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Queen Latifah hit the stage at the 97th Academy Awards with a live performance, paying tribute to the late Quincy Jones through a performance of “Ease on Down the Road.”

Jones died in November, and Latifah’s performance honored the Grammy-winning producer and film composer who collaborated with Michael Jackson. Throughout his career, Jones won 28 Grammy Awards, six of them for the 1990 album “Back on the Block.”

Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg took the stage for a “The Color Purple” reunion that then led into Latifah’s performance. Jones composed the score for the 1985 film, which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year. “The man, our beloved Q, had an equally powerful impact on the world of film as a composer and producer,” Winfrey said.

Goldberg emphasized Jones’ notable film achievements. “When we talk about Black excellence, we’re talking about Quincy,” Goldberg said.

“In 1967, Quincy Jones was the first Black...

Legendary music producer and composer Quincy Jones, who amassed 28 Grammy Award wins across his multi-decade career, died on Sunday at the age of 91.

“Tonight, with full but broken hearts, we must share the news of our father and brother Quincy Jones’ passing,” the Jones family said in a statement obtained by our sister site Variety. “And although this is an incredible loss for our family, we celebrate the great life that he lived and know there will never be another like him. He is truly one of a kind and we will miss him dearly; we take comfort and immense...

Quincy Jones, the first Black producer to be nominated for best picture, and legendary casting director Juliet Taylor will receive honorary Oscars at this year’s Governors Awards, announced by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Wednesday. Screenwriter and director Richard Curtis will receive the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, while James Bond producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli will be bestowed with the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award. The statuettes will be presented at the 15th annual ceremony on Sunday, Nov. 17, in Los Angeles.

“The recipients of this year’s Governors Awards have set the bar incredibly high across their remarkable careers, and the Academy’s Board of Governors is thrilled to recognize them with Oscars,” said Janet Yang, Academy President. “The selection of Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli is a testament to their success as producers of the fan-favorite Bond series and their contribution to the industry’s theatrical landscape.

For only the second time in its 15 year history there is no actor among the honorees for this year’s select group receiving the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences Governors Awards. The AMPAS Board Of Governors have chosen to give Academy Honorary Awards to music legend Quincy Jones and veteran Casting Director Juliet Taylor, the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award to British writer/director Richard Curtis, and the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award to producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli. The awards ceremony, always a highlight in the very long Oscar season will take place on Sunday November 17, 2024 at the Ray Dolby Ballroom at Ovation Hollywood.

You have to go back to the 4th Governors Awards in 2012 to find a group that did not include at least one actor among its recipients. That year the honorees were documentary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker, director/stuntman Hal Needham, AFI founder and producer/filmmaker George Stevens Jr.,...

Marlene Clark, an actor who appeared on “Sanford and Son,” the horror movie “Ganja & Hess” and several other films of the ’60s and ’70s, died on May 18. She was 85.

Clark starred in several films ahead of landing her breakout role as Lamont Lawson’s (played by Demond Wilson) wife Janet in “Sanford and Son.” She later starred in the 1973 horror movie “Ganja & Hess” alongside Duane Jones.

Clark was born and raised in Harlem, N.Y., and spent time in West Virginia during her summers. She returned to New York after attending Morristown Jr. College in Tennessee and enrolled in City College. While at school, Clark participated in school plays, igniting her interest in the acting world.

Clark later moved to Los Angeles with her then-husband Billy Dee Williams. She began her career in entertainment as a fashion model before landing her first role in the 1968 film “For Love of Ivy.

Marlene Clark, an actress and model who rose to fame in the 1970s, has passed away. Per THR, Clark died at her home in Los Angeles on May 18, though no cause of death was immediately revealed. She was 85 years old.

“For 15 years she curated a bustling restaurant scene where underground artists mingled with locals and the stars of film and television,” Clark's friend, Tamara Lynch, said of the news. “She had a vision of culinary excellence coupled with dynamic professional service and would lay out the blueprint for the glamorous L.A. restaurant scene brilliantly casted with her discerning eye."

