Ruby Dee dead at 91: Legendary stage and screen actress — and Civil Rights leader — frequently costarred with husband Ossie Davis
Family member confirms death. Dee was living in New Rochelle.
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Published: Thursday, June 12, 2014, 12:22 PM
Updated: Thursday, June 12, 2014, 5:57 PM
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The death was confirmed Thursday by a family member, who declined to answer any questions pending the release of a statement.
"She died late (Wednesday) with her whole family around her," family friend Latifah Salahudin told the Daily News. "All three kids and seven grandkids were there, surrounding her with so much love. She went peacefully from natural causes. We should all be so lucky."
"She was so full of life and so strong. Such a powerful woman. We're all going to miss her," Salahudin added.
The Cleveland-born, New York-raised actress and activist — winner of an Emmy, a Grammy and a Screen Actors Guild award, among others — not only starred on Broadway (“Take It From the Top!” “Two Hah Hahs and a Homeboy”), film (Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing” and “Jungle Fever”), and TV (“All God’s Children,” “Feast of All Saints”), but, with her husband and collaborator Ossie Davis, was a major figure in the Civil Rights movement.
Dee’s first film role came in 1949, in the musical drama “That Man of Mine.” She played Rachel Robinson in “The Jackie Robinson Story” in 1950, and costarred opposite Nat King Cole, Eartha Kitt and Cab Calloway in “St. Louis Blues” (1958).
She appeared in the 1979 TV movie “Roots: The Next Generations,” and costarred with Davis in their own short-lived 1980-81 show, “Ossie and Ruby!”
The two played contentious neighbors who embodied, and recalled, the social unrest of the ’60s in Lee’s “Do the Right Thing” (1989). She earned her sole Academy Award nomination, for Best Supporting Actress, for “American Gangster” (2007).
Ruby Dee Dead At 91: Legendary Stage And Screen Actress —...
NY Daily News
Ruby Dee, an American actress, poet, playwright, screenwriter, journalist, and activist died Wednesday in New Rochelle, NY. She was 91. The Cleveland-born,...
Dee was a frequent presence on New York stages for four decades, since joining the American Negro Theatre in 1941 before her stage debut two years later in the Broadway drama "South Pacific."
In 1946 she costarred in the play "Jeb" with Davis, whom she married in 1948.
In 1953, Dee starred in the Broadway premiere of "A Raisin in the Sun," playing the wife of Sidney Poitier — and reprised that role in the film eight years later.
Reed Saxon/ASSOCIATED PRESSDee poses with husband Ossie Davis when the pair won ;ifetime achievment awards from the Screen Actors Guild in 2001.Washington declined to comment: "Not today," a spokesperson said.
But the Rev. Al Sharpton issued a statement calling Dee "a phenomenally rare artist and a jewel to our nation and community."
"I was privileged to work on several civil rights cases with her and her husband Ossie Davis," the statement added. "She was as committed to social justice as she was to the screen and stage. She will be greatly missed.”
Dee's absence from the stage never dimmed her status as a trailblazer. Accepting her best actress Tony Award on June 8, Audra McDonald heralded a number including women, including Dee, saying, "I am standing on Lena Horne's shoulders. I am standing on Maya Angelou's shoulders. I am standing on Dianne Caroll and Ruby Dee."
Beyond her artistic work, Dee is best known for her work as an activist. She was long a member of such organizations as the Congress of Racial Equality, the NAACP, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee), and Southern Christian Leadership Conference. She and Davis were personal friends of both Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X, whose eulogy Davis gave in 1965, two years after Dee gave a stirring reading at King’s March on Washington.
Dee was born Ruby Wallace, but kept her married surname even after she divorced her first husband, blues singer Frankie Dee, in the 1940s. She married Davis in 1948 and the two collaborated for decades on art, activism and family, having three children, blues musician Guy Davis, and two daughters, Nora Day and Hasna Muhammad, all of whom survive Dee.
The couple also raised eyebrows with an autobiography that advocated open marriage, saying that lies, not extramarital affairs, destroy marriages. They later said that they came to realize that they didn't need anyone else.
A documentary on the couple's trailblazing career and personal history, "Life's Essentials with Ruby Dee," will screen on June 22 at the 18th Annual American Black Film Festival in Chelsea. The film was directed by Dee and Davis' grandson Muta’Ali.
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