Entertainer says activism inspired his art
By Sandy Cohen, Entertainment Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) --As Harry Belafonte joins the elite EGOT club — adding an Oscar statuette to an awards cache that already includes an Emmy, Grammy and Tony — he says inspiring social consciousness has always motivated him artistically.
The film academy is recognizing Belafonte's lifelong activism with the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, which he will accept Saturday night at the annual Governors Awards. Actress Maureen O'Hara, animator Hayao Miyazaki and screenwriter Jean-Claude Carriere will also receive Oscar statuettes at the private ceremony.
Belafonte said in a recent interview that he was surprised and moved by the academy's acknowledgement of his humanitarian work.
"For the motion picture academy to step into this space and make the honor based on those facts, was, for me, a huge honor," said the 87-year-old entertainer.
As a writer and performer, Belafonte has drawn on themes of justice and equality. As an activist, he marched alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. and continues to lend his voice, platform and pocketbook to support social causes.
"I was an activist before I thought about being an artist," he said. "When I got into the world of culture; when I saw my first play and I saw what happens with the power of the pen; what I saw happen with actors, with directors, the magic of theater — all those things attracted me to the platform because I saw it as a way of communicating ideas and communicating thoughts that help inspire the human experience."
He says the film industry has grown a great deal from its early days, when "much that came out of that industry demonized black people — made us look stupid, made us look inferior, made us look mindless and made us look as if we were totally incapable."
"Now if you look today at the motion picture industry, you see films like '12 Years a Slave.' You see pictures like 'Brokeback Mountain.' There are works of art that are rooted in social conflict," he said. "But that doesn't dismiss the fact that we still have a lot of work to do, because the motion picture industry is still very guilty of continuing to perpetuate stereotypes."
Other causes commanding Belafonte's attention now include the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri, the influence of the conservative activist Koch brothers, the Tea Party and "an absentee president."
"A thousand little things every day awaken my attention to things that need to be written about, spoken about and dramatized," Belafonte said.
Asked what he's most looking forward to at the Governors Awards ceremony, he quipped: "Dinner."
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences established the Governors Awards in 2009 to recognize recipients of honorary Oscars. Highlights from Saturday's untelevised event will be included in the 2015 Academy Awards telecast.
Actor Kathryn Crosby, widow of Bing Crosby, dies at 90
Kathryn Crosby, who appeared in such movies as "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad", "Anatomy of a Murder," and "Operation Mad Ball" before marrying famed singer and Oscar-winning actor Bing Crosby, has died. She was 90.
She died of natural causes Friday night at her home in the Northern California city of Hillsborough, a family spokesperson said Saturday.
Appearing under her stage name of Kathryn Grant, she appeared opposite Tony Curtis in "Mister Cory" in 1957 and Victor Mature in "The Big Circus" in 1959. She made five movies with film noir director Phil Karlson, including "Tight Spot" and "The Phenix City Story," both in 1955.
Her other leading men included Jack Lemmon in "Operation Mad Ball," James Darren in "The Brothers Rico," and James Stewart in "Anatomy of a Murder," directed by Otto Preminger.
Born Olive Kathryn Grandstaff on Nov. 25, 1933, in West Columbia, Texas, she graduated from the University of Texas with a degree in fine arts. She came to Hollywood and began her movie career in 1953.
She met Bing Crosby while doing interviews for a column she wrote about Hollywood for her hometown newspaper. They were married in 1957, when she was 23 and he was 54.
She curtailed her acting career after the wedding, although she appeared often with Crosby and their three children on his Christmas television specials and in Minute Maid orange juice commercials. She became a registered nurse in 1963.
In the 1970s, she hosted a morning talk show on KPIX-TV in Northern California.
After Crosby's death at age 74 in 1977, from a heart attack after golfing in Spain, she appeared in stage productions of "Same Time, Next Year" and "Charley's Aunt." She co-starred with John Davidson and Andrea McArdle in the 1996 Broadway... Read More