#James Earl Jones | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

unbfacts · 5 months

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#james earl jones #Darth Vader #people #entertainment

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mimi-0007 · 17 days

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FATHER & SON: James Earl Jones with his Father Robert Earl Jones on Stage in the 1962 Production "Moon on a Rainbow Shawl."

Robert Earl Jones (February 3, 1910 – September 7, 2006), sometimes credited as Earl Jones, was an American actor and professional boxer. One of the first prominent Black film stars, Jones was a living link with the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s, having worked with Langston Hughes early in his career.

Jones was best known for his leading roles in films such as Lying Lips (1939) and later in his career for supporting roles in films such as The Sting (1973), Trading Places (1983), The Cotton Club (1984), and Witness (1985).

Jones was born in northwestern Mississippi; the specific location is unclear as some sources indicate Senatobia, while others suggest nearby Coldwater. He left school at an early age to work as a sharecropper to help his family. He later became a prizefighter. Under the name "Battling Bill Stovall", he was a sparring partner of Joe Louis.

Jones became interested in theater after he moved to Chicago, as one of the thousands leaving the South in the Great Migration. He moved on to New York by the 1930s. He worked with young people in the Works Progress Administration, the largest New Deal agency, through which he met Langston Hughes, a young poet and playwright. Hughes cast him in his 1938 play, Don't You Want to Be Free?.

Jones also entered the film business, appearing in more than twenty films. His film career started with the leading role of a detective in the 1939 race film Lying Lips, written and directed by Oscar Micheaux, and Jones made his next screen appearance in Micheaux's The Notorious Elinor Lee (1940). Jones acted mostly in crime movies and dramas after that, with such highlights as Wild River (1960) and One Potato, Two Potato (1964). In the Oscar-winning 1973 film The Sting, he played Luther Coleman, an aging grifter whose con is requited with murder leading to the eponymous "sting". In the later 20th century, Jones appeared in several other noted films: Trading Places (1983) and Witness (1985).

Toward the end of his life, Jones was noted for his stage portrayal of Creon in The Gospel at Colonus (1988), a black musical version of the Oedipus legend. He also appeared in episodes of the long-running TV shows Lou Grant and Kojak. One of his last stage roles was in a 1991 Broadway production of Mule Bone by Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, another important writer of the Harlem Renaissance. His last film was Rain Without Thunder (1993).

Although blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee in the 1950s due to involvement with leftist groups, Jones was ultimately honored with a lifetime achievement award by the U.S. National Black Theatre Festival.

Jones was married three times. As a young man, he married Ruth Connolly (died 1986) in 1929; they had a son, James Earl Jones. Jones and Connolly separated before James was born in 1931, and the couple divorced in 1933. Jones did not come to know his son until the mid-1950s. He adopted a second son, Matthew Earl Jones. Jones died on September 7, 2006, in Englewood, New Jersey, from natural causes at age 96.

