Oscar-winning actor Sidney Poitier broke down barriers for actors of color, becoming a Hollywood leading man at a time before Black Americans were even granted full civil rights. He also opened doors for Black directors after stepping behind the camera for nine features.
Born in 1927, Poitier made his big screen debut in “No Way Out” (1950), playing a doctor treating a racist white bigot (Richard Widmark). Just eight years later he was competing at the Oscars as Best Actor for “The Defiant Ones” (1958), which centers on two runaway fugitives chained together — one Black, the other white (Tony Curtis). His bid made him the first Black male performer to contend in an acting category at the Academy.
He would soon be joining the winner’s circle with “Lilies of the Field” (1963), a small-scale drama about a wandering handyman who helps a group of nuns build a church. Poitier made history as the first Black thespian to win Best Actor, a feat that wouldn’t be repeated until 38 years later when Denzel Washington clinched the prize for “Training Day” (2001). It was sweetly serendipitous that he pulled off this victory the same year that Poitier was given an Honorary Oscar. During his acceptance speech, Washington gave his mentor a shoutout, saying “I’ll always be chasing you, Sidney. I’ll always be following in your footsteps.”
Poitier won the Golden Globe for “Lilies,” competing again for “The Defiant Ones,” “Porgy and Bess” (1959), “A Raisin in the Sun” (1961), “A Patch of Blue” (1965) and “In the Heat of the Night” (1967), as well as the TV movie “Separate But Equal” (1991), in which he played Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. That role brought him an Emmy nomination, as did his performance as Nelson Mandela in “Mandela and de Klerk” (1997). His performance in the original Broadway production of “Raisin” brought him a Tony bid in 1959. He also won the BAFTA for “The Defiant Ones.”
Additionally, he received the Cecil B. DeMille award at the Golden Globes in 1982, the AFI Lifetime Achievement prize in 1992, the Kennedy Center Honors in 1995, the SAG life achievement Award in 1999 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009, presented by President Barrack Obama, a trailblazer in his own right.
Tour our photo gallery of Poitier’s 20 greatest films, including a few for which he should’ve earned Oscar nominations.
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20. UPTOWN SATURDAY NIGHT (1974)
Image Credit: Warner Bros/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Sidney Poitier. Written by Richard Wesley. Starring Bill Cosby, Harry Belafonte, Flip Wilson, Richard Pryor, Paula Kelly, Rosalind Cash, Roscoe Lee Brown, Johnny Sekka, Calvin Lockhart.
Poitier directed four movies with disgraced comic Bill Cosby, costarring in three of them (the less said about their final collaboration, the supernatural comedy “Ghost Dad,” the better). The best of these pairings, “Uptown Saturday Night,” casts them as two friends on a desperate search to find a stolen wallet containing a winning lottery ticket. They seek the help of a powerful gangster (an hilarious Harry Belafonte) hoping to take down a rival (Calvin Lockhart). Two sequels — “Let’s Do It Again” and “A Piece of the Action” — followed.
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19. DUEL AT DIABLO (1966)
Image Credit: Rainbow/Brien/Cherokee/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Ralph Nelson. Screenplay by Marvin H. Albert and Michael M. Grilikhes, based on the novel ‘Apache Rising’ by Albert. Starring James Garner, Bill Travers, Bibi Andersson, Dennis Weaver.
After guiding Poitier to a history-making Oscar victory, “Lilies of the Field” director Ralph Nelson next cast him in this brutally violent western thriller. “Duel at Diablo” centers on a frontier scout (James Garner) hunting the white murderer of his Comanche wife. He rescues a woman (Bibi Andersson) abducted by Apaches, though her husband (Dennis Weaver) isn’t exactly pleased to see her given she’d previously returned and run off to be reunited with the tribe leader. When Garner gets a lead on the location of his wife’s killer, he agrees to transport a calvary supply unit to the next fort with the help of the couple and a horse wrangler (Poitier). The film raises surprisingly potent questions about the racism that’s often inherent in the genre.
