DEADLINE: Sidney Poitier the trailblazing and iconic Black actor, director and civil rights activist, has died, Bahamian Minister of Foreign Affairs Fred Mitchell has announced.
Details of his death were not immediately available.
The first Black actor to win the Academy Award for Best Actor – for 1964’s Lilies of the Field – Mr. Poitier was towering figure in Hollywood and beyond, starring in such classics as Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, In the Heat of the Night and To Sir With Love, to name a select few, while taking on a global profile for his unceasing calls for civil rights, racial equality and human dignity.