BY OSWALD T. BROWN
WASHINGTON, D.C., December 4, 2019 — My friend Lionel Evans in The Bahamas posted a video of “Sidney Poitier — From Baby to 91 Year Old” that was followed by a collection of videos on the remarkable career of this internationally acclaimed actor. One of those videos was a 2009 interview with Sir Sidney that I decided to share as a personal “keepsake” memento because, like all Bahamians, I am immensely proud of the accomplishments of Sir Sidney, who although he was born in Miami, is a true Bahamian.
Here’s a brief background on this internationally acclaimed Bahamian-American actor gleaned from Wikipedia:
“Sir Sidney Poitier, KBE ( born February 20, 1927) is a Bahamian-American actor and film director. He received two nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actor, winning one, by which he became the first black actor to win the Award. He was also nominated six times for both the Golden Globe for Best Actor and the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award (BAFTA) for Best Foreign Actor, winning each once. From 1997 to 2007, he served as the Bahamian Ambassador to Japan.
Poiter’s family lived in The Bahamas, but he was born in Miami while they were visiting, thereby acquiring American citizenship. He grew up in The Bahamas before moving to New York when he was 16. He joined the North American Negro Theatre eventually landing his first film role in 1950 with his role as an incorrigible high school student in Blackboard Jungle (1955) giving him his breakthrough.
In 1958 Poitier starred with Tony Curtis in the critically acclaimed The Defiant Ones as chained-together convicts who escape and must cooperate. Both actors received nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actor, with Poitier’s being the first ever for a black actor, as well as nominations for the BAFTAs, which Poitier won. In 1964 he won the Academy Award for Best Actor and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor for his role in Lilies of the Field (1963), in which he played a handyman who stays with and helps a group of German-speaking nuns build a chapel. Poitier also received critical acclaim for A Raisin in the Sun (1961) and A Patch of Blue (1965).
He continued to break ground in three successful 1967 films, each dealing with issues of race and race relations: To Sir, with Love; Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, and In the Heat of the Night, making him the top box-office star of that year. He received nominations for the Golden Globes and BAFTAs for the latter film, but not for the Oscars, likely due to vote splitting between his roles.
After twice reprising his Virgil Tibbs character from In the Heat of the Night and acting in a variety of other films, including the thriller The Wilby Conspiracy (1975), with Michael Caine, Poiter turned to acting/directing with the action-comedies Uptown Saturday Night (1974), Let’s Do It Again (1975), and A Piece of the Action (1978), all co-starring Bill Cosby. During a decade away from acting he directed the successful Stir Crazy (1980) starring Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder, among other films. He returned to acting in the late 1980s and early 1990s in a few thrillers and television roles.
Poitier was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1974. In 2009 Poitier was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States’ highest civilian honor. In 2016, he was awarded the BAFTA Fellowship for outstanding lifetime achievement in film. In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked Poitier 22nd on their list of Greatest Male Stars of classic Hollywood cinema. In 2002 Poitier was chosen to receive an Academy Honorary Award, in recognition of his “remarkable accomplishments as an artist and as a human being.”
Click on the following link to view the video of the 2009 interview Sir Sidney Poitier https://youtu.be/_nKcrKoX7Is
