Ruby Dee

The acclaimed actress and social activist Ruby Dee graduated in 1945 with a BA from Hunter College, and later studied acting with renowned Hunter College theatre professor Lloyd Richards. She was known for her distinguished career in theatre and film, pioneering civil rights activism, and her artistic partnership with her husband, Ossie Davis.

Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Dee was raised in Harlem, where she began acting as a member of the American Negro Theatre. Her performance as Ruth in A Raisin in the Sun garnered her a National Board of Review award in 1961. She also played Lena in Boesman and Lena, for which she received an Obie and a Drama Desk award, and Mary Tyrone in A Long Day’s Journey Into Night, for which she received a Cable ACE award. She also appeared in Do The Right Thing, Jungle Fever, Peyton Place, Go Tell It on the Mountain, The Stand, Having Our Say, and American Gangster, for which she received a SAG award and an Oscar nomination.

In 1988, Dee was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame. With Davis, she was inducted into the NAACP Image Award Hall of Fame, awarded the Silver Circle Award by the Academy of Television Arts and Science, the National Medal of Arts Award, and the Screen Actors Guild’s Lifetime Achievement Award. In December 2004, Dee and Davis were recipients of the John F. Kennedy Center Honors.