The stand-up made his initial mark onstage in the early ’90s with multiple appearances on HBO’s Def Comedy Jam before joining the cast of Fox’s influential sketch comedy series In Living Color for its fifth and final season in 1993. There, McFadden appeared in 23 episodes, including turns on the show’s recurring “Wheel of Dozens” game show parody and a controversial sketch called “Mr. Armstrong,” where his disabled substitute teacher is tormented by his class before turning the tables.
Since then, McFadden made multiple stand-up appearances on shows like The Late Show With David Letterman, Late Night With Conan O’Brien, and Last Call With Carson Daly. He also had various small film and TV roles, including on Curb Your Enthusiasm, Martin, Moesha and the Adam Sandler film Little Nicky. He also had his own comedy special as part of the Comedy Central Presents series in 1998.
In recent years (his last IMDb credit is the short, National Lampoon Presents Tooned Up in 2005), Brooklyn native McFadden has lived in Tanzania, where according to The Hollywood Reporter, he ran both a gold mining and entertainment production company called Oldavai Records. The State Department informed McFadden’s family of his death, although no further details are known at this time. He is survived by his sisters Bernice and Misty, his sons, Jaron and Myles, his mother, Vivian, and his brother, Kris.
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