A 24-hour Sidney Poitier tribute is coming to Turner Classic Movies next month.
And we won’t have to wait for all of it: “The Defiant Ones” (1958) airs at 11 a.m. ET Monday (Jan. 17), in a Martin Luther King Day marathon … and again at 10 p.m. ET Feb. 19, in the Poitier tribute, which includes the Oscar-winning “In the Heat of the Night” (1967), shown here with Poitier and Rod Steiger.
“Defiant Ones” brought raves for Poitier, who became the first Black nominee for the best-actor Academy Award. Five years later, with “Lilies in the Field,” he became the first Black winner.
He was never nominated again, but did win a lifetime Oscar in 2002. He also received lifetime awards from the Golden Globes, the Kennedy Center, the American Film Institute and the Screen Actors Guild.
And he was in a rare position – an American native who could properly be referred to as “sir.” He grew up in the Bahamas, but happened to be born in Miami. That gave him duel citizenship, in the Bahamas (then a British colony) and the U.S.; he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth.
That birth came two months early and he weighed only three pounds. His mother, director George Stevens once said, was assured by a soothsayer that “he will travel the corners of the Earth and walk with kings.”
He did, but it took work. Poitier moved to Miami at 15 and New York at 16. He later praised an “elderly Jewish man who had the perseverance to teach a young black dishwasher how to read.”
His death (Jan. 6) was followed quickly by tributes. Oprah Winfrey had a nine-hour marathon on her channel and said it was “my honor to have loved him as a mentor. Friend. Brother. Confidant. Wisdom teacher.”
Now comes the two TCM marathons; the second will start Feb. 19 with “In the Heat of the Night” (1967), an Oscar-winner for best-picture, and conclude on Feb. 20, which would have been Poitier’s 95th birthday. The line-ups, with all times ET, changing in each time zone:
MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY (Jan. 17)
– Dramas in the morning — “The World, the Flesh and the Devil” (1959) at 6:15; “Intruder in the Dust” (1949) at 8; “One Potato, Two Potato” (1964) at 9:30 and Poitier’s “Defiant Ones” (1958) at 11.
– An autobiographical documentary by photographer Gordon Parks (1988) at 1 p.m., followed by “The Learning Tree” (1969) – Parks’ acclaimed film based on his boyhood, at 2:15.
– More dramas: “Sounder” (1972) at 4:15 p.m. and “Nothing But a Man” (1964) at 6:15.
– And documentaries from the civil-rights era, from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m.
POITIER MARATHON
– Feb. 19 and overnight: “In the Heat of the Night” (1967), 8 p.m.; “The Defiant Ones” (1958), 10; “A Warm December” (1972), midnight; “Cry, the Beloved Country” (1952), 2 a.m.; “Something of Value” (1957), 4 a.m.
– Feb. 20: “Good-bye, My Lady” (1956), 6:15 a.m.; “Edge of the City” (1957), 8:15 a.m.; “No Way Out” (1960), 10 a.m.;. “Blackboard Jungle” (1955), noon; “To Sir, With Love” (1967). 2 p.m.; “Lilies of the Field” (1963), 4 p.m.; “A Patch of Blue” (1965), 6 p.m.