Fred Berry - Career

Career

Berry was born in St. Louis, Missouri. Before starring on What's Happening!!, he was a member of the Los Angeles based dance troupe The Lockers, with which he appeared on the third episode of the first season of Saturday Night Live. He also appeared on the dance music program Soul Train, and was featured in the program's signature line dance segment doing the memorable early '70s dance step "the slo-mo." What's Happening!! lasted from 1976 to 1979. He was a millionaire by age 29. After the show ended, Berry, who weighed over 300 pounds, had trouble finding work because he was permanently identified with the Rerun character.

Eventually however, he came to embrace his being typecast, and made his peace with it as the best means to maintain his celebrity. In public, he was often seen wearing the red beret and red suspenders that are part of the Rerun character, and even went so far as to have his middle name legally changed to "Rerun".

During the 1980s, Berry battled drug addiction and alcoholism. He revived the character of Rerun in the series What's Happening Now!!, but he was only on that show for a year. Berry asked for more money than the rest of the cast (believing he was the reason people tuned in). Berry's widow, Essie Berry told Urbanite magazine at Georgia State University that their unwillingness to pay Fred Berry his due in both shows led to their early cancellations.

During the 1990s, Berry became a Baptist minister and lost 100 pounds (45 kg) after being diagnosed with diabetes. He made a living during this time mostly through making public appearances as Rerun.

Berry made a brief cameo appearance in Insane Clown Posse's film Big Money Hustlas as Bootleg Greg, a merchandise counterfeiter. In 1996, he also made an appearance in Less Than Jake's video “Dopeman” (which was never aired on television). In the second season of the comedy television series Scrubs, he appeared in his iconic Rerun suspenders and beret in an extended dance sequence fantasized by Dr. John “J.D.” Dorian (which included a dozen others also wearing the same outfit). Berry also appeared in a Snoop Doggy Dogg video, “It's A Doggy Dogg World”, which was a tribute to the Black culture of the 1970s. (He performed his legendary dance moves in a Soul Train line.) He also appeared in fellow Locker Toni Basil music video "Shopping From A to Z".

He returned to the screen in 1998 in the action movie In The Hood and made a cameo in Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star (2003), playing himself in a song at the end. His final role was another memorable cameo in In the Land of Merry Misfits (produced by Maria Menounos and narrated by John Waters), which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival.