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Is comedian Andy Kaufman alive and well?

Thanks to his work on sitcom Taxi, wacky publicity stunts (including staging televised wrestling ...
Newstalk
Newstalk

13.11 14 Nov 2013


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Is comedian Andy Kaufman alive...

Is comedian Andy Kaufman alive and well?

Newstalk
Newstalk

13.11 14 Nov 2013


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Thanks to his work on sitcom Taxi, wacky publicity stunts (including staging televised wrestling 'feuds') and eccentric performances on stage & TV, Andy Kaufman had become a major star before his death at 35 in 1984. The film Man on the Moon - a Kaufman biopic starring Jim Carrey - helped introduce his work to a new generation. 

Although Kaufman is said to have died from a rare form of lung cancer (pre-empted by increasingly frail public appearances), rumours persist, even among his family and friends, that the entertainer (he didn't like being called a comedian) had faked his own death.

The story took an unusual twist this week at a New York award show set up in Kaufman's honour. A 24 year-old woman took to the stage claiming to be Andy's daughter - a particularly unusual development considering the star died 29 years ago. The strange claim was backed up by Kaufman's own brother Michael, who told the audience how he received a letter from his brother on New Year's Eve 1999 after following instructions to meet in a specific restaurant on that date.

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As The Comic's Comic explains, "the letter purported that Andy wanted to go into hiding and live a normal life, that he'd met and fallen in love with a woman and had a daughter, and that he didn't want Michael or anyone to say anything while their own father was still alive. Andy's and Michael's father died this summer. Michael said a young woman called him a month afterward to say that Andy indeed was alive".

As unlikely as the whole story sounds, several of Kaufman's friends, including his frequent collaborator Bob Zmuda, have claimed over the years that Andy suggested he wanted to fake his own death. Kaufman was notorious for playing elaborate hoaxes, which has led many fans to believe such an extreme prank is not beyond the realms of possibility. It also raises the possibility that the whole thing is a 'posthumous' prank Kaufman purposefully orchestrated before his death.

Whether the incident proves to be a cruel joke being played on Kaufman's friends & family or something orchestrated by the entertainer himself, Andy Kaufman's death is proving just as colourful as his life.

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