Taylor Negron, dearly beloved actor and hilarious comedian, passed away on Saturday, at the age of 57, Deadline confirms. The Californian actor reached death due to a long-lasting battle with cancer and his passing was announced by his cousin, Chuck Negron, via an online video. The announcer was a rock artist, member of the ’70s band Three Dog Night and in his sad video he shared the news: ‘“I want to inform you that my cousin Taylor Negron just passed away. His mother, his brother Alex and my brother Rene and his wife Julie were all there with him. May he rest in peace.”
The TV appearance and movie portfolio of Taylor Negron is vast and includes roles in numerous productions, summing more than 100 titles. The Californian actor made his entrance into the movie industry around the 1970s, with roles in television series like The Last Resort (1979) or Detective School (1979). His prior artistic career featured his engagement in stand-up comedy during high school and educational background includes courses with Lee Strasberg and a private comedy seminar with Lucille Ball. The relationship between the two was a tight one and Negron used to remember her advice and her guidance dearly: “What I learned from her was what she learned from Buster Keaton – know your props, know what you’re doing, know where the exit is, know the entrances, know where the camera is. Get there early. Know everyone on the set. Do not pull any funny business. Be a professional.”
It was the year 1982 the one which marked the debut of Taylor Negron into a full movie with his role as Dr. Phil Burns in Young Doctors in Love. That very year he also turned into the Pizza Guy for the comedy-drama Fast Times at Ridgemont High, directed by Amy Heckerling, who later on resorted to Taylor for the revival of the role in 2012’s comedy-drama Vamps. Ever since, his appearances in comedy pieces were inevitable and his roles were memorable. His television series career includes roles in shows like Hope & Gloria, Friends and Seinfeld. Movies remembering his name are the action-comedy-crime The Last Boy Scout (1991), in which he starred along with Bruce Willis, Angels in Outfield (1994) or the animation-comedy Stuart Little (1999).
Taylor Negron was a complete artist, his skills and abilities spanning from television and comedy to movies and painting, playwriting or poetry. In 2008, Negron wrote The Unbearable Lightness of Being Taylor Negron – A Fusion of Story and Song, which debuted at the Edinburgh Comedy Festival – title inspired from Milan Kundera’s 1982-written novel. His work as a painter included a last year exhibition of “Snow Paintings’’.