Sidney Poitier, a trailblazing actor who paved the way for many Black actors, has died, NBC News reports. He was 94.
The Hollywood icon was the first Black man to earn an Academy Award for best actor for the role he played in the 1963 film, “Lilies of the Field.”
Poitier strived to break barriers for Black actors and steered away from roles depicting racial stereotypes.
In movies such as “A Patch of Blue,” “To Sir, With Love,” “In the Heat of the Night” and “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” he played roles portraying intelligent men as he was dedicated to displaying Black excellence in movies.
“I felt very much as if I were representing 15, 18 million people with every move I made,” he wrote, referring to how it felt being the only Black person on a movie set.
The actor’s cause of death has not been disclosed at this time.
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