On this day in 1952, pioneering actress Hattie McDaniel, best known as the first African American to win an Academy Award for her role in “Gone with the Wind,” died.
Portraying a head slave, McDaniel did capture the allusive award, but it was for a role Blacks had long been reduced to racial tropes and stereotypes.
Decades later, Denzel Washington and Halle Berry broke through the troupes and adversity in the early 2000s, but victories like these have been very rare.
For two straight years not one actor or actress of color was nominated for an Academy Award, prompting the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite to trend on social media.
All this and more on “Prime.”
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