Biografía

The [Superfly] experience left me upset. Controversy served to obscure my performance, which was not an easy thing to pull off. Outside New York, people assumed I really was a hustler. 'Superfly' took me from relative obscurity, but I haven't been offered that many roles since.

Frankly, I've not been pleased with most of what I've had to do. I have a considerable amount of experience, and what they've asked me to do has not demanded that much of me.

[My father] had a strenuous job, lifting pipes and feeding them into some machine, and he lifted so many of them that it killed him. I swore right then that they'd never work me to death in those factories. I told my mother that; I told everybody.

My father was a jazz musician originally. He played in the pit orchestra of 'Blackbirds of '29,' and with Jelly Roll Morton, and others. In later years, though, he had to take a temporary job in a defense plant to support the family. It turned out not to be so temporary.

I had always been so dedicated! I'd figured that if I'd devote myself to art and acting, everything else would follow. You know, 'As you sow, so shall you reap,' and all that. Everybody had told me all I needed was a break. Well, I'd won four awards and had a very good spread in The New York Times and I thought, 'This is my break!' But I still didn't get work. I watched other new people whose careers took off. They were even on television talk shows. When I asked my agent why I hadn't been on any television shows, he just couldn't say. Right then I found myself face to face with some facts about life, show business and racism that I hadn't wanted to accept. I became absolutely paranoiac.