Kevin Hart is grieving the passing of his father, Henry Witherspoon, who has died at 73. He shared the heartbreaking news with fans on Instagram on Oct. 12 alongside a heartwarming carousel of photos with a touching caption. In Hart’s tribute post, he shared several pictures of Witherspoon spending quality time with his family and cherished moments between the father and son. “RIP to one of the realest & rawest to ever do it…Love you dad,” he wrote in the caption. “Gone but never forgotten….Give mom a hug for me…. y’all did good man. Thank you for everything…. I’m a better father because of you We will all make you proud….” he continued. He added a second post with his late dad, simply captioning it, “RIP spoon …..” Hart last featured his dad in an Instagram birthday post from 2020, writing, “Happy B Day to the man the myth and the legend….Spoonie G’s aka spoon aka my crazy ass father. Truly the toughest man on the planet…. love you Dad .”
Several celebrity friends sent support and condolences to the comedian on the platform, such as longtime pal Dwayne Johnson, who wrote, “Luv u I’m here.” Stranger Things’ Caleb McLaughlin expressed support for Hart by commenting with a praying hand emoji and a heart. Chelsea Handler also responded, writing, “Oh, sorry, Kev. He wouldn’t have left you before he knew you were good.” Hart often talked about his troubled childhood relationship with Witherspoon in his standup routines. However, the two had become close as his career prospered, and Witherspoon became a significant figure in his son’s life.
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“Regardless of my upbringing and the way I was raised and how often he was in my life, he’s my dad…I have a positive outlook on life regardless, and I’m going to love you because you’re my father,” Hart told People in 2018. His childhood was punctuated by Witherspoon’s struggles with drug addiction and multiple jail stints. “I understand that nobody’s perfect, people are flawed, people make mistakes,” Hart said. “I shouldn’t hold a high level of judgement over your head about things I can’t change.” During a 2017 interview on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, the comedian was candid about his father’s addiction and the lessons he learned about fatherhood. “My kids actually think I’m the coolest dad on the planet … I know why I am the way that I am, my dad has a lot to do with that,” he explained. “The mistakes that my dad made, you know, the decisions to do drugs, being in and out of jail, in and out of our lives. I saw firsthand what not being present did, and because of that, I now know what being present means.”
