Roots and Coming To America star John Amos dies aged 84 – reports

By Ellie Iorizzo, PA Los Angeles Correspondent

John Amos, who scored an Emmy nomination for the TV series Roots and starred in the comedy film Coming To America opposite Eddie Murphy, has died at the age of 84, according to US reports.

The US actor died on August 21st in Los Angeles of natural causes, according to Variety magazine.

Amos shot to fame in the 1970s when he played Gordy Howard, the weatherman on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which led to his role as family patriarch James Evans Sr in the Norman Lear sitcom Good Times.

He went on to portray Toby, the older version of Kunta Kinte, in the groundbreaking miniseries Roots.

Amos scored his only Emmy nomination for his role in the 1977 series which depicted the atrocities of slavery.

The sprawling cast included Louis Gossett Jr as Fiddler, Ben Vereen as Chicken George, and LeVar Burton as the young Kunta Kinte.

“I knew that it was a life-changing role for me, as an actor and just from a humanistic standpoint,” Amos told Time magazine.

“It was the culmination of all of the misconceptions and stereotypical roles that I had lived and seen being offered to me. It was like a reward for having suffered those indignities.”

Over a decade later, Amos starred as Cleo McDowell in Coming To America, who hires an African prince, played by Murphy.

Other starring roles included Admiral Percy Fitzwallace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on US drama The West Wing.