One of these days I will add Eddie Murphy‘s Boomerang to my Best Movies section. Realistically I could just recategorize my 2012 article on the film’s 20th Anniversary and make it a Best Movies entry and be satisfied. However, if I were to do that I’d have to add a little more than just a passing mention of Geoffrey Holder‘s performance as Nasty Nelson, because he is truly one of the film’s high points.
Today, sadly, we learn Holder died Sunday at the age of 84 due to complications of pneumonia. On top of playing Nasty Nelson, Holder is perhaps better known to others as the “Un-Cola” guy for 7Up commercials back in the ’80s, as Punjab in 1982’s Annie, as Baron Samedi in 1973’s James Bond film Live and Let Die or in ways I never got to know him, as a Tony Award-winning stage performer and dancer for the Metropolitan Opera Ballet.
As a kid I watched Annie more times than I care to remember thanks to my little sister, as a teen it was Boomerang that caught my eye and his performance in Live and Let Die was actually one I saw well after the other two though he’s an unmistakable presence as a man as tall as I am, standing 6’6″. If you haven’t yet seen his work, give it a peek, he’s was quite the performer. [Deadline]
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