THEATRE

1945 The Hasty Heart (Blossom) Hudson Theatre, Broadway

1945 Strange Fruit (Henry) McIntosh NY theater production

1948 Volpone (Commendatori) City Center

1948 Set My People Free (Ned Bennett) Hudson Theatre, Broadway

1949 Caesar and Cleopatra (Nubian Slave) National Theatre, Broadway

1952 Fancy Meeting You Again (Second Nubian) Royale Theatre, Broadway

1956 Mister Johnson (Moma) Martin Beck Theater, Broadway

1962 Infidel Caesar (Soldier) Music Box Theater, Broadway

1962 The Moon Besieged (Shields Green) Lyceum Theatre, Broadway

1962 Moon on a Rainbow Shawl (Charlie Adams) East 11th Street Theatre, New York

1968 More Stately Mansions (Cato) Broadhurst Theatre, Broadway

1975 All God's Chillun Got Wings (Street Person) Circle in the Square Theatre, Broadway

1975 Death of a Salesman (Charley)

1977 Unexpected Guests (Man) Little Theatre, Broadway

1988 The Gospel at Colonus (Creon) Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, Broadway

1991 Mule Bone (Willie Lewis) Ethel Barrymore Theatre, Broadway

FILMS

1939 Lying Lips (Detective Wenzer )

1940 The Notorious Elinor Lee (Benny Blue)

1959 Odds Against Tomorrow (Club Employee uncredited)

1960 Wild River (Sam Johnson uncredited)

1960 The Secret of the Purple Reef (Tobias)

1964 Terror in the City (Farmer)

1964 One Potato, Two Potato (William Richards)

1968 Hang 'Em High

1971 Mississippi Summer (Performer)

1973 The Sting (Luther Coleman)

1974 Cockfighter (Buford)

1977 Proof of the Man (Wilshire Hayward )

1982 Cold River (The Trapper)

1983 Trading Places (Attendant)

1983 Sleepaway Camp (Ben)

1984 The Cotton Club (Stage Door Joe)

1984 Billions for Boris (Grandaddy)

1985 Witness (Custodian)

1988 Starlight: A Musical Movie (Joe)

1990 Maniac Cop 2 (Harry)

1993 Rain Without Thunder (Old Lawyer)

TELEVISION

1964 The Defenders (Joe Dean) Episode: The Brother Killers

1976 Kojak (Judge) Episode: Where to Go if you Have Nowhere to Go?

1977 The Displaced Person (Astor) Television movie

1978 Lou Grant (Earl Humphrey) Episode: Renewal

1979 Jennifer's Journey (Reuven )Television movie

1980 Oye Ollie (Performer) Television series

1981 The Sophisticated Gents (Big Ralph Joplin) 3 episodes

1982 One Life to Live

1985 Great Performances (Creon) Episode: The Gospel at Colonus

1990 True Blue (Performer) Episode: Blue Monday

#james earl jones #black tumblr #black literature #black community #black excellence #blackexcellence365 #actor #robert earl jones #stage actor

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darth-memes · 3 months

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAMES EARL JONES!

#star wars #sw memes #james earl jones #original trilogy #the empire strikes back #darth vader #luke skywalker #anakin skywalker #revenge of the sith #prequel trilogy

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ellelans · 1 year

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Help me,Obi-Wan Kenobi.You’re my only hope.

Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope.

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chronophotographic-gun · 5 months

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Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

#dr strangelove #dr strangelove or how i learned to stop worrying and love the bomb #dr strangelove 1964 #stanley kubrick #peter sellers #george c scott #sterling hayden #keenan wynn #slim pickens #peter bull #james earl jones #1960s #1964 #filmedit #film #cinema #movies

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theconjurervfx · 2 months

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Conan The Barbarian (1982) dir. John Milius.

#80s movies #conan the barbarian #scifi #cult classic #mood #vibes #pop culture #arnold schwarzenegger #james earl jones #conan #thulsa doom #max von sydow #sandahi bergman #cassandra gava #valerie quennessen #nadiuska

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pepperoniparadise · 1 month

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“Your focus determines your reality.”

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skysgalaxy · 8 months

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This is just too funny and golden ✨

Second one is from the comedy show Big Bang Theory

#star wars #vivien lyra blair #hayden christensen #carrie fisher #james earl jones #star wars original trilogy #kenobi series #anakin skywalker #leia organa #leia skywalker #skywalker family #star wars fandom

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cinemajunkie70 · 3 months

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A very happy birthday to James Earl Jones!

#james earl jones #darth vader #the lion king

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davidhudson · 3 months

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Happy 93rd, James Earl Jones.

#james earl jones #sesame street #television #cinema #film #movies

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shewhoworshipscarlin · 2 months

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When I read great literature, great drama, speeches, or sermons, I feel that the human mind has not achieved anything greater than the ability to share feelings and thoughts through language. --James Earl Jones

#james earl jones #actor #black history month #quote

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nkp1981 · 10 months

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