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And radioactive, as far as television and movie executives were concerned: Tomlin had to fight to keep Pryor's material in her TV specials (though most was cut), and notes from the network brass instructed her not to kiss him at the sign-off. ''People get scared,'' she says. ''The kind of laughter he evoked was the laughter of liberation.''

Meanwhile, Pryor's career was also getting stymied on the big screen. He was denied a role he'd co-created with Mel Brooks: Sheriff Bart in Blazing Saddles. He retained a writing credit, but had to forfeit the lead to the more corporately acceptable Cleavon Little. But Pryor's invisibility was about to cease.

''There was a list of people I thought were essential as hosts,'' recalls Lorne Michaels. ''Richard was one of the three.'' At the time, Pryor was playing sold-out shows to mostly black audiences and working as a writer on Sanford and Son. NBC refused to let him host its infant late-night comedy experiment, fearing Pryor's legendary volatility. Eventually, Michaels threatened to resign, the network relented, and, riding a wave of post-Watergate chaos, Pryor hosted SNL's seventh airing. The appearance, according to Michaels, ''put us on the map.'' The sketches included the famous ''word-association'' skit with Chevy Chase. (''White.'' ''Black.'' ''Colored.'' ''Redneck.'' ''Jungle bunny.'' ''Honky!'' ''Spade!'' ''Honky honky!'' ''Nigger!'' ''Dead honky.'') Recalls Chase, who developed the skit with Pryor: ''As I was writing, I was able to come up with a lot of epithets for black people, so I asked Richard to give me some epithets for white people. Surprisingly, he didn't know many. Whitey, sure. But then he had to improvise. That's why he said, 'Honky honky.' And I realized: Richard doesn't harbor any real prejudices. He just tells it how he sees it.''

Everyone saw it. Pryor gave SNL its best ratings yet — and did even better in reruns. ''Richard lent integrity and credibility to our show,'' recalls Michaels. ''His appearance as host defined the outer limits of what we could do. It set the boundaries with the network. He made us, by association, more legitimate. Our debt is entirely to him.''

Within the year, Pryor was a major star. He had a movie deal with Universal, a series offer from NBC (resulting in The Richard Pryor Show, a variety hour) and, in short order, a serious cocaine habit. Movies like Silver Streak would establish him as a screen presence, even if they didn't really capture the genius of his stand-up. But the tempting excesses of celebrity — coupled with the comic's longstanding attraction to the abyss — drew Pryor closer and closer to oblivion. His infamous 1980 self-immolation was the beginning of the end; first his representatives said it was an accident, but Pryor, ever honest, later admitted it was a suicide attempt that ended with him wandering the Sunset Strip in flames. Mooney helped coax him back to perform Live on the Sunset Strip, a lacerating concert film where he transformed his brush with fiery death into an existential riff. (''When you run down the street on fire, people will move out of your way.'') It wasn't easy. ''He told me, 'They f--ed up. They gave me the money up front. I'm gone.' And he flew to Hawaii,'' laughs Mooney. ''The producers called me, going 'What are we going to do?' I said, 'You've got to use humor. He's just been in The Wiz. Send out an airplane to write in the sky Surrender, Richard.' That's exactly what they did. And he came back.''


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