Lynch added, “Marlene’s style was impeccable. She loved fashion, food and acting. Her large, full laugh that could fill a room will be missed. She leaves behind friends and family that will forever be grateful for her grace, love and beautiful heart. Marlene was one of our finest examples of Black beauty.

Marlene Clark, best known for her portrayals of Lamont’s girlfriend Janet in the 1970s NBC sitcom Sanford & Son and as Ganja Meda in the 1973 horror film Ganja & Hess, has died.

Demond Wilson, who played Lamont on Sanford & Son, paid tribute to Clark on Twitter, writing “Rip beautiful actress Marlene Clark. . . It was a delight to work with you…,” noting she died on May 18. Wilson listed her age as 73, but that has not been confirmed.

Clark joined Sanford & Son in the comedy’s fifth season in 1976 as a recurring opposite Wilson, remaining through the series’ final season the following year.

Raised in the Harlem section of New York City, Clark was a fashion model before her transition to acting.

Her earliest work began in films in the 1960s including For Love of Ivy opposite Sidney Poitier and Putney Swope in 1969, directed by Robert Downey Sr. She went...

Marlene Clark, the statuesque actress who portrayed Lamont’s fiancée on Sanford and Son and stood out in such 1970s’ films as Ganja & Hess, Switchblade Sisters and Slaughter, has died. She was 85.

Clark died May 18 in her home in Los Angeles, her family announced. No cause of death was revealed.

Clark also starred as a reptilian seductress in Roger Corman’s Night of the Cobra Woman (1972) and as one of the suspected werewolves in the British horror film The Beast Must Die (1974), and she was an early victim in the Larry Hagman-directed Beware! The Blob (1972).

Clark played John Saxon‘s secretary in Enter the Dragon (1973), starring Bruce Lee, and her big-screen body of work also included Black Mamba (1974), Newman’s Law (1974), Lord Shango (1975) and The Baron (1977), where she appeared opposite her Beast Must Die onscreen husband, Calvin Lockhart.

In the surreal Ganja & Hess (1973), directed by Bill Gunn,...

Jay Weston, producer of films like “Lady Sings the Blues” and “Buddy Buddy,” died of natural causes Feb. 28 at the Motion Picture Home in Woodland Hills, Calif. He was 93.

Weston first met Billie Holiday at the Newport Jazz Festival — a chance encounter that would ultimately lead to Weston producing a biopic about her starring Diana Ross in 1972. “Lady Sings the Blues” marked Ross’ feature debut and went on to score five Academy Award nominations, including best actress for Ross and original screenplay.

“I read the book and I said to [Holiday’s] agent, ‘I want to make a movie out of it,’” Weston said in a 2011 interview with the Los Angeles Business Journal, referring to the jazz singer’s autobiography. “He said, ‘Give me $5,000, and I’ll think about it.’ So I gave him $5,000, and it took 13 years and many $5,000 payments to keep the rights because everybody wanted it.”

The veteran filmmaker...

Jay Weston, a veteran producer of Hollywood films including 1972’s “Lady Sings the Blues” starring Diana Ross and 1968’s “For Love of Ivy” starring Sidney Poitier, has died at the age or 93.

Weston, who also built a respected career as a restaurant critic, died at the Motion Picture Home in Woodland Hills, California.

Weston’s most notable producing efforts likely came on “Lady Sings the Blues,” which was nominated for five Academy Awards. Other features included “Buddy Buddy” (notable for being Billy Wilder’s final film), “Chu Chu and the Philly Flash” and “W.C. Fields and Me.”

Weston was born in Brooklyn, New York, on March 9, 1929, to Phillip and Shirley Weinstein. He went to NYU as a pre-med student, but soon switched to an arts curriculum. After earning a BA, he began a career in publicity before being drafted and sent to Korea in 1952. There he started a newspaper, The Hialean,...

Jay Weston, who was working as a publicist when a chance meeting with Billie Holiday at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival would lead to the producing of her 1972 biopic Lady Sings the Blues, died February 28 of natural causes at the Motion Picture Home in Woodland Hills, CA. He was 93.

