Richard Roundtree

Richard Roundtree

Birth : 1942-07-09, New Rochelle, New York, USA

Death : 2023-10-24

History

Richard Roundtree (July 9, 1942 – October 24, 2023) was an American actor. Roundtree was noted as being "the first black action hero" for his portrayal of private detective John Shaft in the 1971 film Shaft, and its four sequels, released between 1972 and 2019. For his performance in the original film, Roundtree was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actor in 1972. Description above from the Wikipedia article Richard Roundtree, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Profile

Richard Roundtree
Richard Roundtree
Richard Roundtree
Richard Roundtree
Richard Roundtree

Movies

Moving On
Ralph
Two old friends reconnect at their friend's funeral, and decide to exact revenge on the widower who wronged all three of them decades earlier.
A Choice of Weapons: Inspired by Gordon Parks
Self
This documentary chronicles renaissance man Gordon Parks’ stellar career from staff photographer for LIFE magazine, through his artistic development photographing everyday Americans, through his evolution as a novelist and groundbreaking filmmaker.
Haunting of the Mary Celeste
Tulls
Rachel, a concerned researcher, and her team have set out to sea to prove that the disappearance of a family and crew from a merchant ship was for reasons having to do with the supernatural. Her theory that those on the Mary Celeste vanished into a "rift" between dimensions proves true as the boat breaks down and her crew begins to vanish one by one.
A Family Reunion Christmas
Grandpa
M'Dear and her sisters struggle to keep their singing act together before a church Christmas pageant while Grandpa teaches the kids a valuable lesson.
Shaft
John Shaft, Sr.
JJ, aka John Shaft Jr., may be a cyber security expert with a degree from MIT, but to uncover the truth behind his best friend’s untimely death, he needs an education only his dad can provide. Absent throughout JJ’s youth, the legendary locked-and-loaded John Shaft agrees to help his progeny navigate Harlem’s heroin-infested underbelly.
What Men Want
Skip Davis
Magically able to hear what men are thinking, a sports agent uses her newfound ability to turn the tables on her overbearing male colleagues.
Collar
Alonzo Sparks
While his life begins to crumble, TJ Williams's fast fading future is bartered for political gain by his former best friend and boss, a mayor with her eye on a Senate seat and an ambitious activist reverend.
Django Unchained
Thanks
With the help of a German bounty hunter, a freed slave sets out to rescue his wife from a brutal Mississippi plantation owner.
Retreat!
Henshaw
Inspired by war films from the 1950's, Retreat! tells the story of nine U.S. Soldiers who were forced to retreat into unknown territories deep in the heart of Korea.
The Confidant
Claude
The feature weaves an intricate tale about childhood best-friends that have an unusually strong bond and a more intriguing secret. Both young men are on the right path to promising futures, a first round NFL draft pick, and a talented art major on a full scholarship. A complicated web of lies, gambling, murder and a pact between friends sends an innocent friend to prison and the other to fame. After spending eleven years in prison, the innocent comes to collect a debt and is determined to have the life he was promised... by any means necessary.
Whatever She Wants
Theodore Wolf
Whatever She Wants is the story about one woman s determination to rediscover who she really is... Vivian Wolf (Vivica A. Fox) has suffered one heartbreak too many and has no room left for unfulfilling relationships. Now she has come up with the solution to every woman s problem, a private club called Whatever She Wants where men have to qualify to get in.
Diary of a Single Mom
Lou Bailey
Ocean (Monica Calhoun), a 27-year-old highly-motivated mother has found her calling in managing a neighborhood apartment building along with the residents and the problems found within. As she struggles with a new job, a new home, her own children, a difficult niece, and the issues of other tenants, all within learn something about taking action and using compassion in their own lives.
Set Apart
J.T.
