NAACP Image Awards: 10 Times Regina King Proved Why She’s Nominated For Entertainer Of The Year
Regina King leaves a lasting impression when she steps into a role. She is like a supernova, or an exploding star whose beautiful remnants outshine a galaxy. The film and television actress and director has come a long way since beginning her career in 1985 at the age of 14 as Brenda Jenkins on the NBC sitcom 227.
The Los Angeles native, now 50, credits her success and longevity to her mother, Gloria, a special education teacher, who kept her grounded. As a result, in the past three decades, she catapulted from a television child star to an award-winning Hollywood A-list actress. She has racked up seven NAACP Image Awards, and is a 2021 nominee for Entertainer of the Year. In 2019, she won her first Oscar for If Beale Street Could Talk, and secured her fourth Emmy for playing Sister Night on the hit HBO series Watchmen.
She also directed her first feature film, One Night in Miami, which was released in December 2020 on Amazon Prime. It is a fictionalized account of a true evening that occurred on Feb. 25, 1964, when Muhammad Ali defeated then-boxing champ Sonny Liston, at the Miami Beach Convention Center and spent the evening celebrating with football legend Jim Brown, R&B icon Sam Cooke and Black nationalism luminary Malcolm X.
“I think it will be a reminder for some, and a discovery for others,” King said of One Night in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “This conversation in the middle of right now, it has been going on forever, as far as a Black American is concerned. The passion and the pain that you hear and you see now are coming from the same space that these four men are speaking from and living through 40 years ago.”
Here are 10 times Regina King proved why she’s a nominee for Entertainer of the Year:
ONE OF MANY
In 2019, she won her first Oscar for If Beale Street Could Talk, an epic love story based on James Baldwin's 1974 eponymous novel. In the role of Sharon Rivers, she portrays a mother steadfast in her love for her daughter. Rivers goes through great lengths to help prove the innocence of her daughter’s longtime romantic partner after he is accused of rape by a Puerto Rican woman, who simply claimed a Black man did it. “To be standing here, representing one of the greatest artists of our time, James Baldwin, it’s a little surreal,” King said in her acceptance speech. She thanked the late Baldwin for writing the story and writer-director Barry Jenkins for nurturing and surrounding it with “so much love and support.” Watch the moving speech here:
BLACK EXCELLENCE
King, a nominee for the NAACP Image Awards Entertainer of The Year, has not only been recognized by the organization for her excellence over the years ––7 wins–– but she has also served as a presenter. At the 43rd awards ceremony in 2012 in Los Angeles, she served as a presenter alongside Sean 'Diddy' Combs at The Shrine Auditorium on February 17, 2012.
A HUMBLE BEGINNING
King’s mother and father, an electrician, divorced when she was a child. At a young age, King knew she wanted to be an actor. She studied under acting coach/actress Betty A. Bridges, mother of actor Todd Bridges, for 10 years before and during her first role on the TV series 227. “My mom told NBC that if I was going to play Brenda, I wasn’t going to one of those Hollywood private schools,” she said in a 2020 interview with PEOPLE magazine. “I was staying in public school.”
She has a sister, Reina, who is also an actress and producer. Both of their names mean "queen" in Spanish and Latin, respectively. King is slated to portray Shirley Chisholm, the first Black U.S. congresswoman, in the feature film, Shirley, which she will also produce alongside her sister, through their Royal Ties Productions company.
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A DRAMATIC ROLE
In 2017, the star picked up a NAACP Image award for Outstanding Actress in a Television Movie, Mini-Series or Dramatic Special for her roles in John Ridley’s American Crime on ABC. She also captured two Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for her role in the drama. She is seen below at the 48th NAACP Image Awards at Pasadena Civic Auditorium on February 11, 2017 in Pasadena, California.
CELEBRATING OUR STORIES
In 2014, King played the role of Natalie Hawkins, the divorced mother of Olympic gold medal gymnast Gabby Douglas on Lifetime. The movie told the story of Douglas's journey to the 2012 Olympics, and revealed the sacrifices Hawkins made for her daughter’s athletic career as well as for her three other children. In the image below, King is seen arriving at the 45th NAACP Image Awards at Pasadena Civic Auditorium on February 22, 2014.
A LEAP TO THE BIG SCREEN
After five seasons on 227, King jumped to the big screen, landing a role in John Singleton's directorial debut, Boyz N the Hood. She parlayed that success into other collaborations with Singleton in Poetic Justice and Higher Learning. “King has always been consistent in showing her dynamic range, bouncing effortlessly from dramatic material to comedic performances, like in the hit film Friday, with Ice Cube, and in A Thin Line Between Love and Hate, opposite Martin Lawrence,” ABC writes.
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‘SHOW ME THE MONEY’
Her performance as the wife of a football player Cuba Gooding, Jr., who famously uttered “show me the money,” in the popular film Jerry Maguire (1996) helped her to win additional and more prominent roles in How Stella Got Her Groove Back and Enemy of the State (both 1998), according to Britannica.
A DIRECTOR IS BORN
In addition to directing episodic television for ABC's Scandal and BET's Being Mary Jane, King headed up the BET Network teleplay adaptation of the best-selling book "Let the Church Say Amen" and “has continued her role behind the camera for Shondaland's series The Catch, OWN's Greenleaf, TNT's Animal Kingdom and Fox's PITCH,” according to ABC. In 2015 King joined season two of HBO's critically hailed television drama The Leftovers as a series regular, earning her a Critic's Choice Award nomination, the site notes.
A STELLAR PERFORMANCE
King won rave reviews in 2004 for her role in Ray as Margie Hendricks, an R&B singer who sang backup for Ray Charles, played by Jamie Foxx, in an Oscar-winning role. For her performance she received an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture at the 36th annual ceremony. She is pictured below at the ceremony holding the award.
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WINNING!
King scooped up an award for Best Actress in a Drama series for her role on TNT’s popular police drama Southland while serving with Sean 'Diddy' Combs as a presenter at the 43rd annual NAACP Image Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on February 17, 2012 in Los Angeles.
Her portrayal of Lydia Adams won the hearts of many throughout the series that ran for five seasons. ‘[W]e were so appreciative of the stories and style in which the show was shot and the opportunity to work together and learn from each other,” she told E about the series. She also picked up an NAACP award for Best Actress in a Drama series in 2011 for the Southland role and Directing a Drama Series.
Watch the 52nd Annual NAACP Image Awards on BET on Saturday, March 27, 2021 at 8/7C.