His death was announced by spokesperson Jeff Sanderson on behalf of the Weston family.

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A prominent restaurant critic later in life, Weston’s show business career in the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s was marked by such high points as producing Billy Wilder’s last film, Chu Chu and the Philly Flash with Carol Burnett and Alan Arkin, W.C. Fields...

Jay Weston, who produced the Diana Ross-starring Lady Sings the Blues and Billy Wilder’s final feature, Buddy Buddy, has died. He was 93.

Weston died Tuesday of natural causes at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, his family announced.

Weston also served as head of ABC’s feature film division, Palomar Pictures, where his first project was the Sydney Pollack-directed They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (1969), nominated for nine Oscars.

And he produced the 1969 Broadway drama Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie?, starring Al Pacino in a career-launching, Tony-winning turn.

A chance meeting with Billie Holiday at the Newport Jazz Festival led him to securing the rights to her autobiography. He then produced Lady Sings the Blues (1972), the Sidney J. Furie-helmed biopic that collected five Academy Award nominations.

Weston followed with films including W.C. Fields and Me (1976), starring Rod Steiger; Chu Chu and...

Three of this year’s Oscar nominated tunes were penned by Black songwriters: Celeste reaped a bid (along with Daniel Pemberton) for “Hear My Voice” from “The Trial of the Chicago”; D’Mile, recent Grammy champ H.E.R. and Tiara Thomas collaborated on “Fight for You” from “Judas and the Black Messiah”; and supporting actor nominee Leslie Odom Jr. was cited with Nashville based singer/songwriter Sam Ashworth for “Speak Now” from “One Night in Miami.”

The first Black tunesmith to contend for Best Original Song at the Oscars was Quincy Jones who was nominated in 1967 (alongside lyricist Bob Russell) for “The Eyes of Love” from the long-forgotten “Banning.” (Jones earned the first of his four score Oscar nominations that same year for “In Cold Blood.”) He and Russell reaped another bid the following year for the title tune from “For Love of Ivy.” His last nomination to date was in 1985 for...

Easily the best family-oriented black experience movie of the early 1970s, the Third World Cinema Corporation’s first film features Diahann Carroll and James Earl Jones in a funny, endearing saga of life in the welfare system, with human feeling and compassion to spare. But the triumphant socially progressive movie fails the 2020 diversity test — its primary producer, cameraman, writers and director are white. Are we still allowed to enjoy it?

Claudine

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 1052

1974 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 92 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date October 13, 2020 / 39.95

Starring: Diahann Carroll, James Earl Jones, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Tamu Blackwell, David Kruger, Yvette Curtis, Eric Jones, Socorro Stephens.

Cinematography: Gayne Rescher

Film Editor: Louis San Andres

Original Music: Curtis Mayfield

Written by Lester Pine and Tina Pine

Produced by J. Lloyd Grant, Hannah Weinstein

Directed by John Berry

In 1974 Claudine impressed this viewer quite a bit. I hadn’t seen many really good...

Exclusive: The CW has put in development Gg (Goodgame) a gaming industry drama series that merges the worlds of gaming and Hollywood, from producers Kim Moses and J Moses (Grand Theft Auto), TV executive/producer Debbie Liebling (PEN15), writer-producer Daisy Gardner and CBS Television Studios.

Gg (Goodgame) marks the first project from OptIn, a production company launched by siblings J Moses and Kim Moses, which is designed to bring together storytelling, talent, relationships, portfolios, discipline and knowledge in the TV and Games industries. OptIn will produce in association with Cbstv Studios, with Liebling, Gardner and the Moses serving as executive producers.

Written by Gardner, Gg (Goodgame), a one-hour drama with comedic elements, centers on the adventures of a rebellious, young female excelling in the male-dominated gaming industry. The story will be told through the young woman’s perspective. Throughout her life, she struggles...

President Barack Obama is one of many who have offered words about Maya Angelou’s death, calling Angelou “a brilliant writer, a fierce friend, and a truly phenomenal woman” in a statement released today.