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18. SNEAKERS (1992)
Image Credit: Melinda Sue Gordon/Universal/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Phil Alden Robinson. Written by Phil Alden Robinson, Lawrence Lasker, Walter Parkes. Starring Robert Redford, Dan Aykroyd, Ben Kingsley, Mary McDonnell, River Phoenix, David Strathairn.
Poitier appeared in only a handful of films throughout the 1980s and 1990s, focusing mostly on his directing career. One of his last big screen appearances was in this breezy caper that’s a sort of “Oceans 11” for computer hackers. “Sneakers” stars Robert Redford as the leader of a group of espionage experts (including Poitier, Dan Aykroyd, David Strathairn, River Phoenix, and Mary McDonnell) involved in a complicated software heist against one of Redford’s former friends turned rival (Ben Kingsley). Though it’s far from great art, it’s highly entertaining to watch this eclectic group of thespians have such a good time together.
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17. PRESSURE POINT (1962)
Image Credit: United Artists/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Hubert Cornfield. Screenplay by Hubert Cornfield and S. Lee Pogostin, based on the short story ‘Destiny’s Tot’ by Robert Mitchell Linder. Starring Bobby Darin, Peter Falk, Carl Benton Reid.
Among the many 1960s movies that used contemporary social issues as dramatic fodder, “Pressure Point” holds up surprisingly well, perhaps because it’s pitched as a psychological thriller. It all starts when a young psychiatrist (Peter Falk) goes to a senior doctor (Poitier) for advice about a troublesome patient. Through flashbacks, the older shrink recalls a case from his early days when he had to treat a paranoid, violent American Nazi (Golden Globe nominee Bobby Darin) charged with sedition during WWII. Though Poitier perceives him to be a threat, the government decides to release Darin to tragic results.
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16. THE SLENDER THREAD (1965)
Image Credit: Athene/Paramount/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Sydney Pollack. Written by Shana Alexander, David Rayfiel, Stirling Silliphant. Starring Anne Bancroft, Telly Savalas, Steven Hill, Ed Asner, Dabney Coleman.
Sydney Pollack’s feature directorial debut stars Anne Bancroft as a woman who takes a lethal dose of sleeping pills, then calls a crisis hotline to talk with someone before she dies. She gets in touch with a student volunteer (Poitier) who tries to keep her on the line long enough to track her down and organize a rescue. Pollack creates as much suspense as one can with two people talking on a telephone, aided by capable performances from Bancroft and Poitier. Though a box office bomb, the film managed to snag Oscar nominations for its black-and-white costumes and art direction.
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15. SHOOT TO KILL (1988)
Image Credit: Moviestore/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Roger Spottiswoode. Screenplay by Harv Zimmel, Michael Burton, Daniel Petrie Jr., story by Zimmel. Starring Tom Berenger, Kirstie Alley, Andrew Robinson, Clancy Brown.
Poitier took a decade-long absence from acting before returning to the screen with this slickly-made thriller by Roger Spottiswoode. He plays Warren Stantin, an FBI agent who teams up with a wilderness tracker (Tom Berenger) to find a sadistic killer (Clancy Brown) who has disappeared in the mountains. Kirstie Allie costars as the tracker’s girlfriend, who’s leading a hiking group held hostage by the madman. There’s nothing too deep or meaningful about “Shoot to Kill,” but Poitier and Berenger have an easy chemistry that makes this oddball buddy picture work.
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14. BUCK AND THE PREACHER (1972)
Image Credit: Columbia/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Sidney Poitier. Written by Ernest Kinoy. Starring Harry Belafonte, Ruby Dee, Cameron Mitchell.
