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Gary Coleman (born February 8, 1968 in Zion, Illinois) is an American actor, who was born with a congenital kidney disease causing nephritis (an autoimmune destruction of the kidney), which halted his growth at an early age, leading to a small stature (4' 8") which became his most distinguishing feature. Coleman has had two kidney transplants, one in 1973 and one in 1984, and requires constant dialysis.

During the eight-year run of the American sitcom Diff'rent Strokes, where his famous line was "what'chu talkin' 'bout, Willis?" Coleman was a popular figure, starring in a number of feature films and made-for-TV movies including On the Right Track, and The Kid With the Broken Halo. The Kid With the Broken Halo eventually served as the basis for the Hanna-Barbera produced animated series The Gary Coleman Show from 1982.

At the height of his fame on Diff'rent Strokes, Coleman earned $70,000 per episode. As he grew older, however, he fell from public favor. After the cancellation of Diff'rent Strokes, his acting career declined sharply. He did play a building code inspector in a Married... with Children episode (#S08E16, "How Green Was My Apple") where Bundy had called him to report an illegal driveway.

In 1995, Coleman was also featured as character "Mad Dog" on the show Martin (Episode title: "High Noon"), in which he played an ex-convict whom Martin helped to imprison. Once released, Mad Dog comes looking for Martin.

In 1997, Coleman did voice work for the The Curse of Monkey Island the third installment in the Monkey Island series of comedy adventure games developed by LucasArts. In 2004, Coleman played a supporting role in the controversial computer game Postal² by Running With Scissors, Inc.

Later media appearances

In 1999, Gary played himself in an episode of The Simpsons titled "Grift of the Magi". Gary has also been featured in one of the seasons of The Surreal Life and was the manager of the Surreal Life characters at the restaurant they worked at. He felt that he was used by the people who made Diff'rent Strokes.

In 2001, Coleman was employed as a shopping mall security guard in the Los Angeles area. A video of him trying to stop a vehicle from entering a compound while the driver (obviously a member of the paparazzi) ridiculed him made the rounds on various late night talk shows. Coleman also played himself on the Scooby Doo special, "Night of the Living Doo".

Coleman occasionally is able to cash in on his camp value to members of Generation X, by appearing in cameo roles in film and TV. As with Day-Glo, Rubik's Cube, Valley girls, Care Bears, Mr. T, the Smurfs and other artifacts from the early 1980s, Coleman's popularity coincided with the childhood of a particularly productive generation of internet users, and he is, as of 2005, a minor cult figure.

Coleman has also appeared in World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) superstar John Cena's music video for "Bad Bad Man" in which he appeared as himself, as well as in Kid Rock's video for "Cowboy". In this video he appeared, appropriately garbed, taking on Rock's diminutive sidekick, Joe C. Additionally, Coleman's one-time Surreal Life co-star, Ron Jeremy also has a cameo, as a piano player.

Coleman made an appearance on E!'s short-lived celebrity dating show Star Dates where washed up celebrities went on blind dates with regular people. The likes of Jimmie Walker (Good Times), Butch Patrick (The Munsters), and Susan Olsen (The Brady Bunch) have also appeared on the show.

Coleman also appeared in a Nickelodeon sitcom called Drake & Josh. The two main characters were selling a product called the Gary Coleman Grill (a parody of the George Foreman Grill). At the end of the show, Coleman appears as himself. In 2006, Coleman appeared in a commercial for a cash-advance loan company called CashCall. He ends the commercial by saying, "Pay your bills on time and everyone will love you."

In June 2005 VH-1 named him No. 1 on its list of the Top 100 Child Stars Ever.

Gary Coleman in Italy

In 1986, Gary Coleman had a very short appearance in one episode of an Italian talk-show, Studio 5, with popular italian TV comedian actor Marco Columbro and show-girl Roberta Termali. Also, he and his Italian dubbing actor Fabrizio Manfredi had a special guest appearance in Pentatlon, a quiz show by Mike Bongiorno.

In Italy, Diff'rent Strokes was aired under several names: Harlem contro Manhattan (1979-80), Il mio amico Arnold (1981-87), Arnold (1988-today). Original theme was often replaced by several italian music songs: the first one, Arnold, performed by Nico Fidenco, was a single hit in 1980.

