Richard Lewis, best known for starring in the sitcom Curb Your Enthusiasm, has died. He was 76.
Variety has confirmed the star died after suffering a heart attack.
The comedian’s death follows after he announced in April last year he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and was retiring.
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Deadline reported the star’s death was confirmed by his publicist Jeff Abraham, who revealed the actor died overnight at his home in Los Angeles.
“His wife, Joyce Lapinsky, thanks everyone for all the love, friendship and support and asks for privacy at this time,” Abraham told the outlet.
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Lewis was best known for his comedic role on the HBO sitcom Curb Your Enthusiasm, which he starred in alongside Larry David for 12 season since 1999.
Tributes have already started flowing in for the star, with some Hollywood greats sharing their condolences on social media.
Lewis’ co-star Larry David shared a heartbreaking statement shared by HBO to Variety.
“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,” he said.
“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.”
Oscar winner Jamie Lee Curtis posted an emotional tribute to Instagram remembering her late Anything but Love co-star.
“I’ve just read that my friend Richard Lewis has died. I remember exactly where I was when I saw a billboard of him about a stand up special on Sunset Boulevard when we were casting the ABC pilot Anything But Love and asked the casting people to bring him in to audition to play my best friend/maybe boyfriend, Marty Gold,” she began.
“I thought he was handsome. He made me laugh, which is the one thing that a strong, capable woman, can’t really do for herself. He got the part when I snort laughed when he mispronounced the word Bundt cake,” she continued the lengthy tribute.
“He blew everyone else away It was a love triangle show and they didn’t pick up that pilot but they came back to me and said that the chemistry with Richard was so great and could we revamp the original pilot which is the show we ended up making for a couple years.”
“He was also a stand-up comic and hated the live audience, where I, who had never done a play, loved it. He used to hide his lines everywhere on the set, on props, door frames, on my face in a close up and was always carrying a clipboard with his lines on them. It turns out he was a wonderful actor. Deep and so freaking funny.”
“We went through the death of our friend and costar, Richard Frank, together and grieved the loss of our producer and friend, John Ritter. Richard’s last text to me, was hoping that I could convince ABC/Disney to put out another boxed set of episodes of the show.”
“He also is the reason I am sober. He helped me. I am forever grateful for him for that act of grace alone,” Curtis candidly wrote.
“He found love with Joyce and that, of course, besides his sobriety, is what mattered most to him. I’m weeping as I write this. Strange way of saying thank you to a sweet and funny man. Rest in laughter, Richard. My Marty, I love you, Hannah!”
Lewis’ Curb Your Enthusiasm co-star Cheryl Hines remembered the actor as the “funniest person.”
“When I was young I had the biggest crush on Richard Lewis. He was the funniest person on stage and the most handsome comedian,” she wrote to Instagram.
“Then when I was cast on Curb Your Enthusiasm, I got to work with him and it was a dream come true,” she continued.
“Through the years I learned who Richard really was and the gifts he gave. Yes, he was the comedian I fell in love with, but he was also one of the most loving people I know.”
“He would take time to tell the people he loved what they meant to him – especially in recent years. In between takes on Curb, he would tell me how special I was to him and how much he loved me. To be loved by Richard Lewis. A true gift.”
“I love you Richard. You will be missed. Sending my love to Joyce and to all of Richard’s family. 💙Larry, Richard adored you. But you know that,” she concluded.
“On a sad note, the great Richard Lewis has died,” actress Bette Midler wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Actor Patton Oswalt shared a simple photo of the late star on X to pay tribute to Lewis.
“Absolutely devastated by this news. Richard was my hero when I was a standup,” American filmmaker Paul Feig wrote.
“I was lucky enough to get to know him and he was the most wonderful man.”
“So supportive and kind and truly one of the funniest people on the planet. You will be missed, my friend.”
“RIP Richard Lewis. A brilliantly funny man who will missed by all. The world needed him now more than ever,” Defending Your Life actor Albert Brooks wrote.
A regular performer in clubs and on late-night TV for decades, Lewis also played Marty Gold, the romantic co-lead opposite Jamie Lee Curtis, in the ABC series Anything But Love and the reliably neurotic Prince John in Mel Brooks’ Robin Hood: Men In Tights.
He re-introduced himself to a new generation opposite Larry David in HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, kvetching regularly.
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“I’m paranoid about everything in my life. Even at home. On my stationary bike, I have a rear-view mirror, which I’m not thrilled about,” he once joked onstage.
To Jimmy Kimmel he said: “This morning, I tried to go to bed. I couldn’t sleep. I counted sheep but I only had six of them and they all had hip replacements.”
Comedy Central named Lewis one of the top 50 stand-up comedians of all time and he earned a berth in GQ magazine’s list of the “20th Century’s Most Influential Humourists.” He lent his humour for charity causes, including Comic Relief and Comedy Gives Back.
“Watching his stand-up is like sitting in on a very funny and often dark therapy session,” the Los Angeles Times said in 2014.
The Philadelphia’s City Paper called him “the Jimi Hendrix of monologists.” Mel Brooks once said he “may just be the Franz Kafka of modern-day comedy.”