Christopher "Big Black" Boykin (January 13, 1972 – May 9, 2017) was an American television personality and musician best known for his role on the

MTV MTV (an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable television television channel, channel and the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global. Launched on ...

reality television series Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring ordinary people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early 1990s ...

'' Rob & Big'', in which he co-starred with professional

skateboarder Skateboarding is an action sport that involves riding and performing tricks using a skateboard, as well as a recreational activity, an art form, an entertainment industry job, and a method of transportation. Originating in the United Stat ...

Rob Dyrdek Robert Stanley Dyrdek (born June 28, 1974) is an American entrepreneur, actor, producer, reality TV personality, and former professional skateboarder. He is best known for his roles in the MTV reality and variety shows '' Rob & Big'', '' Rob D ...

from 2006 to 2008.

Early life

Boykin was born on January 13, 1972, in

Chicago, Illinois Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

and grew up in Raleigh, Mississippi. He graduated from Stone High School in Wiggins, Mississippi in 1990, and served in the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the naval warfare, maritime military branch, service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is the world's most powerful navy with the largest Displacement (ship), displacement, at 4.5 millio ...

Television career

In a skit for

DC Shoes DC Shoes, Inc. is an American brand specializes in footwear for action sports such as skateboarding and snowboarding. The company also manufactures apparel, bags, accessories, hats, t-shirts, and posters. History DC was founded in June 1994 by ...

, professional skateboarder Rob Dyrdek hired Boykin to be his bodyguard and to protect him from security guards. From November 2006 to April 2008, he and Dyrdek starred in the

'' Rob & Big'' on

. In a 2006 episode of ''Rob & Big'', Dyrdek and Boykin visit the studios of game developer

EA Black Box EA Black Box (formerly Black Box Games) was a video game developer based in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada, founded in 1998 by former employees of Radical Entertainment and later acquired by Electronic Arts (EA). The developers are primarily k ...

in Vancouver to do

motion capture Motion capture (sometimes referred as mocap or mo-cap, for short) is the process of recording high-resolution motion (physics), movement of objects or people into a computer system. It is used in Military science, military, entertainment, sports ...

for a

video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

in which they were to become characters. The game, '' Skate'', was published in 2007. Boykin and Dyrdek also appeared in the 2009 sequel, ''

Skate 2 ''Skate 2'' is a 2009 skateboarding video game developed by EA Black Box and published by Electronic Arts. The game was released worldwide in January 2009 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 after the spin-off title '' Skate It''. It is the sequel to ...

''. In 2007, Boykin launched a clothing brand, Big Black, to market T-shirts and hats that bore his catchphrase, "Let's Do Work". In the show's 2008 season, Boykin set two

Guinness world records ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a British reference book published annually, list ...

: one for peeling and eating three bananas in one minute, and another for eating five powdered doughnuts in two minutes, 45 seconds. Boykin left ''Rob & Big'' after the third season, since he was starting a family. MTV premiered '' Rob Dyrdek's Fantasy Factory'' in February 2009, less than a year after the final episode of ''Rob & Big''. Boykin joined the cast in 2011, and remained until the show's final episode in 2015. He also appeared on three episodes of Dyrdek's show '' Ridiculousness'', which premiered in 2011. Guest appearances on the MTV series '' Guy Code'' and ''Snack Off'' (2014) are among his other TV appearances.

Final years

Boykin married Shannon Turley in 2008; although the couple divorced in 2009, they were living together shortly before Boykin's death, due to his worsening health. Their daughter, Isis, was nine years old when Boykin died in May 2017. Boykin had a defibrillator implant for his heart. In early May 2017, he was hospitalized in

Plano, Texas Plano ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for "flat surface" /'plano/) is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, where it is the largest city in Collin County, Texas, Collin County. A small portion of Plano is located in Denton County, Texas, Denton Count ...

, and was placed on a heart monitor. On May 9, his heart stopped; staff spent 30 minutes trying to revive him. He was pronounced dead at 4:00 pm CDT. Although initial reports did not mention an official cause, Boykin's heart failure was the result of a

heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when Ischemia, blood flow decreases or stops in one of the coronary arteries of the heart, causing infarction (tissue death) to the heart muscle. The most common symptom ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Boykin, Christopher 1972 births 2017 deaths People from Raleigh, Mississippi United States Navy sailors Participants in American reality television series African-American television personalities Place of death missing 20th-century African-American people 21st-century African-American people African-American United States Navy personnel