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For a lot of actors, a career in television can be the most important thing that would happen to them and the same can be said of Richard Belzer whose work as the character, John Munch is what he is mostly remembered for. Playing this character was not just helpful for his career but for his finances as well. To learn about how playing John Munch affected Richard Belzer’s net worth and his financial life in general, keep reading.

Career Endeavours

Richard Jay Belzer was born into a Jewish family, his birth took place on the 4th of August 1944, in Bridgeport, Connecticut. He is one of the two children his parents, Frances and Charles Belzer had. Fairfield Warde High School and Dean College were his high school and college respectively but he got expelled from the latter.

Belzer’s first attempt at having a professional career happened in the early 70s when he moved to New York City after his divorce from Gail Susan Ross. When he was in New York he lived with Shelly Ackerman who worked as a singer. It was while he was in New York that he decided to go into comedy. As a child Richard Belzer would perform jokes for his abusive mother, this was done to assuage her as well as dissuade her from physically abusing him and his brother.

He decided to take up his previous defense mechanism and make a living from it. Shortly after he began to perform stand-up in comedy bars, Belzer got a gig as the warm-up comedian for Saturday Night Live, he was one of the pioneers of this show. He quickly gained a reputation as a comic and is sometimes referred to as the dean of the 70s comedy.

Towards the end of the century, Richard Belzer started to get acting roles, in films and music videos. Comedy radio shows were also something he was doing around that same time and he was a regular on the National Lampoon Radio Hour. Between the 80s and early 90s, he juggled acting, stand-up comedy, and radio. In a short while, he started to get regular gigs on television shows.

When Did Richard Belzer Start Playing John Munch?

1993 was the year Richard Belzer was cast to play John Munch on Homicide: Life on the Street, a role that he almost did not get as his audition was not satisfactory for the show’s producers. Belzer played this character for the six years it aired getting better at becoming an actor on the job. When the show ended in 1999, Munch’s life did not end with the show. Instead, the character joined Law $ Order: Special Victims Unit another police procedural show that was just starting. Richard Belzer played this character for twenty years and he made guest appearances in different shows, such as Law $ Order: Trial by Jury, The X-Files, and The Beat.

Richard Belzer’s net worth has not only grown due to his career as a comic and actor but also has also benefitted from the proceeds of his books, most of which are on the conspiracy theories that he believes in, particularly regarding the death of John .F Kennedy.

How Playing John Munch Affected His Financial Life

Prior to playing John Munch, Richard Belzer had a very successful career with the work he was doing with comedy. He had also appeared in a number of films and was selling out comedy bars. While he was already doing well before the role, Belzer’s part in the series did add a boost to his career and is regarded as the hallmark of his career.

Richard Belzer Net Worth Since He Stopped Playing John Munch

Richard Belzer’s estimated net worth as of 2018 is $16 million; this is wealth that he has amassed in the course of his career that lasted for over forty years. As already stated, the versatility of his career poses difficulty in ascertaining if all the wealth that Richard Belzer has now is a direct offshoot from playing John Munch. It is however certain that he has maximized his talents and has built a name and a sizeable amount of wealth for himself.

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