TikTok Resurfaces Video of Don Cheadle Performing With East High Students

"Oh, what fun it is to sing on Channel 6 today!"

December 23, 2024

A video of Don Cheadle performing at East High is on TikTok. TikTok genx_stories_colorado

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When Don Cheadle riffed on "Jingle Bells" with the East High Angelaires during his senior year of high school, he likely had no idea that a recording of the performance from Rocky Mountain PBS's Prime Time would proliferate online more than three decades later. After all, there wasn't any TikTok — much less iPhones or social media — in 1982.

The video, posted by genx_stories_colorado, shows Cheadle adding a scat-heavy doo-wop spin to "Jingle Bells," then singing a duet with an unnamed male before the two students move back to their places with the singing group.

Cheadle is just one of the stars on East High's famous alumni roster, which also includes Pam Grier, Hattie McDaniel and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. After graduating and leaving Denver, Cheadle studied theater at the California Institute of the Arts, from which he graduated in 1986.

Cheadle went from the stage to the screen with bit roles on TV before winning a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Sammy Davis Jr. in The Rat Pack and gaining fame with roles in films like Boogie Lights, Ocean's Eleven and Hotel Rwanda, for which he received an Academy Award nomination, as well as Marvel movies including Iron Man 2, Iron Man 3, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Avengers: Endgame, Captain Marvel and more.

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