"I was roaming around Manhattan looking for work; in fact I had just come from an employment center in New York called 'Warren Street' where you can buy a part-time job for about ten bucks. On this particular day I didn't feel like delivering lunches, or pushing a dolly truck through lower Manhattan, so I went up to 42nd Street around Times Square, which at the time looked like a circus: porn theaters on one side of the street and b-movies on the other. I stopped before one particular theater and there were gangster photos all over the marquee. The movie must have cost about seventy-five cents, so I went in and sat down and saw On the Waterfront. I was so blown away after that day — it was Brando's performance that made me leave the streets to become an actor."— On when he decided to become an actor
Yaphet Frederick Kotto (November 15, 1939note Some sources say anything between 1937 and 1944 - March 15, 2021) was a prolific American film, TV and theatre actor.
He was well known for having broken down a number of Hollywood stereotypes about black characters. He is recognized by most audiences as a character actor who regularly commands the scenes he's in for his powerful performances. He was known to regularly turn down roles which are badly written stereotypically "black" parts, although he would on occasion have to do a film just to put food on the table. His breakout film was Nothing But a Man, which is now regarded as a classic.
He played the Big Bad in the James Bond film Live and Let Die,note A role which was originally stereotypically written (as most of the black roles in the film were) and which he managed to blow out of the water with his serious and human performance. Parker in Alien and Lieutenant Giardello in Homicide: Life on the Street.note In fact he has played a police chief so often, (and so well) throughout his career that he was named an honorary Police Captain at Frederick PD He also turned down the role of Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Lando in Star Wars,note For a time George Lucas was also considering him for the role of Han Solo. which he would later regard as a mistake.
He arguably kickstarted Blaxploitation cinema with his role as a killer in The Liberation of L. B. Jones, where he is shown onscreen killing a white character (which had not been seen previously in American cinema). Other blaxploitation films he appeared in are The Limit (1972)note Which he wrote, starred and directed because he wasn't getting the kind of roles he wanted to play. and Truck Turner (1974).note (Talking on the latter film) "He [Isaac Hayes] watched me do the death scene and that's all he talked about afterwards: "Man, you all see the way my man Yaphet did his death scene?" I can't take too much credit for that scene, I had seen it in The Young Lions with Marlon Brando and that gave me a skeleton to work from.
He was of Cameroonian descent on his father's side (the latter emigrated to the USA in the 1920s), and in fact he comes from a direct male-lineage of the Cameroon royalty (as described in his autobiography Royalty). Further, he claimed in his book that he was also a direct descendant of Queen Victoria. He was a practicing Jew, and spoke about experiencing both racism and antisemitism while growing up in The Bronx.
His latest work was providing the voice for Parker in Alien: Isolation. He was also a member of the Academy.
His wife announced his passing on March 15, 2021.
Works he appeared in with pages on TV Tropes:
- Nothing But a Man (1964) as Jocko
- 5 Card Stud (1968) as George "Little George"
- The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) as Carl
- Live and Let Die (1973) as Kananga/Mr. Big
- Blue Collar (1976) as John "Smokey" James
- Alien (1979) as Parker note "I liked Sigourney Weaver from the moment I met her. Ridley told me "No, no, don't start cozying up with Sigourney". He wanted me to annoy the crap out of her, which I did. He told me to get on Sigourney's nerves; stop speaking to her on the lunch breaks, dressing rooms, etc. All for the end of the movie at that moment when she blows up at (me) "Parker" and takes over leadership. I did exactly as Ridley told me. To this day, I don't know if he ever told her. I will never let a director do that to me again! I asked him when I saw him in Canada at their film festival and the release of the Director's Cut and I don’t think he had."
- Brubaker (1980) as Richard Coombes
- Warning Sign (1985) as Colonel Morse
- The Running Man (1987) as William Laughlin
- Midnight Run (1988) as Alonzo Mosely note "...But Marty Brest! "Herr Director" shot so many takes of the scenes that I lost all joy in doing the film. ...I was shocked when it came off so funny... It sure wasn't funny making it."
- Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991)
- Homicide: Life on the Street (1993–1999) as Lieutenant Al Giardello note "I felt like I was a beggar doing Homicide. Begging to act. Begging for scenes. The writing was not obviously for me. It mainly focused on others. I went from a movie star playing leads to a bit player doing one line here and one line there. The rest of the week I would be hanging around Fells Point waiting to come in and do my one line. When I asked if they could write more for me to do, they'd say "You're doing great. You're the anchor of the show." "Anchor? I'm an actor, let me out!" I finally ended up writing for the show and gave myself something to do… Nine years of not acting."
- Homicide: The Movie (2000) as Lieutenant Al Giardello
