Grizz Chapman, the towering actor best known for playing the equally towering (and equally lovable) bodyguard Grizz on the hit comedy *30 Rock*, has died at the age of 52. The news was confirmed on Saturday by his cousin, Donte Harrison, a Harlem Globetrotter - because even in death, Chapman's life maintained a certain level of fame and athleticism.
No cause of death has been released, but Harrison noted that Chapman died in his sleep on Friday “after years of fighting illness and dialysis.” The actor, who stood a formidable 2.13 meters (7 feet) tall, had been diagnosed with kidney disease and became a spokesperson for the National Kidney Foundation. During his time on *30 Rock*, he spent a year undergoing dialysis treatments three days a week, four hours a day, before receiving a kidney transplant in 2010.
Born in Brooklyn in 1974, Chapman's path to stardom was unconventional. He first met future *30 Rock* co-star Tracy Morgan while working as a bouncer at a strip club, which is a much better origin story than most Hollywood networking events. Later working as a bodyguard, he stumbled into acting via a commercial - and the paycheck was enough to make him reconsider his career choices. “I made $20,000 for 40 minutes of work, so I thought I was in the wrong business at that point and I needed to change,” he said in a 2012 interview with CBR. But it wasn't just the money; he fell in love with the craft, taking acting classes and realizing, to his pleasant surprise, that there was more to it than just standing there looking tall.
Chapman's breakout role came as Grizz, the imposing but gentle bodyguard and one-half of the entourage for Tracy Morgan's chaotic character, Tracy Jordan, on *30 Rock*. He credited Morgan for keeping him on the show when NBC wanted to trim the entourage from four to two. “I made the cut,” Chapman told CBR. “I worked hard to get there. I worked really hard.” He appeared in 80 episodes of the beloved series, which aired from 2006 to 2013. But after the show ended, he faced the classic actor's dilemma: typecasting, but with a twist. “Why can't a seven-foot guy play a doctor?” he asked the Hollywood Reporter in 2013. “Why can't I be a teacher? Why can't I be a football coach? Why can't I be a cab driver? Anything. Anything else than that. I can cry. I can do those things that they think the big guys can't do. So just give us a chance.”
His *30 Rock* co-stars remembered him fondly. Kevin Brown, who played fellow bodyguard Dot Com, simply wrote: “May he RIP.” Judah Friedlander noted Chapman was always “getting big laughs at the table reads and on camera,” while Maulik Pancholy said he was “so kind, so sweet, and his huge heart brought laughter to so many.” Chapman also appeared in films and shows including *The Cobbler*, *Money Monster*, *Blue Bloods*, and *The Blacklist*.
He is survived by his wife, Diana, and their two children - a family that, like his fans, will miss the gentle giant who proved that even in a world of typecasting, a 7-foot actor can be much more than just a bodyguard.