Pam Grier
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| Pam Grier | |
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Grier at a reception for "An Evening with Pam Grier" at the Canadian Film Centre, 2012.
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| Born | Pamela Suzette Grier May 26, 1949 Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | East High School Metropolitan State College |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1970–present |
| Partner(s) | Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (1970-71) Richard Pryor (1976-79) Kevin Evans (1998-99; engaged) |
| Awards | 1997 San Diego Film Critics Society Award for Best Actress (Jackie Brown) |
Contents
Early Life
Pam Grier was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, the daughter of Gwendolyn Sylvia (née Samuels), a homemaker and nurse, and Clarence Ransom Grier, Jr., who worked as a mechanic and Technical Sergeant in the United States Air Force. She has one sister and one brother.[3] Grier is of multiracial ancestry, and has commented on the subject of her ethnic background saying, "I'm a mix of several races: Hispanic, Chinese, Filipino. My dad was black, and my mom was Cheyenne Indian."[4]At age 6, Grier was raped by two boys when she was left unattended at her aunt's house. "It took so long to deal with the pain of that," she says, "You try to deal with it, but you never really get over it," she adds. "And not just me; my family endured so much guilt and anger that something like that happened to me."[4]
Because of her father's military career, her family moved frequently during her childhood, to various places such as England, and eventually settled in Denver, Colorado, where she attended East High School. While in Denver, Colorado she appeared in a number of stage productions, and participated in beauty contests to raise money for college tuition at Metropolitan State College. Contrary to previous reports, she states that she is not the cousin of National Football League great Roosevelt Grier or to National Hockey League player Mike Grier.[citation needed]
Career
Grier moved to Los Angeles, California, in 1967, where she was initially hired as a receptionist at the American International Pictures (AIP) company.[citation needed] It is believed that she was discovered by director Jack Hill,[citation needed] who cast her in his women in prison films The Big Doll House (1971), and The Big Bird Cage (1972).While under contract at AIP, she became a staple of early 1970s blaxploitation movies, playing big, bold, assertive women, beginning with Jack Hill's Coffy (1973), in which she plays a nurse who seeks revenge on drug dealers; her character was advertised in the trailer as the "baddest one-chick hit-squad that ever hit town!" The film, which was filled with sexual and violent elements typical of the genre, was a box-office hit, and Grier was noted as the first African-American female to headline an action film, as protagonists of previous blaxploitation films were males. In his review of Coffy, film critic Roger Ebert praised the film for its believable female lead and noted that Grier was an actress of "beautiful face and astonishing form" and that she possessed a kind of "physical life" missing from many other attractive actresses.[5] Grier subsequently played similar characters in the AIP films Foxy Brown (1974),Sheba, Baby and Friday Foster, (both 1975).
With the demise of blaxploitation, Grier appeared in smaller roles for many years. She acquired progressively larger character roles in the 1980s, including a prostitute in Fort Apache the Bronx (1981), a witch in Something Wicked this Way Comes (1983), and Steven Seagal's detective partner in Above the Law (1988). She had a recurring role on Miami Vice from 1985–1989, and has made guest appearances on Martin, Night Court and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, and also had a recurring role in the TV series Crime Story between 1986 and 1988. Her role in Rocket Gibraltar (1988) was cut due to fears by the film's director, Daniel Petrie, of "repercussions from interracial love scenes.".[6] She also appeared on Sinbad, Preston Chronicles, The Cosby Show, The Wayans Brothers Show, and Mad TV. In 1994, Grier appeared in Snoop Dogg's video for "Doggy Dogg World".
In 2010, Grier began appearing in a recurring role on the hit science fiction series Smallville as the villain Amanda Waller, also known as White Queen, head agent of Checkmate, a covert operations agency. She recently appeared as a friend and colleague to Julia Roberts' college professor in Larry Crowne. Also in 2010, Grier wrote her memoir, Foxy: My Life in Three Acts, with Andrea Cagan.[7]
Personal Life
Grier has never married and has no children. She dated basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar during the early 1970s, and had an 18-month affair with actor/comedian Richard Pryor around 1976–77. She also was romantically linked to actor/comedian Freddie Prinze in the 1970s.[7] In 1998 she was engaged to music executive Kevin Evans, but the engagement ended in 1999. From 2000 to 2008 she dated marketing executive Peter Hempel.[citation needed] She received her Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from the University of Maryland Eastern Shore in 2011. That same year, she received an Honorary Doctorate of Science from Langston University.[citation needed] She started the Pam Grier Community Garden and Education Center with the National Multicultural Western Heritage Museum.[citation needed]Filmography
Discography
- "Long Time Woman" (1971, from the film The Big Doll House)
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