In 2006, best episodes were still broadcast on Italia Uno (Mediaset group), every day, at 06.00am.

Legal struggles

Coleman famously sued his parents and manager over misappropriation of his $8.3 million trust fund and won a $1,280,000 ruling on February 23 1993. The basis for the lawsuit was that his parents had used the trust fund to accumulate $770,000 for themselves, leaving Gary only $220,000. Coleman filed for bankruptcy in 1999.

Coleman appeared on the People's Court on November 2, 2000, charged with assault. He was ordered to pay bus driver Tracy Fields $1,665 for hospital bills resulting from a fight. Fields had attempted to get Coleman's autograph while he was shopping for a bulletproof vest in a California mall.[1] Coleman said he felt "threatened by her insistence" and punched her in the head. Coleman was working as a security guard at the time[2].

Candidate for Governor of California

Coleman was a candidate for governor in the 2003 California recall election. This campaign was sponsored by the free newsweekly the East Bay Express as a satirical comment on the recall. After Arnold Schwarzenegger announced his candidacy, Coleman stated that he would be voting for Schwarzenegger. Coleman placed 8th in a field of 135 candidates, receiving 14,242 votes.

Miscellaneous

• Coleman is a model railroader.
• Coleman is sometimes confused with Emmanuel Lewis, star of the 1980s sitcom Webster, considered a knock-off of Coleman's earlier success.
• In 1993, Coleman opened the Gary Coleman Game Parlor, a video game entertainment center, in Fisherman's Village in Marina del Rey, California. The motto of the GCGP was "Our games are easier, so you can play longer". It went out of business in 1994.
• In 2005, Coleman moved to Utah from California.
• In 2006, Katie Schnur fell in love with 'im.

Avenue Q character

Gary Coleman is a character (not an actor) in the hit 2003 Broadway musical, Avenue Q, which won the 2004 Tony Award for best musical. The character works as the superintendent of the apartment complex where the musical takes place. In the introductory song, "It Sucks to be Me", he states: "I'm Gary Coleman from TV's Diff'rent Strokes/I made a lot of money that got stolen by my folks/now I'm broke, and I'm the butt of everyone's jokes/but I'm here, the superintendent of Avenue Q!" Previously, the other characters had been arguing over whose life was the worst but once Gary comes in, they concede defeat with a chorus of "It sucks to be you!" At various times when the Gary Coleman character speaks, theme music reminiscent of an 80s sitcom interrupts the usual Broadway-style music.

In the Broadway version of the musical, Coleman was first portrayed by actress Natalie Venetia Belcon. He was portrayed by Haneefah Wood and Tonya Dixon in the Las Vegas version (Haneefah Wood later replaced Natalie Venetia on Broadway). In the London version, his character was changed as the creative team felt that the UK audience would not know who Gary Coleman was. The character became "that famous kid from TV" and is portrayed by a male actor. After the show caught on in London, the audience insisted that the character go back to being Gary Coleman (because it turned out people in the UK did know who he was) and was actually changed by the creative team again to "Gary Coleman" which still remains today. The creative team also changed the lyrics so that he now states: "I was the cutest little black kid on tv/I made a zillion dollars that my parents stole from me/My life was over when I hit puberty/But I'm here, fixing the toilets on Avenue Q!"

Filmography

Films

Television work

• Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (guest)
• Good Times (1977? guest)
• Diff'rent Strokes (1978–1986)
• The Kid from Left Field (1979)
• Scout's Honor (1980)
• Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (cameo)
• The Kid with the Broken Halo (1982)
• The Gary Coleman Show (1982) (canceled after a few months) (voice)
• The Kid with the 200 I.Q. (1983)
• The Fantastic World of D.C. Collins (1984)
• Playing with Fire (1985)
• Like Father, Like Santa (1998)
• "The Simpsons", "Grift of the Magi" (1999)
• Drake and Josh (guest)
• A Carol Christmas (2003)

External links

• CNN's take on Coleman's 2003 candidacy for the governorship of California
• Another popular internet meme; a photograph of Gary Coleman and David Hasselhoff
• Rotten.com bio

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