Poitier was tone deaf, and could not sing or dance.
This is what black actors did at the time, so audiences did not like him.
He worked very hard to improve his acting skills, and to get rid of his Bahamian accent.
He eventually got a leading role in the Broadway play called Lysistrata and he got excellent reviews.
At the end of 1949, he got a job working for Darryl F. Zanuck in the movie No Way Out (1950).
He played a doctor treating a white bigot.
After this job, he soon got more movie roles.
The acting jobs he got were better and more interesting than the roles most black actors played at the time.

In 1955, he played a member of an badly behaved high school class in Blackboard Jungle.
This was an important role in Poitier's career.

Poitier was the first black actor to win the Academy Award for Best Actor (for Lilies of the Field in 1963).

He acted in the first production of A Raisin in the Sun on Broadway in 1959, and later starred in the movie version released in 1961.
He was also in The Bedford Incident (1965), and A Patch of Blue (1965) co-starring Elizabeth Hartman and Shelley Winters.
In 1967, he was the most successful actor at the box office, with three successful movies, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner; To Sir, with Love and In the Heat of the Night.
The last movie featured his most successful character, Virgil Tibbs, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania detective.

However, Poitier began to be criticized for typecasting himself, playing black characters who had only good personalities, like his character in Guess Who's Coming To Dinner.
Poitier agreed with this but although he wanted more different roles, but also wanted to set a good example with his characters and go against the negative stereotypes that had come before.
He was the only major black actor in the American movie industry at the time.
Poitier was tone deaf, and could not sing or dance. This is what black actors did at the time, so audiences did not like him. He worked very hard to improve his acting skills, and to get rid of his Bahamian accent. He eventually got a leading role in the Broadway play called Lysistrata and he got excellent reviews. At the end of 1949, he got a job working for Darryl F. Zanuck in the movie No Way Out (1950). He played a doctor treating a white bigot. After this job, he soon got more movie roles. The acting jobs he got were better and more interesting than the roles most black actors played at the time.
In 1955, he played a member of an badly behaved high school class in Blackboard Jungle. This was an important role in Poitier's career.
Poitier was the first black actor to win the Academy Award for Best Actor (for Lilies of the Field in 1963).
He acted in the first production of A Raisin in the Sun on Broadway in 1959, and later starred in the movie version released in 1961. He was also in The Bedford Incident (1965), and A Patch of Blue (1965) co-starring Elizabeth Hartman and Shelley Winters. In 1967, he was the most successful actor at the box office, with three successful movies, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner; To Sir, with Love and In the Heat of the Night. The last movie featured his most successful character, Virgil Tibbs, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania detective.
However, Poitier began to be criticized for typecasting himself, playing black characters who had only good personalities, like his character in Guess Who's Coming To Dinner. Poitier agreed with this but although he wanted more different roles, but also wanted to set a good example with his characters and go against the negative stereotypes that had come before. He was the only major black actor in the American movie industry at the time.
Sidney Poitier