R.I.P. Richard Lewis, star of Curb Your Enthusiasm

Richard Lewis, the surly staple of the American stand-up comedian scene and an actor known for his 20-year-long role as Larry David’s best friend on Curb Your Enthusiasm, died of a heart attack last night at his home in Los Angeles, his publicist Jeff Abraham confirmed to Deadline. He was 76 years old.

Lewis’ declining health had long been a concern. In April 2023, Lewis shared his diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease, a condition he had been living with for years before he shared the news. He also shared that he was retiring from performing standup at the same time.

Rising to prominence in the 1970s, Lewis, dressed in his trademark black suits, became a regular on late-night talk shows and at brickwall comedy clubs. He did practically everything a comedian aspires to do: He became a television regular, appeared in hit movies, and left behind a legacy as one of America’s most revered stand-up comics, all without losing the cloud of darkness that hangs over his humor.

Lewis was, above all else, one of the most self-deprecating and neurotic stand-ups in mainstream comedy. Often seen gesticulating wildly on stage as he delivered a motor-mouthed recollection of a failed sexual experience, Lewis was a comic’s comic who appealed to mass audiences and turned his shortcomings into comedy with theretofore unspeakable frankness. Hunched over, running his fingers through his voluminous black mane and neurotically scratching and rubbing his forehead, Lewis offered angst-ridden musings on modern life and self-absorbed reflections on his failings. His ability to connect with an audience, playing the role of an overexplaining chum, remained one of his signatures across his astonishing 50-year career, like listening to a self-loathing sibling describe every minor difficulty that stood between him and the task at hand.

That darkness was no act. Lewis was never shy about his struggles with substance dependency. It was the subject of his 2000 memoir The Other Great Depression, which detailed his alcoholism and addiction to cocaine. In 1994, he overdosed on cocaine and ended up in the hospital. After that, he committed himself to sobriety.

As recently as two years ago, Lewis was expressing his gratitude for his decision to give up drugs and alcohol. “August 3, 1994, I thought that I was near death from alcoholism,” he tweeted in 2021. ”Early the next day, I was rushed to the ER and turned my life around a day, sometimes a minute at a time. If you’re struggling, you can get help. I did.”

Lewis was born on June 29, 1947, at the same Brooklyn hospital three days before long-time friend and co-star Larry David. Raised in Englewood, New Jersey, by his father, the co-owner of a catering business, and his mother, a community theater actor, he was the youngest of three children.

Though the pair were seemingly destined from birth to connect, Lewis didn’t officially meet David until he was 12. The pair attended summer camp together but were bitter rivals.

“We hated each other. He was an annoying, lanky, obnoxious basketball player,” Lewis told The Washington Post in 2020. “I was a better shooter.” (For his part, David disagrees. “I was a better player. I had more moves. I was harder to guard […] I could go left and right. And put up a jump shot. And I was a much better rebounder.”) The rivalry separated them for another decade until they both began doing stand-up in New York City.

Lewis began his stage career in 1971, joining a highly influential class of comedians, including Richard Belzer, George Carlin, Richard Pryor, and Lily Tomlin. After meeting comic David Brenner in New York, he began appearing on The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson, where he performed more than 20 times. His big break came in 1979 when NBC aired the made-for-TV mockumentary Diary Of A Young Comic, which slotted in for Saturday Night Live while the sketch show was on hiatus. The role parlayed into more opportunities, and Lewis became a regular on The Late Show With David Letterman and The Howard Stern Show.

By 1985, Lewis secured his first television comedy special, I’m In Pain, for Showtime. But after that, he hopped to a different premium cable channel, HBO, which hosted his three follow-up specials: 1988’s I’m Exhausted, 1990’s I’m Doomed, and 1997’s The Magical Misery Tour. The comedy specials were only part of Lewis’ connection to the Home Box Office. Appearing as Prince John in 1993’s Robin Hood: Men In Tights, the Mel Brooks parody introduced Lewis to a new generation of fans as the film aired regularly on HBO throughout the mid-1990s.

At the start of the new millennium, Lewis joined his longtime frenemy, Larry David, on Curb Your Enthusiasm, playing a fictionalized version of himself. By 2005, he was a vital part of the show’s alchemy, taking on a central role in season five as the unlucky recipient of David’s kidney. Though his health continued to waver, Lewis was a fixture of the show through its 12th and final season, which is currently airing.

“Richard and I were born three days apart in the same hospital, and for most of my life, he’s been like a brother to me,” David said in a statement on Wednesday. “He had that rare combination of being the funniest person and also the sweetest. But today, he made me sob, and for that, I’ll never forgive him.”

Among Lewis’ many accomplishments, he ranked 45 on “Comedy Central’s 100 Greatest Standups Of All Time.” He was also credited by Yale as coining the phrase “the [blank] from Hell.”

Lewis is survived by his wife, Joyce Lapinsky.