Sidney Poitier: The 2013 "Sunday Morning" interview

I'm a Baptist I don't go to mass Zika Well, how did you get there before I got there? we walk every

sunday

now we have you now dad, you don't have me he was a legend, he was a pioneer sydney

poitier

was a groundbreaking actor truly one of a kind a few years ago we asked leslie stahl to speak to the oscar winning actor no It occurred to us best that I remember that their conversation has been a series of firsts in 1959 he was the first black man nominated for an Oscar as best actor for his role as an escaped convict alongside Tony Curtis kiss me again he was the first black man to kiss a white woman in a movie I have this scooter a big, strong man sent me he didn't say anything sending me to any place he was passing through and when he won the Oscar for best actor in 1964 he was not only the first black actor to do so but who remained the only one until 2002 after starring in more than 50 films foitier says his career choices focused less on being the first and more on the image of his characters.

You wouldn't play anyone who was immoral. No, no, if you look back at my career, you'll find out that I didn't, I didn't. Once his typical character was dignified, proud and ethical, well, you were pretty sure you're not your virgil, a virgil, that's a funny name for a kid who comes from Philadelphia, what do they call you there? They call me Mr. Tibbs, take Virgil Tibbs to Philadelphia. Homicide detective who reluctantly helps the police chief of a small Mississippi town, played by Rod Steiger, solve a murder. Why did you two come here to ask about Mr.

Colbert, but before signing on to play the role, Poitier asked the movie studio for a major change to the script? to this scene mr. colbert was ever in this greenhouse let's say last night around midnight i said that if he slaps me i will slap him back you will put in writing that the studio agrees that the film will not be shown with me anywhere in the world standing still there, getting the slap, God, you had this written in the contract, that's right, you saw it, I saw it, what are you going to do about it?

I don't know and of course it's one of the great moments of the entire movie. movie when you slap him back yes, I knew he would have been insulting all the black people in the world. The youngest of seven siblings, Sydney was born three months early while his Bahamian parents were in Miami selling tomatoes, not knowing if he would survive the ones his father bought. a small coffin while his mother was consulting a palmistry reader the lady took his hand and started talking to my mother and she said don't worry about your son he will survive he will walk with the kings sydney lived in the bahamas until he was 15 when his Parents feared that he was on a path to crime, they sent him back to Miami to live with his older brother, but at 16 Sydney went to New York where he tried acting even though he had only had two years of school, okay. , here's my big question you couldn't read you had a very thick Bahamian accent I had it and you decide to try to become an actor I did it why didn't you take that path?

Has no sense. I had no way of knowing that there is a crazy thing I'm trying to do after a disastrous audition with the American Negro Theater where Pottier could barely read the script an act of kindness at his job as a dishwasher changed one of the lives waiters an old Jewish man I had a newspaper and he walked up to me and looked at me and said what's new in the newspaper and I looked at this man and I said I can't tell you what's in the newspaper, I said because I can't read very well he says let me ask you something would you like me to read with you I said yes if I lied now let me tell you something every night every night the place is closed everyone is gone and he sat there with me week after week after week after week I learned a lot and then things started happening like getting an acting apprenticeship at the same theater company that had laughed at him at his audition.

There Poitier learned alongside actors such as Ruby D Aussie Davis and Harry Belafonte. What is a great idea? What are you going to do now? Look, I'm trying to help your brother. Why don't you shut up? Take care, black boy, watch how you talk to me. Shut up and then in 1950 he was cast in his first leading role in a dead end movie okay this is what he played a doctor who faces the overt racism of a prisoner played by Richard Widmark please help me , don't look, he's sick, he's crazy, that's all you said, but I can't kill a man just because he hates me.

From the beginning of his career, Poitier insisted on portraying men who were upright, well-educated and often stronger in character than the whites around him. I didn't get into the movie business to be symbolized as someone else's vision of me if the screen did. don't leave me room in the structure of your script i take a step back i couldn't do it i just couldn't do it in 1967 sydney

poitier

was among the top 10 hollywood money makers alright, take a seat and one of the top ten leading men in that alone year starred sir with love, take care in the heat of the night and guess who's coming to dinner.

This is John with Spencer Tracy and Catherine Hepburn Dr. prentice, I'm very glad to meet you, I'm delighted to meet you Mr. Righten but that year you began to face criticism from some in the African American community who labeled you an uncle tom for the purity of your rules and it didn't hurt you you hurt me so that I simply say that I live by a certain code I have to have a certain decency in my pattern of behavior I have to have that new york slave eh, that's right in the 1970s poitiers took up directing and surprisingly the actor who so often impersonated elegance, grace and seriousness give me our life in the 1980s he dedicated himself to writing books, produced three autobiographies and when we spoke in

2013

,

sidney

poitier, then 86 years old, had just written a novel, he did not have the intention to make an impression, I was finding liberation within myself, I was searching for Who am I at this point in my life?

Did you discover something? Yes, who are you? I'm a good person.