Ruby Dee
Actor | Writer
Ruby Dee (born October 27, 1924) is an American actress, poet, playwright, screenwriter, journalist, and activist, perhaps best-known for co-starring in the film A Raisin in the Sun (1961).
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Filmography - Acting
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Betty and Coretta (2013)
As: Narrator
The widows of Martin Luther King and Malcolm X and how they carry on as single mothers after the assassination of their husbands.
Runtime: 88 min.
Directed by: Yves Simoneau
Stars: Malik Yoba | Ruby Dee | Mary J. Blige | Angela Bassett | Lindsay Owen Pierre
Long Distance Revolutionary: A Journey with Mumia Abu-Jamal (2013)
As: Herself
The film chronicles the life and revolutionary times of death row political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Runtime: 120 min.
Directed by: Stephen Vittoria
Stars: Giancarlo Esposito | Ruby Dee | Peter Coyote | Mumia Abu-Jamal | Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter
A Thousand Words (2012)
As: Annie McCall
Jack McCall is a fast-talking literary agent, who can close any deal, any time, any way. He has set his sights on New Age guru Dr. Sinja (Cliff Curtis) for his own selfish purposes. But Dr. Sinja is on to him, and Jack’s life comes unglued after a magical Bodhi tree mysteriously appears in his backyard. With every word Jack speaks, a leaf falls from the tree and he realizes that when the last leaf falls, ...
Runtime: 91 min.
Directed by: Brian Robbins
Stars: Kerry Washington | Eddie Murphy | Cliff Curtis | Allison Janney | Clark Duke
Video Girl (2011)
As: Valerie
Lorie Walker ( Meagan Good), attends a ritzy private school in a small southern town. Raised by her grandmother Valerie ( Ruby Dee), she often daydreams of becoming a professional dancer. After a chance meeting with a renowned music video director, her lifestyle changes completely. She finds herself struggling to stay grounded in this new, provocative, glamorous world.
Runtime: 95 min.
Stars: Ruby Dee | Meagan Good | Melyssa Ford | LisaRaye McCoy | Adam Senn
Politics of Love (2011)
Politics makes strange bedfellows, but never stranger than when a sexy, savvy, African-American conservative Republican reluctantly falls for his Democratic counterpart: a beautiful Indian-American Obama campaign volunteer. Sparks fly, tempers flare, heads turn, and romance blossoms for this mismatched pair of lovers in the frantic and intoxicating days leading up to Election Day. Can the politics of ...
Runtime: 93 min.
Directed by: William Dear
Stars: Loretta Devine | Gerry Bednob | Mallika Sherawat | Anil Raman | Brian J. White
The Perfect Age of Rock 'n' Roll (2011)
As: Miss Candy
In this film, childhood friends come face to face with the demons of rock and roll (lust, drugs, and passion) on a cross-country road trip that compels them to face their past, present, and future. Rocker Spyder, whose debut album was a huge hit saw his follow-on album bomb, causing him to retreat to his small hometown and give up. Seven years later, 27-year-old Spyder reconnects with his long-lost ...
Runtime: 92 min.
Directed by: Scott D. Rosenbaum
Stars: Lukas Haas | Taryn Manning | Jason Ritter | Kevin Zegers | Max Rosenbaum
America (2009)
As: Mrs. Harper
In "America," Dr. Maureen Brennan, a psychiatrist at a youth treatment center, encounters her newest patient, a bi-racial boy named America. Through their sessions, Dr. Brennan helps America come to terms with his roller-coaster life, which began when he was taken by authorities from his crack-addicted mother, and placed into foster care as an infant. The short time of stability in his life occurred when ...
Runtime: 89 min.
Directed by: Yves Simoneau
Stars: Rosie O'Donnell | Ruby Dee | Jade Yorker | Philip Johnson | Tim Rhoze
Steam (2007)
As: Doris
Three women — a young coed, a forty-something single mother, and one a senior-aged widow — meet in the sauna of the local gym, where they gradually get to know one another and bond over their respective trials and tribulations.
Runtime: 120 min.
Directed by: Kyle Schickner
Stars: Ally Sheedy | Ruby Dee | Alan Ritchson | Zach Mills | Kate Siegel
American Gangster (2007)
As: Mama Lucas
Following the death of his employer and mentor, Bumpy Johnson, Frank Lucas establishes himself as the number one importer of heroin in the Harlem district of Manhattan. He does so by buying heroin directly from the source in South East Asia and he comes up with a unique way of importing the drugs into the United States. Based on a true story.