Having firmly established himself as a leading man, Poitier kicked off his directorial career with this entertaining, socially-conscious western. He also plays the lead role of Buck, an ex-Civil War soldier transporting freed slaves out west. With a group of violent whites hired by plantation owners hot on his trail, Buck teams up with a con man named the Preacher (Harry Belafonte) to fight them off. The actor shows a steady hand behind the camera (becoming one of the first African Americans to helm a major motion picture) that would serve him well in eight subsequent films.
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13. PARIS BLUES (1961)
Image Credit: United Artists/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Martin Ritt. Screenplay by Walter Bernstein, Irene Kamp, Jack Sher, Lulla Rosenfeld, based on the novel by Harold Flender. Starring Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Louis Armstrong, Diahann Carroll.
When “Paris Blues” was released in 1961, it was met with more excitement for its soundtrack by Duke Ellington (which earned Oscar and Grammy nominations) than anything else. Yet its far more interesting for it pointed examination of Europe’s more open acceptance of black people contrasted with the American racism of the time (and of today). Poitier and Paul Newman star as two expatriates living in Paris — one a jazz saxophonist, the other a trombonist — who romance two American tourists (Newman’s real life wife Joanne Woodward and Diahann Carroll). When the relationships become more serious, the bohemian musicians must reconsider their futures abroad.
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12. PORGY AND BESS (1959)
Image Credit: Goldwyn/Columbia/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Otto Preminger. Screenplay by N. Richard Nash, based on the opera by DuBose Heyward, George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin. Starring Dorothy Dandridge, Sammy Davis Jr., Pearl Bailey, Brock Peters, Diahann Carroll.
Good luck finding a copy of this one: an issue with the rights and dissatisfaction with the Gershwin estate has prevented “Porgy and Bess” from ever having a home video release, and very few prints of the completed film still exist. Poitier and Dorothy Dandridge star in the title roles as a crippled vagabond and a beautiful drug-addict who fall in love in the Catfish Row district of South Carolina during the early 1900s. Yet her violent ex (Brock Peters) and drug dealer (Sammy Davis Jr.) threaten to keep them apart. Both earned Golden Globe nominations for their work, while the film won an Oscar for its musical scoring.
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11. NO WAY OUT (1950)
Image Credit: 20th Century Fox/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. Screenplay by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and Lesser Samuels. Starring Richard Widmark, Linda Darnell, Stephen McNally, Mildred Joan Smith.
Poitier made his big screen debut with this once-potent race relations drama. Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, “No Way Out” centers on a black doctor (Poitier) assigned to treat a wounded white bigot (Richard Widmark). When Widmark’s brother dies, he blames Poitier and orders his gang to take his rage out on the local African American community. Explosive in its time, the film has dated a bit by today’s standards, though it’s message is still resonant. Plus, it pointed the way towards a bright career for its leading man. Mankiewicz and Lesser Samuels earned an Oscar nomination for their screenplay (that same year, Mankiewicz won writing and directing prizes for Best Picture-champ “All About Eve”).
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10. A PATCH OF BLUE (1965)
Image Credit: Moviestore/REX/Shutterstock Written and directed by Guy Green, based on the novel ‘Be Ready with Bells and Drums’ by Elizabeth Kata. Starring Shelley Winters, Elizabeth Hartman, Wallace Ford, Ivan Dixon, Elisabeth Fraser.
“A Patch of Blue” was an early stab at portraying an interracial romance, with Elizabeth Hartman cast as a blind white girl falling in love with a black man (Poitier). It’s a new, quite literal twist on the old adage “love is blind.” Yet there’s not much physical affection in the film, with Poitier all but chaste throughout most of it, since it was made at a time when portraying such things would get it banned in theaters throughout the South. Still, it gets an A for effort. Shelley Winters won the Supporting Actress Oscar for playing Hartman’s abusive, prostitute mother. Hartman competed in Best Actress, while Poitier was snubbed despite earning bids at the Golden Globes and BAFTA.
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9. CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY (1951)
Image Credit: British Lion/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Zoltan Korda. Screenplay by Alan Paton and John Howard Lawson, based on the novel by Paton. Starring Canada Lee, Charles Carson, Joyce Carey.
