American rapper and actor Coolio, known for his hit “Gangsta’s Paradise”, died on Wednesday (9/28) at the age of 59. His manager, Jarez Posey, reported that he was at a friend’s house when he died.
Coolio reportedly went to the residence bathroom and did not return. After calling him unsuccessfully, the owner of the house found Coolio lying on the floor.
According to the police, who are investigating the incident, there were no signs of violence. Paramedics who answered the emergency call suspect he suffered cardiac arrest, but the cause of death has not yet been disclosed.
Artis Leon Ivey Jr., who became known worldwide as Coolio, is one of the most famous artists of the golden generation of American rap of the 90s. He burst onto the Los Angeles scene as part of the WC and Maad Circle in 1991, but a solo career soon followed, releasing the album “It Takes a Thief” in 1994, which produced the hit “Fantastic Voyage” – with a video directed by F. Gary Gray, who would later make the films “Straight Outta Gangster “and” Fast and Furious 8 “. The song reached number 3 on the charts, but the initial success is not even comparable to what it came to try the following year with the hit “Gangsta’s Paradise”.
One of the most played songs of the decade, “Gangsta’s Paradise” was the subject of the movie “Dangerous Minds”, in which Michelle Pfeiffer was a former Marine hired as a teacher in a public high school. The actress also starred in the song’s music video, which helped propel her to MTV.
After its release, the hit spent three weeks at the top of the charts.
The cultural impact of “Gangsta’s Paradise” even inspired a parody, “Amish Paradise”, of “Weird Al” Yankovic.
The artist has also scored other hits in his career, such as “1,2,3,4 (Sumpin ‘New)”, “I Remember” and “It’s All the Way Live (Now)”, as well as composing the theme song for the Nickelodeon sitcom “Kenan & Kel” (1996-2000), starring Kenan Thompson and Kel Mitchell.
His musical projection led him to dub the character Kwanzaa-bot in the animated series “Futurama” and, thanks to his distinctive appearance, with “floating pigtails” on his head, he was invited to become an actor, winning small roles in films such as as “God help us!” (1996) and even the infamous “Batman & Robin” (1997).
His first appearances on the screen were figurations. But that started to change with “Rescue from the Deep,” a direct-to-video B action movie released in 2000, in which he played the lead – and received extremely negative reviews for the initiative. This did not stop him from trying again in the thriller “Stealing Candy” (2003), opposite Daniel Baldwin. But the result was repeated: bombardment of negative reviews.
Subsequently, Coolio appeared again in “Daredevil – The Man Without Fear” (2003), before disappearing from the cinema, devoting himself to a series of releases for the DVD market. The best of these was “Dracula 3000: Infinite Darkness” (2004), in which he became a vampire.
In his later roles, he ended up specializing in playing his most popular character: himself. Coolio was Coolio in the animation “Gravity Falls” (in 2012), in the series “Black Jesus” (2014), in the musical “Nina” (2017) and in his last completed film, the comedy “Bobcat Moretti”, still without a debut release date.
Recall three of the rapper’s greatest hits below.
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Source: Terra
Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
