Emmy and Tony Award-winning actress Cicely Tyson, who distinguished herself in theater, film and television, passed away Thursday afternoon. She was 96.
“I have been managing Miss Tyson’s career for over 40 years, and every year has been a privilege and a blessing,” her manager, Larry Thompson, said in a statement. Cicely thinks of her new memoir as a Christmas tree adorned with all the ornaments of her personal and professional life. Today she places the last ornament, a star, on top of the tree. ‘
Tyson debuted with a small role in 1957’s “Twelve Angry Men” and her formal debut in the 1959 Sidney Poitier film “Odds Against Tomorrow”, followed by “The Comedians”, “The Last Angry Man”, “A Man Called Adam ”and“ The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. ”Because she refused to take part in the blaxploitation films that became popular in the late ’60s, she waited until 1972 to return to the screen in the drama. “Sounder,” which garnered several Oscar nominations, including one for Tyson for Best Actress.
Tyson received an Oscar nomination in 1973 for Martin Ritt’s drama “Sounder” and an honorary Oscar in 2018.
Variety reviewer AD Murphy was thrilled that the film was ‘excellent’ and added: “The performances of Paul Winfield and Cicely Tyson, as the dedicated, yet impoverished parents, are milestones in their own careers.”
Despite her performances on stage and in films, much of the actress’ best work has been done for television. In addition to ‘Miss Jane Pittman’, she has done excellent work in ‘Roots’, ‘The Wilma Rudolph Story’, ‘King: The Martin Luther King Story’, ‘When Nobody Would Listen’, ” A Woman Called Moses, ” The Marva Collins Story ‘,’ The Women of Brewster Place ‘,’ The Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All ‘and the TV adaptation of’ Trip to Bountiful ‘.
During her career, Tyson refused to play drug addicts, prostitutes, or maids, which she thought was demeaning to black women. But when a good part came, she grabbed it with determination.
On stage she was in 1961 in Jean The Genet’s original Off Broadway production “The Blacks” and decades later she won a Tony for her starring role in a revival of “The Trip to Bountiful.”
On television, she first landed a role for a black woman in a drama series, ‘East Side / West Side’, and the actress later won two well-deserved Emmies for 1974’s memorable ‘The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman’. She has been nominated a total of 16 times in her career, and also received the Supporting Actress Award in 1994 for an adaptation of “Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All”; she was nominated five times for guest actress in a drama for ‘How to get away with Murder’.
The actress became a household name thanks to her starring role in ‘Miss Jane Pittman’. The TV movie, in which a 110-year-old woman recalls her life, requires her to portray the heroine over a period of nine decades. Pauline Kael writes about Tyson’s performance and compares her ‘to the highest, because that’s the comparison she invited and deserved.’
She has also occasionally stayed on the big screen in films including ‘A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ But a Sandwich ‘,’ Richard Pryor ‘comedy’ Bustin ‘Loose’, ‘Fried Green Tomatoes’ and ‘Hoodlum’.
Tyson returned to Broadway in 1983 to star in a short revival of ‘The Corn Is Green’.
She also appeared on television in the title role of “Ms. Scrooge, a genealogical adaptation of Charles Dickens, as well as telepics, including ‘Benny’s Place’, ‘Playing With Fire’, ‘Acceptable Risks’, ‘Heat Wave’, ‘Duplicates’, ‘A Lesson Before Dying’ and ‘The Pink’ Parks story. ”
In 1994-95, she starred as a Southern lawyer in NBC’s short, legal drama ‘NBC’s Sweet Justice, and appeared in a 2009 episode of’ Law and Order: SVU ‘.
In her 70s, Tyson worked more in film than ever before in her career, thanks in part to Tyler Perry: She appeared in his films “Diary of a Mad Black Woman” (2005), “Madea’s Family Reunion (2006) and” Why did I get married too? ‘ (2010) as well as in the Perry starring role “Alex Cross” in 2012, which he does not direct.The actress also played supporting roles in ‘Because of Winn-Dixie’, ‘Fat Rose and Squeaking’, ‘Idlewild’ and ‘The Help’ in 2011.
Tyson, who has already clinched an impressive career, won the Tony for Best Actress for her role as Carrie Watts in the 2013 revival ‘A Trip to Bountiful’, and repeated the performance in a 2014 Lifetime TV adaptation.
Born in East Harlem as immigrant parents in the West Indies, Tyson rose from a humble beginning. After high school, she studied as a secretary for the American Red Cross before becoming a model; at the top of her game she appears in Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar. She studied at the Actors Studio and with Lloyd Richards and Vinnette Carroll, who played Tyson as Barbara Allen in a 1959 Off Broadway revival of the musical “The Dark of the Moon.” She participated in the variety show “Talent ’59” on Broadway and appeared in a production of “Jolly’s Progress” in which she also underestimated Eartha Kitt, before a role in “The Blacks” ignited her stage career.
In 1961, Tyson was one of the original members in ‘The Blacks’, which spent two years in the St. Mark’s Playhouse. Her teammates included Roscoe Lee Browne, James Earl Jones, Godfrey Cambridge and Raymond St. Jacques. The role of Virtue earned her the Vernon Rice Award, an achievement she repeated in 1962 for the production of ‘Moon on a Rainbow Shawl’. She co-starred with Diana Sands in the 1963 Broadway production of “Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright,” which closed during a newspaper strike, and later that year Off Broadway appeared in “The Blue Boy in Black” with Billy Dee Williams. She moved on to Carroll’s musical “Trumpets of the Lord” (she also appeared in the 1968 Broadway performance), as well as the 1966 production of “A Hand Is at the Gate”, the play “Carry Me Back to Morningside Heights” “from 1968 and the program of Lorraine Hansberry from 1969 reads:” To be young, gifted and black. “
Tyson was also one of the founding members of the Dance Theater of Harlem in 1969.
Tyson, interspersed with her performances on stage, appeared in a number of television programs, including a dramatic presentation of ‘Brown Girl, Brown Stones’ in 1960 and ‘Between Yesterday and Today’. East Side / West Side star George C. Scott, who was impressed by her performance in ‘The Blacks’, asked her to play his assistant in the 1963 CBS series. Although the program lasted only 26 episodes, it increased her visibility, and she followed it up with appearances in, among others, ‘Naked City’, ‘The Nurses’,’ I Spy ‘,’ Slattery’s People ‘and’ The Bill Cosby Show ‘.
Tyson has been active in charities and arts organizations, including Urban Gateways, the Human Family Institute, and the American Film Institute. She has received awards from the National Council of Negro Women and the NAACP, as well as the Capitol Press Award.
The actress was one of 25 black women honored for their contributions to art, entertainment and civil rights as part of Oprah Winfrey’s 2005 Legends Ball.
Tyson still remained feisty, even when she reached 90. She criticized an emerging version of ‘Roots’ as unnecessary, and in a speech at the Grace Awards, where Tyson received a lifelong award from the Alliance for Women in Media in May 2015, told the actress that she was asked : “Now that you’ve made it, what else are you going to do?” to which she replies, “My darling, the day I feel like I made it, I’m done.”
Tyson was married from 1981 to 1988 to jazz grower Miles Davis.
Survivors are her niece, British actress Cathy Tyson.