Paul Winfield

Actor

• Born: May 22, 1939
• Birthplace: Los Angeles, California
• Died: March 7, 2004
• Place of death: Los Angeles, California

Best known for his commanding role in the film Sounder (1972), Winfield was a prolific and versatile actor who found success in theater, film, and television. He was the third African American actor nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor and performed in more than 125 films and television shows.

Early Life

Paul Edward Winfield was born in Los Angeles in 1939 to a single mother, Lois Beatrice Edwards, a garment worker and labor organizer. She married Clarence Winfield, a construction worker and garbage collector, when Winfield was eight years old. The Winfields and their four children moved to Portland, Oregon, where he spent his early years. After a series of moves, the family finally settled in the Watts section of Los Angeles during the neighborhood’s transition from all white to predominantly black. Winfield’s life was influenced greatly by his mother and by an older woman with whom he had an affair.

Winfield was bused to Manual Arts High School, at that time a predominantly white school, where he was the first student to be selected as the best actor in the Southern California Speech and Drama Teachers Association Drama Festival competition for three consecutive years. Winfield, who tended to be a loner, was an excellent student and a talented violinist and cellist.

Winfield turned down a scholarship to Yale University, fearful of not fitting in, and instead accepted a two-year drama scholarship at the University of Portland in Oregon. He left the university after two years and briefly attended Stanford, then Los Angeles City College and the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). He left UCLA six credits shy of earning a degree to make his first stage appearance. Winfield was an artist-in-residence at Stanford University from 1964 to 1965 and at the University of Hawaii in 1965.

Life’s Work

Winfield was first inspired to become an actor when he watched James Edwards in the film Home of the Brave(1949). Edwards’s role as Private Peter Moss impressed upon Winfield that African Americans could play roles other than jesters, chauffeurs, and servants. Although most of his appearances were character roles, Winfield’s versatility allowed him to make a successful career on the stage, in film, television, and in voice-overs.

Performing onstage was Winfield’s first love. He landed his first stage roles in 1964 in two plays by LeRoi Jones (later known as Amiri Baraka), Dutchman and The Toilet, directed by Burgess Meredith. Winfield’s performance was noted by Sidney Poitier. Winfield joined the Stanford Repertory Theater and, as a member of the Inner City Cultural Center Theater, helped produce professional plays for high school students. He had a fondness for Shakespearean plays. His Shakespearean performances included A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Merry Wives of Windsor, and the title role in Othello. Other stage performances included Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull, Henrik Ibsen’s Enemy of the People, and A. R. Gurney’s Love Letters. He performed in many plays at the Los Angeles Mark Taper Forum and appeared in the Broadway play Checkmates.

Winfield’s first film role was in The Lost Man (1969), directed by Poitier. Although roles for African American actors were sparse during the early 1970’s, Winfield had boycotted many films because he viewed them as exploitative. However, he ended his boycott for a role in Trouble Man (1972) because it opened craft unions to African Americans. In 1972, Winfield was selected for the role of Nathan Lee in Sounder, the film for which he gained international recognition. After Sounder, most of his film roles were as a supporting actor. His credits included A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ but a Sandwich (1978) and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982). His most notable films in the 1990’s included Presumed Innocent (1990), Catfish in Black Bean Sauce (1999), and Second to Die (2002).

Winfield made his television debut in 1965 in the series Perry Mason. Television provided steady work for him throughout his career, and he had an impressive list of television roles. He appeared in Julia (1968-1970) with Diahann Carroll, 227 (1988-1990), and Touched by an Angel (1995-2003). Winfield’s television career also included several made-for-television films and miniseries, including It’s Good to Be Alive (1974), portraying Martin Luther King, Jr., in King (1978), and Roots: The Next Generations (1979); the latter two earned him Emmy nominations. During the mid-1980’s, he often played more authoritative figures in television films and series such as The Sophisticated Gents (1982), For Us the Living: The Medgar Evers Story (1983), The Women of Brewster Place (1989), Tyson (1995), and Strange Justice (1999).

Because one of Winfield’s greatest assets was his powerful voice, he was sought after for voice-over and narration roles. He narrated the PBS documentary Baseball in 1994; appeared in several episodes of The Magic School Bus, Spider-Man (1994-1998), and The Simpsons; and is best known for his highly melodramatic narration of City Confidential from 1998 to 2004.

Winfield’s honors include an Image Award from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) for Best Actor in 1982 for the television film The Sophisticated Gents, induction into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame in 1991, an Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for Picket Fences in 1995, and the St. Louis International Film Festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 1999.

Winfield was romantically involved with Cicely Tyson for almost two years. He later had a thirty-year relationship with his partner Charles Gillian, Jr., although he was discreet about their relationship. He battled obesity and diabetes for a number of years and served as a spokesman to raise awareness of diabetes. Winfield died of a heart attack on March 7, 2004.

Significance

Winfield was the third African American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. He also was nominated for three Emmy Awards, winning once. A socially conscious performer, Winfield sought roles that elevated the status of African Americans during a period when roles for black actors were sparse. His role on Julia was noted for creating more opportunities for African Americans in the entertainment industry.

Bibliography

Bogle, Donald. Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Film. 4th ed. New York: Continuum, 2001. Puts Winfield’s work and achievements into cultural and racial context.

Elbert, Albert. “Paul Winfield: A Man unto Himself.” Essence 4 (June, 1973): 27. Provides excellent information on Winfield’s early childhood, relationships, points of view, and the influences that shaped his career.

Mapp, Edward. “1972: Paul Winfield.” In African Americans and the Oscar: Seven Decades of Struggle and Achievement. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2003. Brief examination of the controversy over Sounder and Winfield’s performance that includes quotations from the actor himself about the significance of the role.