Four troubled, inner city kids get a western-style shot at redemption when a cowboy pastor invites them to his country ranch and offers them a chance to put their lives in perspective. Korina, Rey, Anthony, and Marcus all grew up on the streets. Every decision they make in that volatile environment could affect the rest of their lives. Pastor John Gunn (John Schneider) runs the Power Company Kids' ministry, an organization dedicated to giving at-risk kids the tools they need to build brighter futures. He's convinced that the four teens would benefit from going back to the basics and experiencing the cowboy lifestyle, and with a little help from ranch owners Randy and Heidi Gunn, Pastor Gunn shows the kids that there's much more to life than hustling on the streets. Though reluctant to participate at first, the kids quickly adjust to their new surroundings as their eyes are opened to a whole new world of opportunity.
Ladies of the House
Stan
When three women are asked to refurbish a house for their church, they find that they must break down their own self-perception in order to build something together.
Final Approach
Gary Markash
FBI hostage rescue team leader Jack Bender has been sacked for not being a team player, and months later he finds himself in the ultimate hostage nightmare: stuck aboard a plane that's been taken over by a group of well-armed terrorists who threaten to detonate a nuclear weapon unless they receive a billion dollars
Speed Racer
Ben Burns
Speed Racer is the tale of a young and brilliant racing driver. When corruption in the racing leagues costs his brother his life, he must team up with the police and the mysterious Racer X to bring an end to the corruption and criminal activities. Inspired by the cartoon series.
Point of Entry
Miles Porter
A young woman named Katherine Alden becomes the unwanted victim of her new handsome next door neighbor Caleb, after her and her husband and son moves to a new town for a fresh start from a robbery.
Brick
Assistant V.P. Trueman
A teenage loner pushes his way into the underworld of a high school crime ring to investigate the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend.
Wild Seven
Lee Marvin
In this darkly karmic vision of Arizona, a man who breathes nothing but ill will begins a noxious domino effect as quickly as an uncontrollable virus kills. As he exits Arizona State Penn after twenty-one long years, Wilson has only one thing on the brain, leveling the score with career criminal, Mackey Willis.
Painkiller Jane
Colonel Watts
Jane, a young soldier, is exposed to a biochemical weapon that endows her with self-healing powers. She uses her abilities to fight crime while eluding the military.
Max Havoc: Curse Of The Dragon
Tahsi
A former kickboxer returns to his fighting ways when he encounters a gang in Guam.
Vegas Vampires
Rick Apping
A series of brutal murders at several top nightclubs have left the Las Vegas police department baffled. But when they discover that the killers are a group of bloodsucking vampires led by Q (Alex Wilkinson), it's everything they can do to prevent the information from reaching the public.
Men Cry in the Dark
The future has never looked better for Derrick Reed. Bachelorhood is great, he has a group of guys he can really call friends, and he's the publisher of a magazine that he named after his philosophy of life, Happily Single. Little does Derrick know, appearing on Atlanta's hottest radio station morning talk show to promote his new magazine, he is about to go on a whirl-wind ride, which will eventually take him to the heart of a woman who will change his life forever. He finds the perfect woman and the perfect reason to stop womanizing and make a commitment. This mystery woman is about to have a lasting impact on Derrick's life by changing the way he thinks and feels about women and relationships.
Boat Trip
Felicia's Dad
Two guys whose love lives are a wreck look forward to finding ladies on the high seas. Unfortunately, they've mistakenly been booked on a gay cruise.
BaadAsssss Cinema
Self
With archive film clips and interviews, this brief look at a frequently overlooked historical period of filmmaking acts as an introduction rather than a complete record. It features interviews with some of the genre's biggest stars, like Fred Williamson, Pam Grier, and Richard Roundtree. Director Melvin Van Peebles discusses the historical importance of his landmark film Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song. For a contemporary perspective, the excitable Quentin Tarantino offers his spirited commentary and author/critic bell hooks provides some scholarly social analysis.
Al's Lads
Boom-Boom
Three Englishmen working as waiters on a cruise ship in 1927 are given a chance to work for the Al Capone gang.
Joe and Max
Jack Blackburn
True story of boxers Joe Louis and Max Schmeling and their enduring friendship.
Hawaiian Gardens
M.O.
A romantic drama/detective story about big-time copyright fraud and a bigger-time crush. A complicated love triangle plays out to a dramatic climax, taking us from a strip mall somewhere in the glaring dust of Los Angeles County to a dark forest in Germany.
Corky Romano
Howard Shuster
Corky Romano is a bumbling, simpleton, veterinarian and the youngest, outcast son of an aging gangster, named Pops Romano, who calls upon Corky to infiltrate the local FBI and retrieve and destroy evidence being used to incriminate Pops for racketeering charges.
Antitrust
Lyle Barton
A computer programmer's dream job at a hot Portland-based firm turns nightmarish when he discovers his boss has a secret and ruthless means of dispatching anti-trust problems.
Shaft
"Uncle" John Shaft
New York police detective John Shaft arrests Walter Wade Jr. for a racially motivated slaying. But the only eyewitness disappears, and Wade jumps bail for Switzerland. Two years later Wade returns to face trial, confident his money and influence will get him acquitted -- especially since he's paid a drug kingpin to kill the witness.
Steel
Uncle Joe
When a renegade military reject puts new superweapons in dangerous hands, John Henry Irons becomes Steel. Wearing body armor, wielding a fearsome electrohammer and riding a gadget-packed motorcycle, he's ready to wage war... if he can fix the untimely glitches in his untested gear.
George of the Jungle
Kwame
Deep in the African jungle, a baby named George, the sole survivor of a plane crash, is raised by gorillas. George grows up to be a buff and lovable klutz who has a rain forest full of animal friends: Tookie, his big-beaked toucan messenger; Ape, a witty talking gorilla; and Shep, a peanut-loving pooch of an elephant. But when poachers mess with George's pals, the King Of Swing swings into action.
Any Place But Home
Gil Oberman
Original Gangstas
Slick
A violent street gang, the Rebels, rule the streets of Gary, Indiana. The Rebels shoot Marvin Bookman, a store-keeper, for giving the police information about a drive-by shooting they committed. Marvin's son, former NFL star John who created the Rebels, returns to Gary to be with his father and, with a little help from his friends, to destroy the Rebels his way.
Once Upon a Time... When We Were Colored
Cleve
This film relates the story of a tightly connected Afro-American community informally called Colored Town where the inhabitants live and depend on each other in a world where racist oppression is everywhere, as told by a boy called Cliff who spent his childhood there. Despite this, we see the life of the community in all its joys and sorrows, of those that live there while others decide to leave for a better life north. For those remaining, things come to a serious situation when one prominent businessman is being muscled out by a white competitor using racist intimidation. In response, the community must make the decision of whether to submit meekly like they always have, or finally fight for their rights.
Theodore Rex
Commissioner Lynch
In an alternate futuristic society, a tough female police detective is paired with a talking dinosaur to find the killer of dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals leading them to a mad scientist bent on creating a new Armageddon.
Se7en
Dist. Atty. Martin Talbot
Two homicide detectives are on a desperate hunt for a serial killer whose crimes are based on the "seven deadly sins" in this dark and haunting film that takes viewers from the tortured remains of one victim to the next. The seasoned Det. Sommerset researches each sin in an effort to get inside the killer's mind, while his novice partner, Mills, scoffs at his efforts to unravel the case.
Ballistic
Harold
Jesse Gavin is an undercover cop, part of an elite police team and highly skilled in lethal martial arts! She is suspended from the force after a witness that she was supposed to protect is killed. She must now find out what happened and clear up her name.
Bonanza: Under Attack
Jacob
After a rogue band of Pinkerton detectives led by ruthless Charley Siringo bushwhacks reformed outlaw Frank James, he seeks sanctuary on the Ponderosa with the next generation of Cartwrights and his former Civil War compatriots. Will Frank's comrades come to his aid or turn their backs on him? Richard Roundtree also stars in this made-for-TV sequel to the popular Western series.
