Fans of Ruby Dee

African-American stage, film, and TV luminary Ruby Dee was born in Cleveland, the daughter of a Pullman-porter father and schoolteacher mother. While growing up in Harlem, Dee developed an interest in the theater. In 1941, she began studying under Morris Carnovsky at the American Negro Theatre. While attending Hunter College, she made her first professional stage appearance in South Pacific (not the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, but a short-lived 1943 drama). On Broadway from 1946, Dee's first major success was as the title character in Anna Lucasta. In 1948, she married actor Ossie Davis, with whom she has since appeared in everything from Shakespeare to TV margarine commercials. Though she and Davis were both uncredited in their joint film debut, 1950's No Way Out, Dee achieved second billing in her next feature, The Jackie Robinson Story (1950) (40 years after playing Jackie's wife in this film, she was cast as the famed ballplayer's mother in the made-for-TV The Court-Martial of Jackie Robinson). Among her favorite stage roles were Ruth Younger in Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun, and Luttiebelle in her husband Ossie Davis' play Purlie Victorious, roles that she would commit to film in 1961 and 1963 respectively. She has been prominently featured in the works of director Spike Lee, notably Do the Right Thing (1989) and Jungle Fever (1991). On TV, Dee was a regular on The Guiding Light, Roots: The Next Generations, and The Middle Ages; she has also been cast in a number of made-for-TV feature films, winning an Emmy for her performance in the 1990 Hallmark Hall of Fame presentation Decoration Day. In addition to her acting credits, Ruby Dee is an accomplished writer; she has contributed a weekly column to New York's Amsterdam News, co-authored the script for the 1967 film Up Tight!, penned the 1975 TV play Twin-Bit Gardens, and published a book of poetry, Glowchild (1972). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide