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WASHINGTON - US comedian Bernie Mac, who played an ex-felon blackjack dealer in the "Ocean's Eleven" series and had his own sitcom on television, has died at 50, US media said Saturday.
He succumbed several days after being hospitalized for pneumonia which arose from a longstanding lung ailment, sarcoidosis, at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, said Fox television, which carried the critically acclaimed "The Bernie Mac Show" from 2001 to 2006.
Born in Chicago on October 5, 1957, Bernard Jeffrey McCullough got his start in the city's African-American comedy clubs, and broke into the big time after winning a national comedy contest in 1989.
He became nationally popular after making it to the HBO hit show "Def Comedy Jam," pitching his wry, pointed style at audiences of all colors.
"If you let people put tags on you, you'll never be able to remove them," he told the Chicago Tribune last year.
In 2001 he featured next to Brad Pitt and George Clooney as a casino card dealer in "Ocean's Eleven" and returned in the subsequent two sequels.
He also featured in the 2003 film "Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle" and was a car salesman in last year's hit "Transformers".
The Chicago Tribune said he is survived by his wife Rhonda McCullough and a daughter, Je'Niece. - AFP/vm
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