Shadows of Desire
Dunc
A woman is torn between her love for a gentle man, and her secret passion for his dangerous brother.
Mind Twister
Frank Webb
Two former exotic dancers devise a plot to expose a physciatrist as the murderer of their friend.
Nero come il cuore
Rod
Sins of the Night
Les
Jack Nietsche is a hardened ex-con who now works for an P.I. firm, run by Ted Quincy. Quincy's ex-lover is Roxie, now wife to godfather Tony Falcone. In a huge mix-up/double-cross, Roxie plots with Jack to get rid of Falcone and Quincy, one an abusive husband, the other a demented role playing ex-lover, and run away with Jack. But the double crossings don't end there
Bonanza: The Return
Jacob Briscoe
A man with a grudge against the late Little Joe seeks revenge on the Cartwrights and attempts to take over the Ponderosa.
Amityville: A New Generation
Pauli
Photographer Keyes is given an old mirror from an homeless person he photographs on the street, takes it home and gives it a friend. He doesn't know yet that people see horrible things happen to themselves in the mirror and later these things come true. Are these really suicides or is there a demonic force behind the mirror?
Deadly Rivals
Agent Peterson
A physicist involved in classified military research meets a woman who he begins to suspect is a spy. Her sister is involved with the mob and one of the spies is working with the mob. He unwillingly helps the FBI figure this all out.
Body of Influence
Harry Reams
A successful psychiatrist has his world turned upside-down by the appearance of a mystery woman who cannot recall her own past...
Christmas in Connecticut
Prescott
Elizabeth is the star of a successful cooking show and author of several cookbooks. But when her manager, Alexander sees forest ranger Jefferson, who lost his cabin in a fire, comment on TV about wishing he could get a home-cooked Christmas dinner, he arranges for a special live show on Christmas, for Elizabeth to cook him Christmas Dinner. Only Elizabeth can't cook, and trying to keep Jefferson and the viewing public from finding out on a live show may be a little difficult.
Bloodfist III: Forced to Fight
Samuel Stark
Don Wilson returns to the screen as a man unjustly accused of a brutal crime. Within the prison he must fight for survival, freedom and justice.
A Time to Die
Captain Ralph Phipps
A female photographer teams up with a policeman to try to bring down a corrupt police officer who framed her for drug possession and during her investigation, finds that not everything, or everyone, is what they appear to be.
Gypsy Angels
Dr. Carlson
Vanna White is a stripper who falls for a stunt pilot who develops amnesia after a crash.
Bad Jim
July
A cowpoke buys Billy the Kid's horse and, upon riding it, becomes an incorrigible outlaw himself.
The Banker
Lloyd
High-priced prostitutes are being systematically murdered, their corpses mutilated, and a bizarre South American symbol painted in blood is found at the scene. The cop investigating is out to solve the crime before his ex wife, a reporter, becomes the next victim.
Crack House
Lt. Johnson
Rick and Melissa are a pair of young lovers hoping to get out of the slums for good and escape the poverty and crime their families and friends have gotten involved in. All this comes to an end when Rick feels he must rejoin his old gang to avenge the killing of his brother by a rival gang. In the course of getting even, Rick is arrested, leaving Melissa without anyone to protect her. She falls in with a crack dealer and quickly becomes addicted to the drug. When she gets sold to a drug kingpin by a minor dealer to pay off a debt, only Rick can save her.
Night Visitor
Captain Crane
A teenager insists he saw a satanist kill the call girl next door, and tries to prove it.
Miami Cops
Gamble
Richard Roundtree takes on thugs on the streets of Miami.
Angel III: The Final Chapter
Lt. Doniger
Molly is now a freelance photographer in New York. She runs across a woman at an art show that looks familiar. She goes to L.A. to find out that this woman is in fact, her mother. She also finds out she has a sister. The reunion is short-lived when her mother calls her to tell her that her sister is in danger and later, gets killed in an explosion. Molly must once again, become Angel to try and find her sister.