Runtime: 157 min.
Directed by: Ridley Scott
Stars: Russell Crowe | Chiwetel Ejiofor | Denzel Washington | Josh Brolin | Lymari Nadal
In the Shadow of Hollywood: Race Movies and the Birth of Black Cinema (2007)
As: Herself
This documentary captures the sounds and images of a nearly forgotten era in film history when African American filmmakers and studios created “race movies” exclusively for black audiences. The best of these films attempted to counter the demeaning stereotypes of black Americans prevalent ...
Runtime: 59 min.
Directed by: Brad Osborne
Stars: Lawrence Varnado | Ruby Dee | Jeni Le Gon | Herb Jeffries | Leroy Collins
No. 2 (2006)
As: Nanna Maria
A matriarch organizes a feast with her family, in which she will name her successor. The heart has gone out of Nanna Maria's family. There are no parties — they don't even fight anymore...
Runtime: 94 min.
Directed by: Toa Fraser
Stars: Rene Naufahu | Mia Blake | Taungaroa Emile | Ruby Dee | Miriama McDowell
Their Eyes Were Watching God (2005)
As: Nanny
A drama set in the 1920s, where free-spirited Janie Crawford's search for happiness leads her through several different marriages, challenging the morals of her small town. Based on the novel by Zora Neale Hurston.
Runtime: 113 min.
Directed by: Darnell Martin
Stars: Michael Ealy | Ruben Santiago-Hudson | Halle Berry | Ruby Dee | Terrence Howard
Beah: A Black Woman Speaks (2003)
As: Herself
Beah: A Black Woman Speaks is a 2003 documentary about the life of Academy Award nominated actress Beah Richards. Directed by Lisa Gay Hamilton, it won the Documentary Award at the AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival in 2003.
Runtime: 88 min.
Directed by: LisaGay Hamilton
Stars: Bill Cobbs | Ossie Davis | Ruby Dee | Beah Richards | LisaGay Hamilton
Unchained Memories: Readings from the Slave Narratives (2003)
When the Civil War ended in 1865, more than four million slaves were set free. Over 70 years later, the memories of some 2,000 slave-era survivors were transcribed and preserved by the Library of Congress. These first-person anecdotes, ranging from the brutal to the bittersweet, have been brought to vivid life in this unique HBO documentary special, featuring the on-camera voices of ...
Runtime: 75 min.
Directed by: Ed Bell | Thomas Lennon
Stars: Whoopi Goldberg | Michael Boatman | Don Cheadle | Roscoe Lee Browne | Angela Bassett
Taking Back Our Town (2001)
As: Emelda West
A true story about a concerned housewife, Pat Melancon, who tries to block Shintech, a massive Japanese petrochemical conglomerate, from building a plant in her toxic township already known as "cancer alley". Pat and a few newly recruited, fledgling activitsts face the full force of Shintech's wealth and influence peddling, which has bought the cooperation of the government from the local level all the way ...
Runtime: 90 min.
Directed by: Sam Pillsbury
Stars: Chris Bauer | Hallee Hirsh | Ruby Dee | Myndy Crist | Laura Innes
Feast of All Saints (2001)
As: Elsie Claviere
Set in nineteenth-century New Orleans, the story depicts the gens de couleur libre, or the Free People of Colour, a dazzling yet damned class caught between the world of white privilege and black oppression.
Runtime: 140 min.
Directed by: Peter Medek
Stars: Robert Ri'chard | Jennifer Beals | Peter Gallagher | Ossie Davis | Gloria Reuben
Finding Buck McHenry (2000)
As: Mrs. Henry
When an 11 year old boy gets cut from his Little League baseball team, he sets out to form his own team.
Runtime: 94 min.
Directed by: Charles Burnett
Stars: Ossie Davis | Ruby Dee | Ernie Banks | Michael Schiffman | Duane McLaughlin
A Storm in Summer (2000)
As: Grandmother
Set in 1969, Abel Shaddick, a crotchety deli owner, has a grudge against virtually everyone in his upstate New York town of Fairview, particularly against his slacker nephew Stanley who lives behind the shop. Without telling his uncle, Stanley agrees to put up a needy city kid for the summer as part of a charity program run by rich debutante Gloria. Abel immediately vetoes the plan, but it is too late. The ...
Runtime: 94 min.
