Jamie Foxx to Save Urban-Flavored Sketch Comedy From Extinction

If a part of you died when MADtv was yanked off the air in 2009, and your heart grows heavy every time you hear the name Bunifa Latifah Halifah Sharifa Jackson uttered in conversation, then Jamie Foxx has got the project for you. In between urbanizing Laverne & Shirley for the big screen and romancing Kirstie Alley long-distance, the Oscar-winner is planning to reinvigorate the "urban-flavored sketch comedy show" genre that he helped pioneer during his days on In Living Color. Details after the jump.

The In Living Color alum is cooperating with fellow Color writers and MadTV creators Fax Bahr and Adam Small on an untitled pilot for Fox, with production set up at Tantamount and Fox TV Studios. The team has already recruited one performer for the project: comedian/actor Affion Crockett (Wild Out), best known for his impressions of Russell Simmons, Kanye West, Chris Brown and Jay-Z. Hopefully, this Foxx-Fox project will gain more traction than the sketch-comedy show that Foxx, Bahr and Small tried to get off the ground at MTV last year.

And for those who have forgotten and/or overlooked Foxx's humble beginnings as a sketch performer, here lies his character Wanda Wayne a.k.a. the ugliest woman in the urban sketch comedy world.

· Fox Picks Up Pilot From Jamie Foxx [THR]