Ruby Dee
Birthday:
Birthplace:
Not Available
African-American stage, film, and TV luminary Ruby Dee was born in Cleveland, the daughter of a Pullman-porter father and schoolteacher mother. While growing up in Harlem, Dee developed an interest in the theater. In 1941, she began studying under Morris Carnovsky at the American Negro Theatre. While attending Hunter College, she made her first professional stage appearance in South Pacific (not the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, but a short-lived 1943 drama). On Broadway from 1946, Dee's first major success was as the title character in Anna Lucasta. In 1948, she married actor Ossie Davis, with whom she appeared in everything from Shakespeare to TV margarine commercials. Though she and Davis were both uncredited in their joint film debut, 1950's No Way Out, Dee achieved second billing in her next feature, The Jackie Robinson Story (1950). Among her favorite stage roles were Ruth Younger in Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun, and Luttiebelle in her husband Ossie Davis' play Purlie Victorious, roles that she would commit to film in 1961 and 1963 respectively. On TV, Dee was a regular on The Guiding Light, Roots: The Next Generations, and The Middle Ages; Dee worked steadily throughout the 1970s, '80s, dividing her time more or less equally between television [with turns in such small-screen movies as The Atlanta Child Murders (1981), The Court-Martial of Jackie Robinson (1990) and the 1990 Decoration Day, for which she won an Emmy] and the big screen, where her credits included the features Cat People (1982), Cop and a Half (1993) and A Simple Wish (1997). Dee received a career resurgence thanks to her prominent enlistment in the features of Spike Lee (alongside Davis), notably Do the Right Thing (1989) and Jungle Fever (1991). As time rolled on, she also began to participate in documentaries, such as the 1998 Christianity: The First Thousand Years and the 1999 Smithsonian World: Nigerian Art - Kindred Spirits); made guest appearances in such prime-time series as Touched by an Angel; and essayed a prominent role opposite Halle Berry in the telemovie Oprah Winfrey Presents: Their Eyes Were Watching God (2005). She continued to work steadily after Davis's death in early 2005, and in fact received her first Best Supporting Actress Oscar Nomination for her role in Ridley Scott's period crime saga American Gangster (2007). In 2011 she participated in Sing Your Song, a well-received biography of Harry Belafonte from HBO. In addition to her acting credits, Ruby Dee was an accomplished writer; she contributed a weekly column to New York's Amsterdam News, co-authored the script for the 1967 film Up Tight!, penned the 1975 TV play Twin-Bit Gardens, and published a book of poetry, Glowchild (1972).Dee died of natural causes in June 2014 at age 91.
Photos
Highest Rated Movies
Filmography
MOVIES
RATING | TITLE | CREDIT | BOX OFFICE | YEAR |
---|---|---|---|---|
100% | Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart |
|
— | 2017 |
No Score Yet | Life's Essentials with Ruby Dee |
|
— | 2015 |
No Score Yet | Betty and Coretta |
|
— | 2013 |
50% | Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary |
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$36.3k | 2013 |
78% | 1982 |
|
— | 2013 |
0% | A Thousand Words |
|
$18.5M | 2012 |
95% | Sing Your Song |
|
$48.2k | 2012 |
No Score Yet | Politics Of Love |
|
— | 2011 |
0% | The Perfect Age of Rock 'n' Roll |
|
— | 2011 |
No Score Yet | Video Girl |
|
— | 2011 |
No Score Yet | A Place Out of Time: The Bordentown School |
|
— | 2009 |
No Score Yet | Red & Blue Marbles |
|
— | 2009 |
58% | No. 2 (Naming Number Two) |
|
— | 2008 |
13% | Steam |
|
— | 2007 |
81% | American Gangster |
|
$130.2M | 2007 |
No Score Yet | All About Us |
|
— | 2007 |
No Score Yet | Oprah Winfrey Presents: Their Eyes Were Watching God |
|
— | 2005 |
No Score Yet | The Way Back Home |
|
— | 2005 |
No Score Yet | The Life of Jackie Robinson |
|
— | 2003 |
No Score Yet | Hughes' Dream Harlem |
|
— | 2002 |
No Score Yet | Unchained Memories: Readings from the Slave Narratives |