Directed by: Robert Wise
Stars: Andrew McCarthy | Peter Falk | Nastassja Kinski | Ruby Dee | Aaron Meeks
Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years (1999)
As: Annie Elizabeth 'Bessie' Delany
Tells the story of Sadie and Bessie Delany, two African-American (they preferred "colored") sisters who both lived past the age of 100. They grew up on a North Carolina college campus, the daughters of the first African-American Episcopal bishop, who was born a slave, and a woman with an inter-racial background. With the support of each other and their family, they survived encounters with racism and ...
Runtime: 100 min.
Directed by: Lynne Littman
Stars: Amy Madigan | Lisa Arrindell | Ruby Dee | Diahann Carroll | Audra McDonald
Passing Glory (1999)
As: Mommit Porter
A true story of a priest (Andre Braugher) in New Orleans who formed a group of black players and challenged an all-white prep school basketball team in the 1960's. Eventually events like these signaled the pivotal turn in the games' history leading to the integration in today's sport. Directed by Steve James (Hoop Dreams), these basketball players didn't just make shots, they made history.
Runtime: 100 min.
Directed by: Steve James
Stars: Andre Braugher | Rip Torn | Bill Nunn | Ruby Dee
A Time To Dance: The Life and Work of Norma Canner (1998)
As: Narrator
This intimate, uncannily moving documentary profiles Norma Canner, a pioneer in dance movement therapy, who found in dance a way to help people who had been discarded by society. The film traces the evolution of Norma's career from Broadway actress in the '40s, through her ground-breaking work in creative movement with disabled and mentally retarded children in the '60s, to her present work ...
Runtime: 75 min.
Directed by: Webb Wilcoxen | Ian Brownell
Stars: Ruby Dee | Norma Canner
A Simple Wish (1997)
As: Hortence
Murray is a male fairy godmother, and he is trying to help 8-year-old Anabel to fulfil her "simple wish" - that her father Oliver, who is a cab driver, would win the leading role in a Broadway musical. Unfortunately, Murray's magic wand is broken and the fairies convention is threatened by evil witches Claudia and Boots.
Runtime: 89 min.
Directed by: Michael Ritchie
Stars: Martin Short | Mara Wilson | Kathleen Turner | Deborah Odell | Robert Pastorelli
Mr. and Mrs. Loving (1996)
As: Sophia
A moving and uplifting drama about the effects of interracial marriage in the 1960s. Friends since childhood, and loved by both families, this couple are exiled after their wedding and have to wage a courageous battle to find their place in America as a loving family.
Runtime: 105 min.
Directed by: Richard Friedenberg
Stars: Timothy Hutton | Lela Rochon | Bill Nunn | Ruby Dee | Corey Parker
Just Cause (1995)
As: Evangeline
Bobby Earl is facing the electric chair for the murder of a young girl. Eight years after the crime he calls in Paul Armstrong, a professor of law, to help prove his innocence. Armstrong quickly uncovers some overlooked evidence to present to the local police, but they aren't interested - Bobby was their killer.
Runtime: 102 min.
Directed by: Arne Glimcher
Stars: Sean Connery | Laurence Fishburne | Kate Capshaw | Ruby Dee | Blair Underwood
Tuesday Morning Ride (1995)
Oscar nominated short film from 1995
Runtime: 35 min.
Directed by: Dianne Houston
Stars: Erica Gimpel | Bill Cobbs | Vondie Curtis-Hall | Ruby Dee | Vivian Bonnell
Cop and ½ (1993)
As: Rachel
When a pint-sized 8-year-old kid witnesses a murder he offers to help the police, if they make him a cop, too. Saddled with this streetwise sidekick, a hardboiled cop is forced to take his new partner seriously as they race the clock to bring the bad guys to justice.
Runtime: 97 min.
Directed by: Henry Winkler
Stars: Holland Taylor | Burt Reynolds | Norman D. Golden II | Ruby Dee | Ray Sharkey
Jungle Fever (1991)
As: Lucinda Purify
A successful and married black man contemplates having an affair with a white girl from work. He's quite rightly worried that the racial difference would make an already taboo relationship even worse.
Runtime: 132 min.
Directed by: Spike Lee
Stars: John Turturro | Samuel L. Jackson | Wesley Snipes | Ossie Davis | Annabella Sciorra
Decoration Day (1990)
As: Rowena
A cantankerous widower (Garner) who is virtually living the life of a recluse is forced to rejoin his community when his Godchild (Skaggs) gets in trouble and a childhood friend (Cobbs), a black tenant farmer, refuses to belatedly accept a Congressional Medal of Honor for bravery in World War II.
