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Paul Winfield
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Paul Edward Winfield (22 May 1939 – 7 March 2004) was an American television and film actor. He was known for his portrayal of a Louisiana sharecropper who struggles to support his family during the Great Depression in the landmark film Sounder and as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the television miniseries King. Off camera, Winfield narrated the television crime series City Confidential.
ield was born in Los Angeles, California to Lois Beatrice Edwards, a union organizer in the garment industry.
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Encyclopedia
Paul Edward Winfield (22 May 1939 – 7 March 2004) was an American television and film actor. He was known for his portrayal of a Louisiana sharecropper who struggles to support his family during the Great Depression in the landmark film Sounder and as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the television miniseries King. Off camera, Winfield narrated the television crime series City Confidential.
Biography
Early years
Winfield was born in Los Angeles, California to Lois Beatrice Edwards, a union organizer in the garment industry. His stepfather from the age of eight was Clarence Winfield, a city trash collector and construction worker. He attended Manual Arts High School, the University of Portland, Stanford University, Los Angeles City College and the University of California at Los Angeles.
Career
Winfield carved out a diverse career in film, television, theater and voiceovers by taking ground breaking roles at a time when African-American actors were scarcely cast. His first major feature film role was in the 1969 film, The Lost Man starring Sidney Poitier. Winfield first became well-known to television audiences when he appeared for several years opposite Diahann Carroll on the groundbreaking television series Julia. Filmed during a high point of racial tensions in the United States, the show was unique in featuring an African-American female as the central character. He also starred as Martin Luther King, Jr. in the 1978 miniseries King.
In 1973, Winfield was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for the 1972 film Sounder, and his co-star in that film, Cicely Tyson, was nominated for Best Actress. Prior to their nominations, only two other African Americans - Dorothy Dandridge and Sidney Poitier - had ever been nominated for a leading role. He also appeared, in a different role, in the 2003 Disney-produced television remake of Sounder, which was directed by Kevin Hooks, his co-star from the original. Winfield played the part of “Jim the Slave” in Huckleberry Finn (1974) which was a musical based on the novel by Mark Twain. Winfield would recall late in his career that as a young actor he had played one of the two leads in Of Mice and Men in local repertory, made up in whiteface, since a black actor playing it would have been unthinkable. Winfield also starred in more recent miniseries, including Roots: The Next Generations, Alex Haley'sQueen: The Story of an American Family and Scarlett.
The actor gained a new segment of fans for his brief but memorable roles in several science fiction TV programs and movies. He portrayed Captain Clark Terrell, an unwilling minion of Khan Noonien Singh, in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Lt. Traxler, a friendly but crusty cop partnered with Lance Henriksen in The Terminator starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. In 1995 he was part of the 'name' ensemble cast in Tim Burton's comic homage to 1950's science fiction Mars Attacks!, playing the complacently self-satisfied chickenhawk Lt-Gen. Casey. On the small screen Star Trek franchise, he appeared as an alien captain who communicates in metaphor in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “Darmok”. He also appeared on Babylon 5, as General Richard Franklin, the father of regular character Dr. Stephen Franklin, in the second season episode "Gropos."
Winfield also took on roles as gay characters in the films Mike's Murder in 1984 and again in 1998 in the film Relax...It's Just Sex.
Winfield found success off-camera due to his unique voice. He provided voices on the cartoons Spider-Man, The Magic School Bus, Batman Beyond, Gargoyles, K10C, and The Simpsons, on the latter voicing the Don King parody Lucius Sweet. In his voiceover career, he perhaps best-known as the narrator for the A&E true crime series City Confidential, a role he began in 1998 and continued with until his death in 2004.
Throughout his career, Winfield frequently managed to perform in the theater. His only Broadway production, Checkmates, in 1988, co-starring Ruby Dee, was also the Broadway debut of Denzel Washington. He also appeared in productions at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, and The Shakespeare Theatre in Washington, D.C.
Winfield was nominated for an Emmy Award for his performance in the King and Roots: The Next Generations. He won an Emmy Award, in 1995, for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series, for his appearance as Judge Harold Nance in an episode of the CBS drama Picket Fences.
Personal life
Winfield long battled obesity and diabetes, and he suffered a stroke. He died of a heart attack in 2004 at the age of 64, at Queen of Angels–Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles. He was openly gay in his private life, but remained discreet about it in the public eye.
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