Party Line
Captain Barnes
A rich brother and sister are crazed killers. She lures men into her bed, and he attacks them and murders them. A detective is assigned to find the killers and bring them in.
La vendetta
Dundee
After being betrayed by a fellow Marine and spending five years in a POW camp, homeless Vietnam vet Roy Evans reunites with his commander, Dundee, and is tasked by the FBI to find his betrayer, Slisko, who is suspected of slaying several women. Slisko has also become an arms dealer, and Evans and Dundee endure the trauma of returning to Southeast Asia to apprehend their old comrade
Maniac Cop
Commissioner Pike
In New York, people are slain and strangled to death brutally on the open street. All witnesses agree that the murderer was in a cop's uniform. Soon the police search and find a suspect in its own ranks: Jack Forrest, suspected of murdering his own wife and the rest of the unfortunate individuals to die by the Maniac Cop’s reign of terror. To prove his innocence, he investigates the case with his partner, Theresa Mallory.
Jocks
Chip Williams
The coach of a college tennis team is given an ultimatum: put together a winning team, or else.
Opposing Force
Stafford
A group of elite soldiers, including one woman, sign up for the ultimate training mission. The group parachutes onto a remote island, where their objective is to reach the safety zone before the "opposing force" captures them. Everything does not go as expected, and the training mission turns into the real thing.
The Fifth Missile
Cmdr. Frederick Bryce
The crew of a Polaris submarine, on a training mission simulating an attack on Russia, is stricken by toxic poisoning. One of the poison's effects is to make its victims hallucinate, and the sub's captain imagines that he has been given an order to actually attack Russia. He prepares to do exactly that.
City Heat
Dehl Swift
Set in Kansas City in 1933, Eastwood plays a police lieutenant known simply by his last name, Speer. Reynolds plays a former cop turned private eye named Mike Murphy. Both Speer and Murphy served on the force together and were once good friends, but are now bitter enemies. When Murphy's partner is slain they team up again to fight the mob.
Killpoint
Agent Bill Bryant
An L.A. cop investigating the rape and murder of his wife traces the crime to a psycho biker gang that smuggles guns. He teams up with an FBI agent to stop them and catch his wife's killers.
Young Warriors
Sergeant John Austin
After a young woman is gang raped and murdered in a California college town, her brother takes up arms by night with a gang of like-minded vigilantes from his fraternity, brutally punishing any miscreants they catch in a criminal act.
The Big Score
Gordon
A narcotics detective, played by Fred Williamson, lets nothing stand in the way of his bringing down a major drug dealer. After a bust gone awry, he's accused of stealing a lost briefcase filled with money and both the mob and the police are looking for him. A ruthless hit man, played by Bruce Glover, will stop at nothing to get what his boss wants; the money!
One Down, Two to Go
Ralph
A pair of tough cops go after the mob who jinxed the martial arts tournament and injured their buddy.
Q
Powell
New York police are bemused by reports of a giant flying lizard that has been spotted around the rooftops of New York, until the lizard starts to eat people. An out-of-work ex-con is the only person who knows the location of the monster's nest and is determined to turn the knowledge to his advantage, but will his gamble pay off or will he end up as lizard food?
Inchon
Sgt. Augustus Henderson
A noisy and absurd re-telling of the great 1950 invasion of Inchon during the Korean War which was masterminded by General Douglas MacArthur.
An Eye for an Eye
Capt. Stevens
Sean Kane is forced to resign from the San Francisco Police Department's Narcotics Division when he goes berserk after his partner is murdered. He decides to fight alone and follows a trail of drug traffickers into unexpected high places.
Game for Vultures
Gideon Marunga
The South African businessman David Swansey is delivering illegal German helicopters to Rhodesia. That makes the patriot Gideon Marunga an angry man.
Day of the Assassin
Fessler
Treasure hunters from around the world race to Mexico after a Middle Eastern luxury yacht explodes, sending a Shah's fortune and mysterious document to the bottom of the ocean.