Runtime: 100 min.
Directed by: Robert Markowitz
Stars: Laurence Fishburne | Bill Cobbs | James Garner | Ruby Dee | Judith Ivey
The Court-Martial of Jackie Robinson (1990)
As: Jackie's Mother
A film about the early life of the baseball star in the army, particulary his court-martial for insubordination regarding segragation.
Runtime: 100 min.
Directed by: Larry Peerce
Stars: Andre Braugher | Daniel Stern | Paul Dooley | Stan Shaw | Ruby Dee
Love at Large (1990)
As: Corrine Dart
Vampish miss Dolan hires hardboiled P.I. Harry Dobbs to tail her shady boyfriend. Harry realizes that the man leads a double life but then his client disappears. Harry teams up with his own tail, P.I. Stella Wynkowski, to clear things up.
Runtime: 97 min.
Directed by: Alan Rudolph
Stars: Tom Berenger | Anne Archer | Annette O'Toole | Kate Capshaw | Elizabeth Perkins
Do the Right Thing (1989)
As: Mother Sister
On the hottest day of the year on a street in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, everyone's hate and bigotry smolders and builds until it explodes into violence.
Runtime: 120 min.
Directed by: Spike Lee
Stars: Danny Aiello | Giancarlo Esposito | Richard Edson | Ossie Davis | Ruby Dee
Go Tell It On The Mountain (1984)
As: Mrs. Grimes
This film adaptation of James Baldwin's celbrated novel tells the journey of a family from the rural South to "big city" Harlem seeking both salvation and understanding and of a young boy struggling to earn the approval of a self-righteous and often unloving stepfather.
Runtime: 96 min.
Directed by: Stan Lathan
Stars: Ving Rhames | Alfre Woodard | Paul Winfield | Olivia Cole | CCH Pounder
Cat People (1982)
As: Female
After years of separation, Irina (Nastassja Kinski) and her minister brother, Paul (Malcolm McDowell), reunite in New Orleans in this erotic tale of the supernatural. When zoologists capture a wild panther, Irina is drawn to the cat -- and the zoo curator (John Heard) is drawn to her. Soon, Irina's brother will have to reveal the family secret: that when sexually aroused, they turn into predatory ...
Runtime: 118 min.
Directed by: Paul Schrader
Stars: Malcolm McDowell | Ed Begley Jr. | John Heard | Nastassja Kinski | Ruby Dee
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1979)
As: Grandmother Baker
Based on writer Maya Angelou's childhood, this story is about a young girl in the South who is sent to live with her grandmother after her parents divorce.
Runtime: 96 min.
Directed by: Fielder Cook
Stars: Paul Benjamin | Roger E. Mosley | Ruby Dee | Esther Rolle | Diahann Carroll
It's Good to Be Alive (1974)
As: Ruth Campanella
This movie details the struggles of former Brooklyn Dodger catcher Roy Campanella to adapt to life in a wheelchair following his crippling automobile accident in 1959. Cinematographer Ted Voigtlander was Emmy-nominated.
Runtime: 100 min.
Directed by: Michael Landon
Stars: Paul Winfield | Ruby Dee | Ramon Bieri | Louis Gossett, Jr. | Ketty Lester
Black Girl (1972)
As: Netta's mother
An aspiring dancer and her wicked sister's resent their mother's love for a foster daughter.
Runtime: 97 min.
Directed by: Ossie Davis
Stars: Brock Peters | Leslie Uggams | Claudia McNeil | Louise Stubbs | Rhetta Greene
Buck and the Preacher (1972)
As: Ruth
A wagon master and a con-man preacher help freed slaves dogged by cheap-labor agents out West.
Runtime: 102 min.
Directed by: Sidney Poitier | Joseph Sargent
Stars: Harry Belafonte | Ruby Dee | Sidney Poitier | Cameron Mitchell | Denny Miller
King: A Filmed Record... Montgomery to Memphis (1970)
As: Herself
A 1970 American documentary film biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., presented in the form of newsreel footage and segments of recordings by Dr. King, framed by celebrity narrators, including Marlon Brando, Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Ruby Dee, James Earl Jones, Clarence Williams III, Burt Lancaster, Ben Gazzara, Charlton Heston, Harry Belafonte, The movie was produced by Richard Kaplan and Ely ...
Runtime: 185 min.
Directed by: Sidney Lumet | Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Stars: James Earl Jones | Charlton Heston | Harry Belafonte | Ruby Dee | Ben Gazzara
Uptight! (1968)
As: Laurie
Black militants building up an arsenal of weapons in preparation for a race war are betrayed by one of their own.