Not to be confused with the 1995 James Earl Jones movie, this adaptation of Alan Paton’s novel casts Poitier as a minister in Johannesburg who helps a back-country preacher (Canada Lee) search for his missing son. He soon discovers that his child has become a thief and murderer, and that his sister has become a prostitute. Directed by Zoltan Korda, the film confronts some ugly truths about the effects of apartheid on Africa’s population, both white and black. Unfortunately, this one is hard to find on home video, having never been released on DVD in North America.
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8. EDGE OF THE CITY (1957)
Image Credit: Mgm/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Martin Ritt. Written by Robert Alan Aurthur. Starring John Cassavetes, Jack Warden, Kathleen Maguire, Ruby Dee.
“Edge of the City” marked the feature directing debut of Martin Ritt, and it’s a hidden gem of a movie casting Poitier and John Cassavetes as longshoremen who form a friendship that transcends the bigotry of the time. Jack Warden is the mob-installed foreman who’s racism threatens to destroy their bond. Shot on a shoestring budget on location in New York City, this is a gritty, powerful drama with a strong moral center that never sermonizes or grandstands. Poitier earned a BAFTA nomination as Best Foreign Actor for his performance, although he was overlooked at the Academy.
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7. GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER? (1967)
Image Credit: Columbia/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Stanley Kramer. Written by William Rose. Starring Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Katharine Houghton, Cecil Kellaway, Beah Richards, Roy E. Glenn, Isabel Sanford.
Stanley Kramer intended “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?” to be a daring indictment of racism, presenting a positive view of interracial marriage at a time when it was still illegal in 17 states. (The “Loving v. Virginia” Supreme Court case struck down anti-miscegenation laws the year it came out.) Yet it misses its mark by casting Poitier as a man of such upstanding integrity that his fiancee’s (Katharine Houghton) liberal parents (Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn) could have no possible objection to him aside from his race. His character is so saintly as to be almost neutered, which sets the tone for the rest of this high-gloss fluff. Yet its message is heartfelt, and it holds a special place in cinema history for being the last screen appearance of Tracy, who died shortly after shooting wrapped, and Hepburn. Oscars were won for Hepburn and William Rose’s screenplay.
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6. BLACKBOARD JUNGLE (1955)
Image Credit: Mgm/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Written and directed by Richard Brooks, based on the novel by Evan Hunter. Starring Glenn Ford, Vic Morrow, Anne Francis, Louis Calhern.
Richard Brooks’s “Blackboard Jungle” caused a stir when it was released in 1955, although it seems almost quaint by today’s standards. Glenn Ford stars as an teacher who arrives at a violent inner-city high school determined to do his job despite the protestations of his students. Poitier and Vic Morrow stand out as the main delinquents, who make life a living hell for Ford with their dangerous hijinks. While it’s not nearly as provocative as it was in its time, it still holds up as a sensationalist drama. Of special note, it caused a minor controversy by featuring a rock-and-roll song — Bill Haley & His Comet’s “Rock Around the Clock” — so prominently (including over the credits), which the studio feared it would cause riots in the theaters.
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5. TO SIR, WITH LOVE (1967)
Image Credit: Columbia/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Written and directed by James Clavell, based on the novel by E.R. Braithwaite. Starring Judy Geeson, Christina Roberts, Suzy Kendall.
The inspirational teacher genre isn’t exactly rife with originality, so most of the impact of each film relies solely on the actor at its center, be it Robert Donat (“Goodbye, Mr. Chips”), Maggie Smith (“The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie”), Edward James Olmos (“Stand and Deliver”), or Robin Williams (“Dead Poets Society”). Sidney Poitier is their equal in “To Sir, with Love,” which casts him an out-of-work engineer who takes a job teaching a group of undisciplined white students in the slums of London’s East End. As you can probably guess, he wins them over, but not without some much-needed charm. A made-for-TV sequel (directed by Peter Bogdanovich) followed in 1996.
