Iconic award-winning actress Cicely Tyson has died at 96

Cicely tyson, the award-winning actress who has built a career spanning decades and appeared in countless Broadway TV shows, films and plays, died Thursday at the age of 96, according to her manager. Tyson’s role as a sharecropper’s wife in the movie “Sounder” earned her an Oscar nomination in 1973.

“With a heavy heart, Miss Cicely Tyson’s family announce their peaceful transition this afternoon,” Tyson’s family said in a statement from their manager. “For now, allow the family to keep their privacy.”

Tyson, who came to the fore as a model, was well known in the entertainment industry, winning two Emmy Awards – Best Leading Actress in a Drama and Best Actress in a Special – for her role as Alumnus. slave in the 1974 television drama “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman”. At a turning point in the film, Pittman walks up and drinks from the white water fountain.

“Well, when I work I tell everyone that. I said, ‘I don’t care what you see. Please don’t tell me … because I work so organically, “” Tyson said. “So the next day when I got on set, I knew something had happened. And I just said, ‘Please don’t tell me. I don’t want to know … ‘and people were talking about walking. I said, “What a walk?” “

In 1994, she won a Supporting Female Emmy for her role in “Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All” and a 2013 Tony Award at age 88 for Best Leading Actress in the play “The Trip to Bountiful”. She starred alongside Vanessa Williams, who was inspired by Tyson’s work ethic, according to a 2015 interview.

“She’s never missed a single performance. … There’s no excuse not to show up when Cicely Tyson can show up every day,” Williams said at the time of Tyson.

Tyson was one of a group of 21 actors, musicians, athletes and innovators in 2016 who were awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom – the nation’s highest civilian honor – by former President Obama.

“Over the course of his long and extraordinary career, Cicely Tyson has not only been successful as an actor, she has shaped the entire course of history,” Obama said during the presentation, via ETonline. “Cicely was never the most likely Hollywood star. The daughter of immigrants from the West Indies, she was raised by a hardworking, religious mother who cleaned homes and forbade her children from going to the movies. once she got her education and broke into business, Cicely made a conscious decision not just to say lines, but to speak out. “

Also in 2016, Tyson was celebrated with a Honor of the Kennedy Center for his contributions to American culture, paving the way for African Americans in the industry.

In 2018, she received an Oscar honorary statuette at the annual Governors Awards, according to the Associated Press. “I come from a low status. I grew up in an area that was called slums back then,” Tyson said at the time. “I still can’t imagine that I have met presidents, kings, queens. How did I get here? I marvel.”

In 2020, Tyson was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame and received a Career Achievement Peabody Award.

Her memoir, “Just As I Am,” was released on January 26, the same day that “CBS This Morning” aired an interview between the iconic actress and Gayle King, where Tyson was able to reflect on her roles.

“Every time I’m offered a screenplay … what interests me when I get it is ‘why me?’,” She said. “Who was that character and why did they want me to play him … and when I get to the point where I feel her skin has adjusted my arm or my mind, then I know there’s something about her . “

Born in 1924 to West Indian parents, Tyson said she was a very shy child, the youngest of three. AP said his parents moved from the island of Nevis in the Caribbean to the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City. At an early age, his friends urged Tyson to get into modeling because of his striking appearance.

The journey to stardom, as she told Gayle King, has not been easy. Tyson became pregnant at the age of 17 and had a short marriage that lasted just over two years. Her decision to start an acting career as a single mother led to strife at home, including her mother kick her out of the house.

“Oh, she told me I couldn’t live there and do that,” Tyson said. “Suddenly I found something that I loved to do. And I had a child to support.

Tyson made his screen debut at age 31 in the 1956 black-and-white film “Carib Gold”. Out of sheer determination, his career blossomed after landing the starring role playing the wife of a sharecropper in “Sounder” – the 1972 film based on the William H. Hunter novel. Her character was incarcerated for stealing a piece of food for the farmer’s family and was forced to take care of their children and tend the crops.

At the time, a New York Times review said, “She goes by all her easy beauty to give us, finally, some idea of ​​the deep beauty of millions of black women.”

In Tyson’s memoir, she talks about her love affair with the great jazzman Miles Davis, who put her on the cover of his 1967 album, “Sorcerer”. The two married in 1981, but divorced less than seven years later. However, their romance lasted for decades. Tyson told King that she could never find such love again.

At 96, King asked Tyson what it was like to be considered a legend.

“I am amazed every day that I live,” she said. “I mean, what my life has become is not what I expected … I had no idea I would touch anyone.”

When King asked Tyson, “When the time comes, what do you want us to take away from you?”

She replied, “I did my best. That’s all.”

The Associated Press and ETonline contributed to this report.