, whose dignity and self-assertion ushered in a new era in the depiction of African-Americans in Hollywood films as the civil rights movement was remaking America, has died, a spokesperson for the Bahamian Prime Minister confirmed toHe was the oldest living winner of the best actor Oscar — just one distinction in a career full of distinctions. He was 94.
The actor’s angry side emerged sharply in “In the Heat of the Night,” one of his finest roles. He played Virgil Tibbs, a Philadelphia homicide detective accused of murder in a small Mississippi town who teams with the local sheriff to solve the crime. In a signature moment, Tibbs is slapped by a rich white man, and he slaps him right back. Another occurs when the skeptical, racist white sheriff asks him what they call him in Philadelphia. He responds sternly, “They call me MISTER Tibbs.
But critics excoriated him for his role in “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?” He was called “a Stepin Fetchit in a gray flannel suit” and far worse for what they saw as yet another reassuring and accommodating role as an ideal Black man. Poitier plays a doctor famed for his work developing health programs in Africa who has come to ask for the hand of Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn’s daughter.
“The issue boiled down to why I wasn’t more angry and confrontational,” Poitier wrote in his memoir, “The Measure of a Man.” “In essence, I was being taken to task for playing exemplary human beings.” The actor’s long list of powerful or culturally significant performances began with Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s 1950 noir “No Way Out,” in which the 23-year-old actor played second lead as a doctor trying to save the life of a gunshot victim who is a violent racist.
Poitier was a different kind of actor from the beginning. Like his early role models Montgomery Clift and Marlon Brando, Poitier owned a distinctive voice, with a soft, reassuring timbre developed during his early years growing up on Cat Island in the Bahamas. He appeared in three films in 1965. They included “The Slender Thread,” where Poitier commands the screen as a worker on a crisis hotline. But for his critics, it was yet another role, like those in “The Defiant Ones” and “Edge of the City,” where he was called on to save a white person . He also starred in “The Bedford Incident” and “A Patch of Blue.” In the former, race isn’t acknowledged; in the latter, the heroine , whom Poitier’s character tries to help, is blind.
RIP Mr Poitier ❤
Rest in peace. Condolences to his family and friends.
One of the greatest of his time. May he rest in peace.
Rest in power. We celebrate all that you gave and left for us. Asante sana🙏🏿
😔✌🏻🙏🏻
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