anthrax sampled one of Kinison's famous screams in their 1987 song "I'm the Man".
- Kinison had a fierce rivalry with fellow stand-up Andrew Dice Clay. In his special Family Entertainment Hour, he tells a member of the audience to take off his Dice t-shirt.
- Actor and filmmaker Kevin Smith has said he is a big fan of Kinison. He loosely based the appearance of his character Silent Bob on Kinison.
- Rapper Esham samples Kinison on the song "How Do I Plead to Homicide," off his album Judgement Day.
Discography
- Louder Than Hell (1986)
- Have You Seen Me Lately? (1988)
- Leader of the Banned (1990)
- Live From Hell (1993)
Filmography
TV work
- Rodney Dangerfield: It's Not Easy Bein' Me (1986)
- Married with Children, plays Al's Guardian Angel (1989)
External links
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