N!xau

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N!xau (or earlier G!kau; birth name Gcao Coma) (December 16?, 1944? – July 1, 2003) was a Namibian bush farmer and actor who was made famous by his roles in the 1980 movie The Gods Must Be Crazy and its sequels, in which he played the Kalahari Bushman Xixo. The exclamation mark in his name is a symbol for a click consonant in his native tongue, Ju/’hoan.

In 1992, N!xau appeared in a documentary saying he deeply regretted appearing in the 1980 film. Nevertheless, he starred in a series of sequels: The Gods Must Be Crazy 2, Crazy Safari, Crazy Hong Kong and The Gods Must Be Funny in China. In an obituary appearing in The Namibian, the newspaper wrote that "[l]egend has it" that N!xau let the wages he earned from the film blow away in the wind because he did not recognize the value of money.^[1] In any case, the Internet Movie Database reports that he earned o­nly a few hundred dollars for his work in The Gods Must Be Crazy.^[2] However, IMDB also reports that by the time of the first sequel, that he had obtained enough understanding to negotiate for over half a million South African rand (approximately US$80,000) to appear again.^[2]

After his film career ended, N!xau farmed maize, banana and beans and kept several head of cattle. o­n July 1, 2003, he died from "multi-drug resistant" tuberculosis,^[1] while he was hunting guinea fowl. He was buried o­n July 12 in a semi-traditional ceremony at Tsumkwe, next to the grave of his second wife.

N!xau's manager has said that his name was actually G!kau, but was listed as N!xau because of a typing error when the original film was made.