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4. LILIES OF THE FIELD (1963)
Image Credit: United Artists/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Ralph Nelson. Screenplay by James Poe, based on the novel by William Edmund Barrett. Starring Lilia Skala, Stanley Adams, Lisa Mann, Isa Crino, Francesca Jarvis, Pamela Branch.
Poitier made Oscar history with his Best Actor victory for “Lilies of the Field,” becoming the first black performer to win that prize at a time when the Civil Rights Movement was leading to sweeping changes throughout the country. Given the climate of the times, his victory seemed all but inevitable by the time the envelope was opened, though that doesn’t make it any less deserved. Directed by Ralph Nelson, this small-scale drama tells a simple and moving tale about a traveling handyman (Poitier) who helps a group of nuns build a chapel. The film earned additional nominations in Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress (Lilia Skala), Best Adapted Screenplay (James Poe), and Best Black-and-White Cinematography.
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3. THE DEFIANT ONES (1958)
Image Credit: United Artists/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Stanley Kramer. Written by Nedrick Young and Harold Jacob Smith. Starring Tony Curtis, Theodore Bikel, Charles McGraw, Lon Chaney Jr., King Donovan, Claude Akins, Cara Williams.
“The Defiant Ones” earned Poitier an Oscar nomination as Best Actor, making him the first black male performer to compete in an acting category. Typical of Stanley Kramer’s output, it’s a well-intentioned drama with a strong social message that’s still surprisingly timely today. Though most would dismiss his work as preachy and didactic, this one retains a raw emotional power thanks in large part to its dynamic stars. Poitier and Tony Curtis play escaped convicts chained to each other who must learn to get along in order to survive. Both competed at the Academy Awards in lead, losing to David Niven in “Separate Tables.” No matter, because five years later, Poitier would win a history-making award for “Lilies of the Field.”
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2. A RAISIN IN THE SUN (1961)
Image Credit: Columbia/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Daniel Petrie. Screenplay by Lorraine Hansberry, based on her play. Starring Ruby Dee, Claudia McNeil, Diana Sands, Stephen Perry.
Lorraine Hansberry’s landmark play about an impoverished black family made its way to screens with the original Broadway cast intact, forever enshrining it for future generations. Poitier reprised his Tony-nominated role of Walter Lee Younger, who has big plans for an insurance check that could change his family’s life. While his mother (Claudia McNeil) wants to use the money to buy a house in a white neighborhood, Walter would like to invest it in a liquor store. Rather than trying to substantially “open up” the action, director Daniel Petrie allows the power of Hansberry’s writing and the performances to carry the day. Poitier and McNeil earned lead acting Golden Globe nominations, yet were snubbed at the Oscars.
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1. IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT (1967)
Image Credit: Moviestore/REX/Shutterstock Directed by Norman Jewison. Screenplay by Stirling Silliphant, based on the novel by John Ball. Starring Rod Steiger, Warren Oates, Lee Grant, Larry Gates, Beah Richards, Quentin Dean.
It was the slap heard round the world. When Virgil Tibbs (Poitier) a black detective from Philadelphia investigating a murder in the deep South, fought back against a racist plantation owner (Larry Gates) in plain view of the white police chief (Rod Steiger), it sent shockwaves through audiences who before then had almost exclusively seen African Americans in more servile roles on movie screens. It was also a stunning change of pace for an actor who had previously made a name for himself playing dignified, non-violent individuals. Director Norman Jewison infuses this mystery thriller with a kinetic energy that matches the vigor of its two lead performances. “In the Heat of the Night” won five Oscars, including Best Picture. In a sign of the times still struggling to change, the Academy rewarded Steiger in Best Actor while failing to even nominate Poitier (in all fairness, he might have split the vote with his lead roles in “To Sir, with Love” and “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?” that same year). Two sequel and a TV adaptation followed.