Escape to Athena
Nat Judson
During the World War II, the prisoners of a German camp in a Greek island are trying to escape. They not only want their freedom, but also seek an ineffable treasure hidden in a monastery at the summit of the island's mountain.
Portrait of a Hitman
Coco Morrell
A professional hitman is hired to kill a brain surgeon. However, it turns out that not only are he and the surgeon old friends, but they are both in love with the same woman.
Diamonds
Archie
Charles Hodgson is a British aristocrat who decides to become a thief as a way of getting at his twin brother, Earl, a security expert who has built a supposedly impregnable vault in Tel Aviv, which holds a cache of diamonds. For the caper, Charles enlists Archie, a heist expert, and Sally. He also becomes acquainted with an American woman, Zelda Shapiro, who is in Israel looking for a new husband.
Man Friday
Friday
Englishman Robinson Crusoe, stranded alone on an island for years, is overjoyed to find a fellow man, a black islander whom he names Friday. But Crusoe cannot overcome the shackles of his own heritage and upbringing and is incapable of seeing Friday as anything other than a savage who needs Crusoe's brand of cultural and religious enlightenment. Friday attempts to share his own more generous and unashamed culture, but ultimately realizes that Crusoe can never see him as anything but an inferior being. With that awareness, Friday sets out to turn the tables on Crusoe.
Earthquake
Miles Quade
Various interconnected people struggle to survive when an earthquake of unimaginable magnitude hits Los Angeles, California.
Shaft in Africa
John Shaft
Detective John Shaft travels incognito to Ethiopia, then France, to bust a human trafficking ring.
Charley-One-Eye
The Black Man
A black Union Army deserter and his crippled American Indian hostage form a strained partnership in the interests of surviving the advancing threats of a racist bounty hunter and neighboring bandits.
Firehouse
Shelly Forsythe
Conflict erupts within a close-knit engine company of a big-city fire department when a black recruit and a bigoted white veteran clash during a wave of suspected arson in the ghetto. Pilot to the short-lived series that began a run in January 1974.
Nationtime
Self
A report on the National Black Political Convention held in Gary, Indiana, in 1972, a historic event that gathered Black voices from across the political spectrum, among them Jesse Jackson, Dick Gregory, Coretta Scott King, Richard Hatcher, Amiri Baraka, Charles Diggs, and H. Carl McCall.
Shaft's Big Score!
John Shaft
John Shaft is back as the lady-loved black detective cop on the search for the murderer of a client.
Embassy
Dick Shannon
A KGB assassin infiltrates the American embassy in Beirut in an attempt to eliminate a Russian defector being protected by the CIA.
Shaft
John Shaft
Cool black private eye John Shaft is hired by a crime lord to find and retrieve his kidnapped daughter.
Soul in Cinema: Filming 'Shaft' on Location
Self
A behind the scenes look at the filming of the movie Shaft (1971). The movie's director, Gordon Parks is seen directing a couple of fight scenes which he wants to get in as few takes as possible due to the set-up time and the danger involved in the stunt work. He is also seen speaking to the composer of the film score, 'Isaac Hayes', about the overlaying of the music over one of those fight scenes, and what he wants musically for another scene involving the lead character, John Shaft, moving through Times Square. The latter would eventually become the movie's iconic theme music. Being a frenetically paced action movie, he also works closely with the film's editor, Hugh A. Robertson.
What Do You Say to a Naked Lady
Interracial Couple
Candid Camera's Allen Funt secretely tapes people's reactions to unexpected encounters with nudity in unusual situations, such as when a naked young woman casually exits an elevator in an office building, or when the nude male art model breaks the wall between artist and model and has off-the-cuff conversations with the clothed women artists. Funt also secretly tapes the test audience watching the preview film and their responses to it, from outright indignation to warm hearted-praise.
Thelma
Deceived by a phone scammer pretending to be her grandson, a 90-year-old woman sets out on a quest to reclaim what was taken from her.