by Showtime aired Richard Pryor’s 1982 stand-up concert film, Live on the Sunset Strip, early this morning, and when you watch it 25 years later, you cannot help but notice how raw he was — five years before Eddie Murphy called his concert special "Raw" — in dealing with his fame and his personal troubles onstage. Also, watching the camera spot the Rev. Jesse Jackson laughing in the front row, a mere year or two before he’d pursue his presidential aspirations, you remember that he was just like you or me first, a guy who likes to laugh at brutally funny material.
The next Richard Pryor concert screening on cable comes Saturday on Cinemax (his 1979 special filmed in Long Beach, Calif.).
