Comedian John Pinette Has Died at the Age of 50

Sad news today for fans of comedy, John Pinette has died at the age of 50:

Stand-up comedian John Pinette, 50, was found dead in his room Saturday afternoon at the Sheraton Station Square. Pittsburgh Public Safety spokeswoman Sonya Toler said a relative was concerned after not hearing from Mr. Pinette for an extended period and contacted security at the hotel.

Mr. Pinette was in Pittsburgh for a family function, Ms. Toler said. She declined to discuss details of the function. His manager, Larry Schapiro, could not be reached. The hotel's security detail opened Mr. Pinette’s room for the relative, where they found him and called city police.

The comedian was pronounced dead at the scene around 2:30 p.m.

A supervisor with the Allegheny County medical examiner's office said Mr. Pinette had been suffering liver and heart disease and that his death was due to natural causes.

Read more at the Post-Gazette

I mostly post about horror and exploitation movies here, but I'm also a really big stand up comedy fan, so this news is destroying me right now. While I tend to prefer the darker and more obscene comedy of guys like Doug Stanhope, Dana Gould or Tom Segura I always enjoyed John's material and I think it's sad that most people don't know his comedy and that he's most commonly recognized as "that fat guy from the Seinfeld finale". It's truly a sad day for comedy, John will be missed.