Biography for
Antonio Fargas More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

14 August 1946, New York City, New York, USA

Birth Name

Antonio Juan Fargas

Nickname

Tony

Height

6' 1" (1.85 m)

Mini Biography

A tall, lanky and twinkle-eyed African-American actor with wonderful onscreen charisma, Antonio Fargas has been appearing on stage and screen for nearly 40 years. His film debut was in Shirley Clarke's The Cool World (1964), a gritty, uncompromising tale about African-American youth growing up in Harlem, New York. He then made his acting presence felt in many "blaxploitation" films of the early 1970s, including the classic Shaft (1971), the Mafia flick Across 110th Street (1972), the ultra-violent Pam Grier vehicle Foxy Brown (1974) and the classic tale of Huckleberry Finn (1975) (TV).

Around this time ABC-TV executives were looking for a capable actor to play the role of golden-hearted street informant "Huggy Bear" on "Starsky and Hutch" (1975), and Fargas scored the role with which he is most closely identified. His career continued to flourish after "Starsky and Hutch" wrapped up after four years, and he has appeared in over 50 movies to date, many TV shows and numerous stage productions. He has played a 90-year-old witch doctor in "The Great White Hope", was in Melvin Van Peebles' "Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death", and appeared in productions of "The Rainmaker", "The Emperor Jones" and "Dream on Monkey Mountain". A strong advocate of the strength and diversity of African-American culture, Fargas holds positions on the boards of Rhode Island's Langton Hughes Center for the Arts and The Martin Luther King Center of Newport.

IMDb Mini Biography By: firehouse44

Spouse

Taylor Hastie	(12 July 1979 - 1988) (divorced) 1 child
Sandy Fargas	(? - present) 4 children

Trivia

Antonio restores old homes, including a 1790's colonial in Connecticut and an 1820s farm house in upstate New York.

After moving back to L.A. after his divorce, he appeared in music videos and started a music production company, Bump It.

Son is Justin Fargas, a former running back at the University of Michigan.

Appeared in stage production of "Blues Brothers" in UK, doing Cab Calloway's "Minnie The Moocher".

His son, Justin Fargas, will be a senior running back at the University of Southern California in the fall of 2002. He previously played for the University of Michigan.

Fargas' son, Justin, was recently drafted as a running back by the Oakland Raiders.

His performance as a pimp in The Gambler (1974) helped him land the role of informant Huggy Bear in "Starsky and Hutch" (1975).

Of Puerto Rican and Trinidadian heritage.

Son, Justin Fargas, plays running back for the Oakland Raiders.

Step-father of Matthew E. Chausse.

Personal Quotes

He (Huggy Bear) wasn't a pimp. This whole glorification of pimps and all that makes people think that. But they never told you what he did. One minute he had a bar, the next minute he was a guy on the street hustling, but he was always in the know. But he was never a pimp. The guy who was on 'Baretta' was a pimp. His character was called The Rooster. Plus there were other roles were I had played pimps so a lot of people may have thought that.

Where Are They Now

(January 2003) Appearing in Ford Explorer commerical as the car wash manager

(November 2004) Appeared in the UK version of reality show "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here" on ITV1.

(September 2006) Antonio plays DOC on Everybody Hates Chris! running the corner store in which Chris works for him.

(December 2007) Appearing as Fleshcreep in Jack and the Beanstalk at Derby, UK, Assembly Rooms.