Damon Kyle Wayans ( ; born
September 4, 1960) is an American
stand-up comedian, writer and actor, known as one
of the popular Wayans brothers.
Biography
Early life
Wayans was
born in New York
City
, New
York
, the son of Elvira, a homemaker and social worker,
and Howell Wayans, a supermarket
manager. He has five sisters, Elvira, Vonnie,
Nadia,
Kim, Diedre,
and four brothers, actors
Marlon
Wayans,
Keenen Ivory Wayans,
Shawn Wayans, and
Dwayne Wayans. He had a
clubbed foot as a child. This attribute would also
be given to his character in
My Wife
& Kids and his character on the cartoon series
Waynehead.
Wayans attended Murry Bergtraum
High School
.
Career
Damon started doing stand-up comedy in 1982. His earliest film
appearance was a brief cameo as an effeminate hotel employee in the
1984
Eddie Murphy film
Beverly Hills Cop. He was briefly on
Saturday Night Live as
a featured performer, before getting fired for playing his
character as a flamboyant
gay cop instead of a
straight cop. In the
SNL book
Live
From New York, it was stated that Wayans did this largely due
to growing frustrations that his sketches were not being considered
for the show and increasing stress. He also appeared in the
syndicated TV series
Solid
Gold during the 1980s as a
stand-up comedian. After that, he went on to
do the TV-show
In Living
Color from 1990 to 1992, part of a team that was nominated
for
Emmy Awards all three years.
After
In Living Color, he starred in films such as
The Last Boy Scout,
Major Payne and
The Great White Hype and wrote and
starred in the film
Blankman. In
1996, he produced
Waynehead, a
cartoon for the
WB,
loosely based on his own childhood growing up in a large family,
starring a poor boy with a club foot. The show only lasted a season
due to poor ratings. From 1997 to 1998, he was the executive
producer of
413 Hope St., a
short-lived drama on the
FOX
network starring
Richard
Roundtree and
Jesse L. Martin.
In 1998,
he starred in a short-lived comedy titled Damon, in which he played a Chicago
detective. It aired on
FOX. In 1999, his
New York Times bestselling book
Bootleg with co-author David Asbery was published; it is a
humorous compilation of his observations about family.
In 2005, Damon Wayans was in a celebrity ad campaign for
Hanes.
In 2006, he began starring in
The Underground, a
sketch comedy series on
Showtime. His son,
Damon, Jr. also stars on the show.
Wayans appears in
Janet Jackson's
video "
The Best Things
in Life Are Free" and was considered for the role of
The Riddler in
Batman Forever (the role went to
Jim Carrey, his co-star from
In
Living Color and
Earth
Girls Are Easy).
He hosted the 2006 BET
Awards which was held at the Shrine Auditorium
in Los Angeles, California
on June 27, 2006.
In May 2008, Wayans was highlighted by the media for the production
of a controversial video titled, "Abortion Man". This viral video
portrays a young man in need of killing the unborn child of his
pregnant girlfriend and thus calls upon Abortion Man for aid.
Abortion Man (portrayed as a super hero) then finds the pregnant
girl and proceeds to knee, punch and stomp the girls stomach until
the fetus flies out. Some sources hold that this video is satire
and is an attempt to show the violence and cruelty of abortion
while other sources think the video is simply a product of Wayans'
distorted sense of humor.
For his outstanding role in the ABC comedy series
My Wife and Kids, Wayans earned 4
International Press Academy "Golden Satellite Award" nominations
and 4
Emmy awards nominations for his
acting and directing in the 90's series "In Living Color".
Personal life
Wayans was married to Lisa Thorner, however they divorced in 2000.
He is the father of
Damon Wayans,
Jr.,
Michael Wayans,
Cara Mia Wayans, and
Kyla Wayans. He is also the uncle of
Damien Dante Wayans and
Craig Wayans.
Wayans is a close friend of
NBA legend
Michael Jordan.
He won the People's Choice Awards for Favorite Male
Performer.
In Living Color
Characters
- Anton Jackson, a gross, drunken homeless man who hosts his own
home-repair show and pops up in places where he shouldn't be (It
should be noted that his Anton Jackson character sounds like his
character, Ned Jones, from the SNL recurring sketch, The Jones Brothers
).
- Blaine Edwards, one of the flamboyantly gay film critics in the
Men On... series (this character and Anton Jackson were
the only In Living Color recurring characters Wayans played when he
hosted Saturday Night Live on an episode from the 1994-1995
season)
- Handi Man, a mentally and physically disabled superhero
- Head Detective, a police detective who was rebuilt to look like
Mr. Potato Head after an accident
- Homey D. Clown, a surly ex-con who performs as a kids'
party clown as part of his parole agreement (written by Paul Mooney)
- Les (Les and Wes)
- Oswald Bates, a hyperliterate convict prone to malapropisms
- The Wiz, a thief who runs the Homeboy Shopping Network, an
operation for fencing stolen goods, with Iceman (played by Keenen
Ivory Wayans)
- Tom Brothers (The Brothers Brothers)
- Reverend Ed Cash (partnered with Dr. Reverend Carl Pethos,
played by Jim Carrey. Both were con
artist preachers)
- Blankman (1994 comedy film Blankman)
Impressions
Filmography
References
- You say it how?
- Shawn Wayans Biography (1971-)
- Marlon Wayans - TIME
- The Movie Chicks - Interview - Marlon Wayans
- Damon Wayans Biography - Yahoo! Movies
- CNN Interview with Damon Wayans
External links
Wikis
Quiz
Facts
Map
Search