Vim & Vigor - Winter 2009 - (Page 34)

over sidney poitier, 82, triumphed over poverty and racial prejudice to become one of the greatest movie actors ever—and then he - overcame prostate cancer lready recognized as one of the most successful actors of all time, Sidney Poitier was still ﬂourishing in his mid-60s: acting, directing and enjoying the attention of his children, grandchildren and an adoring public. But then the biopsy result came back: prostate cancer. Like the unprovoked punch to the face from a white man when he was 14—an early encounter with racism he’ll never forget—the blow was unexpected and devastating. How could this happen? Born the seventh child to a semiliterate tomato farmer in the Bahamas, Poitier began his unlikely rise to stardom after trying an acting class in Harlem at 18. He is not the only tall, handsome, conﬁdent and articulate black man to reach the top of his calling. The list unfurls from Frederick Douglass, George Washington Carver and Thurgood Marshall to Muhammad Ali, Tiger Woods, Denzel Washington, Colin Powell and Barack Obama. But he stands as high as any of them in the impact he had in breaking down racial prejudice because of the roles he undertook. In the racially charged 1960s, he burst stereotypes by playing exemplary leading men who exuded dignity. He builds a chapel for no pay in Lilies of the Field, teaches inner-city kids in To Sir, with Love, solves a homicide in a racist Southern town in In the Heat of the Night and confronts the prejudice of PHOTOGRAPH BY GASPER TRINGALE/CPI by bob cooper

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Vim & Vigor - Winter 2009

Vim & Vigor - Winter 2009
Contents
Opening Thoughts
For Your Health
Close Call
Model Behavior
Is It a Sign?
Your Heart: The Owners Manual
Independence Days
The Right Stuff
Watch and Learn
Up to Speed
Pedi-Cures
It Ain't Brain Surgery
Centering Preganancy
Somebody Special
From Here to Hanoi
Community
Ask the Experts

Vim & Vigor - Winter 2009