|
— | 2002 |
No Score Yet | Taking Back Our Town |
|
— | 2001 |
No Score Yet | The Feast of All Saints |
|
— | 2001 |
No Score Yet | Finding Buck McHenry |
|
— | 2000 |
No Score Yet | A Storm in Summer |
|
— | 2000 |
2% | Baby Geniuses |
|
— | 1999 |
No Score Yet | Passing Glory |
|
— | 1999 |
No Score Yet | Having Our Say: Delany Sisters' First 100 Years |
|
— | 1999 |
No Score Yet | The Wall |
|
— | 1998 |
25% | A Simple Wish |
|
— | 1997 |
No Score Yet | Mr. and Mrs. Loving |
|
— | 1996 |
26% | Just Cause |
|
— | 1995 |
No Score Yet | Whitewash |
|
— | 1995 |
No Score Yet | Mississippi, America |
|
— | 1995 |
14% | Cop & 1/2 |
|
— | 1993 |
No Score Yet | The Ernest Green Story |
|
— | 1993 |
No Score Yet | Jazztime Tale |
|
— | 1992 |
81% | Jungle Fever |
|
— | 1991 |
No Score Yet | Hands upon the Heart |
|
— | 1991 |
80% | Color Adjustment |
|
— | 1991 |
No Score Yet | Decoration Day |
|
— | 1990 |
No Score Yet | The Court-Martial of Jackie Robinson |
|
— | 1990 |
75% | Love at Large |
|
— | 1990 |
No Score Yet | American Playhouse |
|
— | 1990 |
93% | Do the Right Thing |
|
— | 1989 |
No Score Yet | Gore Vidal's 'Lincoln' |
|
— | 1988 |
No Score Yet | Sidney Sheldon's 'Windmills of the Gods' |
|
— | 1988 |
No Score Yet | Go Tell It on the Mountain |
|
— | 1985 |
No Score Yet | The Atlanta Child Murders |
|
— | 1985 |
61% | Cat People |
|
— | 1982 |
No Score Yet | To Be Young, Gifted & Black |
|
— | 1981 |
No Score Yet | All God's Children |
|
— | 1980 |
No Score Yet | I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings |
|
— | 1979 |
No Score Yet | Countdown at Kusini |
|
— | 1976 |
No Score Yet | Lorraine Hansberry: The Black Experience in the Creation of Drama |
|
— | 1975 |
No Score Yet | It's Good to Be Alive |
|
— | 1974 |
No Score Yet | Black Girl |
|
— | 1972 |
No Score Yet | Buck and the Preacher |
|
— | 1972 |
100% | King: A Filmed Record...Montgomery to Memphis |
|
— | 1970 |
No Score Yet | Up Tight! |
|
— | 1968 |
88% | The Incident |
|
— | 1967 |
No Score Yet | Purlie Victorious |
|
— | 1963 |
60% | The Balcony |
|
— | 1963 |
94% | A Raisin in the Sun |
|
— | 1961 |
No Score Yet | Take a Giant Step |
|
— | 1959 |
No Score Yet | Virgin Island |
|
— | 1959 |
56% | St. Louis Blues |
|
— | 1958 |
No Score Yet | Edge of the City |
|
— | 1957 |
No Score Yet | Go, Man, Go |
|
— | 1954 |
100% | The Tall Target |
|
— | 1951 |
90% | No Way Out |
|
— | 1950 |
63% | The Jackie Robinson Story |
|
— | 1950 |
TV
RATING | TITLE | CREDIT | YEAR |
---|---|---|---|
No Score Yet |
America ReFramed
2012
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
POV
1988
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
The Mo'Nique Show
2009-2011
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
2000-2015
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Fatherhood
2004-2005
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry
2001-2007
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Touched by an Angel
1994-2003
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Promised Land
1996-1999
|
|
|
70% |
The Stand (1994)
1994
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Evening Shade
1990-1994
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
American Experience
1988
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
American Playhouse
1982-1996
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
The Golden Girls
1985-1992
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Sesame Street
1969-2020
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
The Fugitive
1963-1967
|
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Quotes from Ruby Dee's Characters
Da Mayor: | [after last night's riot] Hope the block is still standing. |
Mother Sister: | We're still standing. |
Mother Sister: | Good morning. |
Da Mayor: | Is it a good morning? |
Mother Sister: | Yes, indeed. You almost got yourself killed last night. |
Mother Sister: | Mother Sister's always watching! |
Annie McCall: | Life's not worth living with out family. Right? Right?! |
Annie McCall: | I like cake! Don't you Jack? |