Cicely Tyson will receive the Living Legend Award at this year’s Black Girls Rock, presented by BET.
Tyson made her Broadway de
but in Jolly’s Progress (1959) as Eartha Kitt’s understudy. She went on to appear in other Broadway shows including Tiger Tiger Burning Bright (1962), A Hand Is On The Gate (1966), Carry Me Back To Morningside Heights (1968), The Corn is Green (1983), and in 1974, she hosted the 28th Annual Tony Awards.
In 1961, Ms. Tyson appeared in Jean Genet’s The Blacks, the longest running off-Broadway non-musical of that decade (1,408 performances). The Blacks boasted a cast of soon-to-be legends of the arts like James Earl Jones, Maya Angelou, Louis Gossett, Jr., and Roscoe Lee Browne.
It wasn’t until 2013 that Tyson won a Tony Award (Best Actress in a Play) for her performance as Miss Carrie Watts in Horton Foote’s The Trip to Bountiful.
That year she also won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play and the Outer Critics Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play, for Bountiful.
Tyson boasts a beyond impressive television and film resume, as well. Most recently she was seen in the ABC hit How To Get Away with Murder, playing Ophelia Hartness, Annalise’s mother. Annalise is played by Tony-winner Viola Davis (2001, Best Featured Actress in a Play, King Hedley II and 2010, Best Actress in a Play, Fences). Other TV credits include The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, Roots, King, A Woman Called Moses, The Women of Brewster Place, and Law and Order: SVU.
On film she has been seen in Sounder, The River Niger, Bustin’ Loose, Fried Green Tomatoes, and The Help, to name a few.
We here are Broadway Black salute you, Miss Tyson! We honor you! We thank you! You are TRULY a Black (girl) who ROCKS.
Black Girls Rock airs Sunday, April 5th, 2015 at 7p/6c on BET,
hosted by Tracee Ellis Ross and Regina King.
We’ll be tuning in! Hope you will be, too.
