Biografia

Received an honorary doctorate from the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, the same institution that denied her admittance to its dance department when she was sixteen years old; she was told then that she had the wrong type of body for dance.

Her father passed away ten days after he accompanied her to the Emmy Awards Ceremony in which she won for Best Choreography for Fama (1982).

Her mother Dr. Vivian Elizabeth Ayers attended Brainerd Institute, Barber Scotia College and Bennett College. Vivian was the first poet in the state of Texas to receive the Pulitzer Prize Award nomination in 1952. Vivian was often called the "Poet Laureate of Texas". In the late 1950s, her poetry, "Hawk", attracted the attention of NASA and for twenty years was the only poetry celebrated by NASA. She worked as an apprentice librarian at the Fondren Library of Rice University and was accorded faculty status in 1965, becoming the first African American to be so qualified. During her years at Rice, she organized and published The Adept Quarterly, an important contribution to the small publications movement of the time.

Daughter of dentist Arthur Allen and Pulitzer-prize nominated Vivian Ayers (artist, poet, playwright and publisher). Older siblings are jazz musician Tex (Andrew Arthur Allen Jr., born 1945) and actress Phylicia Ayers-Allen (Phylicia Rashad, born 1948), and brother Hugh Allen (real estate banker in North Carolina).

Her husband, Norman Nixon, is a former NBA player with the Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Clippers.