Runtime: 104 min.
Directed by: Jules Dassin
Stars: Ruby Dee | Roscoe Lee Browne | Raymond St. Jacques | Jason Bernard | Frank Silvera
The Incident (1967)
As: Joan Robinson
Two young hoodlums (including a young Martin Sheen) terrorize the passengers of a late night New York City subway train.
Runtime: 107 min.
Directed by: Larry Peerce
Stars: Beau Bridges | Martin Sheen | Ed McMahon | Ruby Dee | Victor Arnold
Gone Are the Days! (1963)
As: Lutiebelle Gussie Mae Jenkins
A young, idealistic man returns home to the plantation where he grew up in servitude. With him, he brings his fiance, Lutiebelle, in hopes of convincing the plantation owner that she is really his cousin in order to secure the family inheritance. To aid in the comic complications that follow are his family members Missy and Gitlow, and the plantation owners endearing (but ineffectual) son Charlie.
Runtime: 99 min.
Directed by: Nicholas Webster
Stars: Ossie Davis | Ruby Dee | Godfrey Cambridge | Hilda Haynes | Beah Richards
The Balcony (1963)
As: Thief
Shelley Winters is the madame of a house where customers play out their erotic fantasies, oblivious to a revolution which is sweeping the country. When her old friend, the chief of police (Peter Falk), asks her to impersonate the missing queen in order to reassure the people and halt the revolution, she offers instead three of her customers to play the general, bishop and chief justice, all of whom ...
Runtime: 84 min.
Directed by: Joseph Strick
Stars: Peter Falk | Leonard Nimoy | Shelley Winters | Ruby Dee | Lee Grant
A Raisin in the Sun (1961)
As: Ruth Younger
Walter Lee Younger is a young man struggling with his station in life. Sharing a tiny apartment with his wife, son, sister and mother, he seems like an imprisoned man. Until, that is, the family gets an unexpected financial windfall...
Runtime: 128 min.
Directed by: Daniel Petrie
Stars: Ruby Dee | Sidney Poitier | Diana Sands | Claudia McNeil | Louis Gossett, Jr.
Take a Giant Step (1959)
As: Christine
This pioneering film in the history of African-American cinema, released two years before "A Raisin In The Sun", is the coming-of-age story of a black high-school student living in a middle-class white neighborhood in the late '50s.
Runtime: 100 min.
Directed by: Philip Leacock
Stars: Ruby Dee | Frederick O'Neal | Beah Richards | Johnny Nash | Estelle Hemsley
Virgin Island (1959)
As: Ruth
A British woman marries an American writer in spite of her family's disapproval and goes to live with him on a tropical island.
Runtime: 84 min.
Directed by: Pat Jackson
Stars: Sidney Poitier | John Cassavetes | Isabel Dean | Colin Gordon | Virginia Maskell
St. Louis Blues (1958)
As: Elizabeth
Will Handy grows up in Memphis with his preacher father and his Aunt Hagar. His father intends for him to use his musical gifts only in church, but he can't stay away from the music of the streets and workers. After he writes a theme song for a local politician, Gogo, a speakeasy singer, convinces Will to be her accompanist. Will is estranged from his father for many years while he writes and publishes ...
Runtime: 105 min.
Directed by: Allen Reisner
Stars: Nat 'King' Cole | Eartha Kitt | Cab Calloway | Mahalia Jackson | Ella Fitzgerald
Edge of the City (1957)
As: Lucy Tyler
An army deserter and a black dock worker join forces against a corrupt union official.
Runtime: 85 min.
Directed by: Martin Ritt
Stars: Jack Warden | Ruby Dee | Sidney Poitier | John Cassavetes | Kathleen Maguire
The Tall Target (1951)
As: Rachel, Slave Maid
A detective tries to prevent the assassination of a mysterious "tall man" during a train ride.
Runtime: 78 min.
Directed by: Anthony Mann
Stars: Ruby Dee | Marshall Thompson | Dick Powell | Adolphe Menjou | Paula Raymond
The Jackie Robinson Story (1950)
As: Rae Robinson
Biography of Jackie Robinson, the first black major league baseball player in the 20th century. Traces his career in the negro leagues and the major leagues
Runtime: 77 min.
Directed by: Alfred E. Green
Stars: Ruby Dee | Minor Watson | Louise Beavers | Richard Lane | Jackie Robinson