After news broke that Angelou died Wednesday at the age of 86, Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Quincy Jones, and more released statements reacting to the celebrated poet’s death. Read them below, and check back for updates throughout the day:

President Barack Obama: “When her friend Nelson Mandela passed away last year, Maya Angelou wrote that ‘No sun outlasts its sunset, but will rise again, and bring the dawn.

Today in history… February 20th, 1927, Sidney Poitier, a man who I’m sure needs absolutely no introduction on this website, was born in Miami, Florida. Happy 84th birthday Mr Poitier!

I’ve seen nearly all of his films, although it’s been months since I last revisited any of them. The last Sidney Poitier film I watched was Buck And The Preacher, some time last year. It’s one of my favorite Poitier films, along with In The Heat Of The Night, For Love Of Ivy, and Let’s Do It Again, the 2nd in the comedy/action trilogy of films he made with Bill Cosby in the 1970s.

I’d say that my preference leans towards his latter films – specifically those he had some creative control over, whether writing or directing, as the above films I listed indicate (In The Heat Of The Night aside).

Buck And The Preacher...

Jazz singer Abbey Lincoln has died at her New York home, aged 80. The star passed away at her Manhattan property on Saturday, August 14, her brother David Wooldridge confirms to The New York Times.

Born Anna Marie Wooldridge in Chicago in 1930, she released her debut album, "Abbey Lincoln's Affair - A Story of a Girl in Love", in 1956. Largely inspired by Billie Holiday, Lincoln went on to release more than 20 albums throughout her six-decade long career.

She also branched out into movies, starring opposite Sidney Poitier in 1968's "For Love of Ivy" and was nominated for a Golden Globe for her performance in the film. Lincoln married jazz musician Max Roach in 1962, but they divorced in 1970.

She is survived by her brothers David and Kenneth Wooldridge and her sister, Juanita Baker.

Jazz singer, actor and civil rights activist strongly influenced by Billie Holiday

If Abbey Lincoln was overwhelmed by the responsibility of being proclaimed "the last of the jazz singers", she never let it show. As her great contemporaries and principal influences among the classic female jazz vocalists fell away – with Billie Holiday the first to go, in 1959, and Betty Carter the last, in 1998 – Lincoln steadfastly maintained her dignified, almost solemn, focus; her tart, deftly timed Holiday-like inflections, and her commitment to songs that dug deeper into life's meanings than the usual lost-love exhalations.

And, like Ella Fitzgerald, who all her life took to a stage as if she were surprised to find anyone had come to see her, Lincoln became the opposite of a celebrated jazz diva. In some of her London performances during the 1990s, she would sit quietly beside the piano, tugging at her clothes, like someone who...

"Abbey Lincoln, a singer whose dramatic vocal command and tersely poetic songs made her a singular figure in jazz, died on Saturday in Manhattan," reports Nate Chinen in the New York Times. "She was 80 and lived on the Upper West Side." Her "career encompassed outspoken civil rights advocacy in the 1960s and fearless introspection in more recent years... She starred in the films Nothing But a Man, in 1964, and For Love of Ivy, opposite Sidney Poitier, in 1968."

Update, 8/15: A remembrance from Glenn Kenny, a bit of viewing from Phil Nugent and a profile to listen to from NPR.

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I revisited Buck And The Preacher over the weekend (thank you NetFlix Instant Watch), and, having seen nearly all of Sidney Poitier’s films, I’ll put this one right up there – along with other favorites, In The Heat Of The Night, For Love Of Ivy, and Let’s Do It Again, the 2nd in the comedy/action trilogy of films he made with Bill Cosby in the 1970s.

It only recently came to me that my preference leans towards his latter films – specifically those he had some creative control over, whether writing or directing, as the above films I listed indicate (In The Heat Of The Night aside).

Buck And The Preacher was his directorial debut (although it wasn’t originally planned that way), and a fine job I’d say he did with it. He also starred in the film, as Buck, alongside Harry Belafonte as the nutty preacher.