Sidney Poitier: Trailblazer | 265
Even the Rich
Wondery
4.3 • 11.5K Ratings
🗓️ 18 February 2025
⏱️ 60 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As we continue to honor impactful artists during Black History Month, we turn to a legitimate legend - Sidney Poitier. Very few people have bucked as many odds as he did. After almost dying at birth, and growing up in near-poverty, Sidney immigrates to the US from from the Bahamas as a boy. Once there, he deals with racism, death threats, homelessness, and an industry that wants nothing to do with him. But he forges ahead, refusing to quit, and makes history with an Oscar win that opens the door - not only for Black people in Hollywood - but all over the world.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Wondery Plus subscribers can binge the newest season of Even the Rich before anyone else. |
| 0:04.4 | Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. |
| 0:13.0 | Brooke, have you ever been told that you're not good enough? |
| 0:17.7 | Yeah, every day when I look in the mirror. |
| 0:20.4 | No, stop. No, but I mean, look in the mirror. No, stop. |
| 0:21.6 | No, but I mean, probably hasn't everyone? |
| 0:24.6 | No. |
| 0:25.2 | Like, I think being in entertainment, you get that implication all the time, you know? |
| 0:29.5 | Well, and so much of it is, like, not even in your control. |
| 0:32.6 | I know. |
| 0:33.8 | Well, today's subject has been proving his doubters wrong, his whole life. |
| 0:38.1 | He wasn't expected to survive even a week when he was born, but he went on to live a long, impactful life. |
| 0:44.8 | Along the way, he faced racism, homelessness, and countless people telling him who and what he should be. |
| 0:51.2 | But he always stayed true to himself, and he broke so many barriers in Hollywood |
| 0:55.1 | that the industry hasn't been the same since. Today, we're talking about the absolute legend |
| 1:01.4 | that is Sydney Poitier. It's February 20th, 1927, and 28-year-old Evelyn Poitier has just given birth to a baby boy, |
| 1:14.8 | two months early. |
| 1:16.2 | She and her husband, Reginald, are in Miami to sell the tomatoes they harvested on Cat Island |
| 1:21.3 | in the Bahamas, which is where they live with their six children. |
| 1:25.1 | Having a baby was not on the agenda for this trip. |
| 1:27.3 | Since the baby weighs |
| 1:28.8 | less than three pounds, both the midwife and Reginald are convinced he won't survive. |
... |
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