Sidney Poitier

Sidney Poitier was a groundbreaking international film star, director, author, civil rights activist, and father of six. Over the course of his life, his image both onscreen and off stood as an example of strength, style, talent, and integrity. He starred in more than forty films, including The Defiant Ones, A Raisin in the Sun, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, In the Heat of the Night, and Lilies of the Field, for which Poitier became the first Black man to win the Academy Award for Best Actor. Over the years Poitier’s achievements were recognized with a Kennedy Center Honors Award, an NAACP Image Award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, a Grammy Award, and the American Film Institute’s Life Achievement Award, among many other accolades.