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[[image - b/w photos of Sidney Poitier]]

SIDNEY POITIER

Sidney Poitier has rightly been . the first Negro matinee idol Hollywood has produced. According to Box-office Magazine, he outdraws such film giants as Sean Connery, Jack Lemmon, Michael Caine, Cary Grant and Steve McQueen. In addition to acting, he has also evolved into producing, writing and directing.

Born in Miami, Florida, February 20, 1927, he grew up on Cat Island in the Bahamas and on the island of Nassau, where he went to school all too briefly. As the last of eight children and with an arthritic father, Poitier had to go to work at an early age. Before he was 15, he was sent to his married brother, Cyril, in Miami, where he went to work, handicapped by his strong West Indian dialect.

He hated Florida and rode the rails to Harlem, arriving in 1943 with $1.50 to his name. He worked as a dishwasher and slept on a rooftop across from Broadway's Capitol Theatre. He enlisted and spent two years in the U.S. Army and didn't seem to be going anywhere after his discharge.

He saw an ad and auditioned for the American Negro Theatre, but his accent once again got in the way. He spent six painful months ridding himself of this encumbrance by imitating voices he listened to on the radio and went back to the American Negro Theatre. He wasn't hired, but he was given acting lessons in exchange for janitorial services. Eventually, he made his Broadway debut as Polydorus in a short-lived, all Negro production of "Lysistrata," which opened at the Belasco Theatre, N.Y.C. October 1946. Shortly thereafter he joined the cast of "Anna Lucasta" and tested for and got his first commercial movie, "No Way Out." He had earlier appeared in the documentary "From Whom Cometh Help."

He appeared in many American Negro Theatre productions, scoring his biggest Broadway success in 1959 as the star of "A Raisin in the Sun." He recently directed Robert Alan Aurthur's stage play "Carry Me Back to Morningside Heights."

Most of his career has been concerned with films and most of his appearances have been distinguished ones. There are a couple, like "Porgy and Bess," which he now regrets having done, but they are few.

His films include "Cry The Beloved Country." "Red Ball Express," "Go, Man, Go," "The Blackboard Jungle," "Goodbye, My Lady," "Something Of Value," "Edge Of The City" (he had previously appeared in "A Man Is Ten Feet Tall," the earlier television version of this Robert Alan Aurthur script), "Band Of Angels," "The Defiant Ones," "The Mark Of The Hawk," "All The Young Men," "A Raisin In The Sun," "Paris Blues," "Pressure Point," "Lilies Of The Field," (for which he won an Academy Award), "The Devil At Four O'Clock," "The Long Ships," "Slender Thread," "A Patch Of Blue," "Duel At Diablo," "The Bedford Incident," "To Sir With Love," "In The Heat Of The Night" and "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner." He did the cameo role of Simon in "The Greatest Story Ever Told." He was scheduled to be in "Dr. Dolittle," but a schedule conflict prevented his appearance. 

He and his family live in New York.