News / Entertainment
Comedian Richard Jeni Dead from Self-Inflicted Gunshot
Richard Jeni, the popular stand-up comedian who appeared in several movies and was a regular on the “Tonight Show,” died from an apparent suicide on Saturday.
Los Angeles police received a call from Jeni’s girlfriend in which she said that her boyfriend had “just shot himself in the face.”
Jeni, 49, was rushed to a nearby hospital but died shortly after arrival.
In 1990 Jeni broke onto the national scene with his Showtime channel special, Richard Jeni: The Boy from New York. From there he was a favorite of both Johnny Carson and Jay Leno on the “Tonight Show” and appeared in several movies including “The Mask” and “Burn, Hollywood, Burn.”
He won a Cable ACE award in 1992 for his stand-up routine “Platypus Man,” a routine that inspired a TV series of the same name.
Jeni went on to write for Chris Rock and several other high profile comedians.
