A comprehensive collection of photographs, interviews, and profiles of the most influential Black actresses who have worked in film, television, and theater Foreword by Gabrielle Union Marcellas Reynolds, the author of Supreme Models, presents the first-ever art book dedicated to celebrating Black actresses and exploring their experiences in acting. Through stunning photographs, personal interviews, short biographies, and career milestones, Supreme Actresses chronicles the most influential Black actresses who have worked in film, television, and theater. From Hattie McDaniel, the first actress of color to win an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1939, to Dorothy Dandridge, the first actress of color to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress in 1954. And from Ethel Waters, the first African American actress to be featured on an American sitcom in 1950, to Cicely Tyson, the first African American star of a TV drama in 1963. The performances by these talented actresses are ingrained into our memories. We experienced laughter, love, and loss with these women. But how did they begin their acting careers? Who were the first Black actresses who paved the way? What are their defining moments? What effects did racial prejudice have on their careers? Supreme Actresses remembers and celebrates the groundbreaking women who have been influencing culture for decades, reshaping the very standards of beauty in modern society.

“This coffee-table book is the first-ever collection of works devoted to celebrating black models. Fashion devotees will find glorious images of supers such as Iman, Tyra Banks, Naomi Campbell, Joan Smalls, and Adwoa Aboah alongside interviews and personal essays.” —Vogue Filled with revealing essays, interviews, and stunning photographs, Supreme Models pays tribute to black models past and present: from the first to be featured in catalogs and on magazine covers, like Iman, Donyale Luna, and Beverly Johnson, to the supermodels who reigned in the nineties—Tyra Banks, Naomi Campbell, and Veronica Webb. The book also observes the newest generation of models—Adut Akech, Jourdan Dunn, and Joan Smalls—who are shaking up the fashion industry by speaking out about racial prejudice while becoming social media sensations. Written by celebrity fashion stylist and journalist Marcellas Reynolds, Supreme Models features more than 70 women from the last 75 years. Reynolds writes, “I hope that everyone who reads this book learns something about the models included within—and more about the business of fashion and modeling. But what I want most is for Supreme Models to be a source for the little boys, or girls, who like my childhood self, need to see themselves represented in a positive light.” The book, filled with gorgeous photographs of the women, details their most memorable campaigns, covers, editorials, and runway shows. Black models have been influencing fashion and pop culture for decades, reshaping beauty standards and boundaries. Supreme Models is a celebration of their monumental impact.

From one of America's most renowned film scholars: a revelatory, perceptive, and highly readable look at the greatest silent film stars -- not those few who are fully appreciated and understood, like Chaplin, Keaton, Gish, and Garbo, but those who have been misperceived, unfairly dismissed, or forgotten. Here is Valentino, "the Sheik," who was hardly the effeminate lounge lizard he's been branded as; Mary Pickford, who couldn't have been further from the adorable little creature with golden ringlets that was her film persona; Marion Davies, unfairly pilloried in Citizen Kane; the original "Phantom" and "Hunchback," Lon Chaney; the beautiful Talmadge sisters, Norma and Constance. Here are the great divas, Pola Negri and Gloria Swanson; the great flappers, Colleen Moore and Clara Bow; the great cowboys, William S. Hart and Tom Mix; and the great lover, John Gilbert. Here, too, is the quintessential slapstick comedienne, Mabel Normand, with her Keystone Kops; the quintessential all-American hero, Douglas Fairbanks; and, of course, the quintessential all-American dog, Rin-Tin-Tin. This is the first book to anatomize the major silent players, reconstruct their careers, and give us a sense of what those films, those stars, and that Hollywood were all about. An absolutely essential text for anyone seriously interested in movies, and, with more than three hundred photographs, as much a treat to look at as it is to read.

Elvis Presley musicals, beach romps, biker flicks, and alienated youth movies were some of the most popular types of drive-in films during the sixties. The actresses interviewed for this book (including Celeste Yarnall, Lana Wood, Linda Harrison, Pamela Tiffin, Deanna Lund, Diane McBain, Judy Pace, and Chris Noel) all made their mark in these genres. These fantastic femmes could be found either twisting on the shores of Malibu, careening down the highway on a chopper, being serenaded by Elvis, or taking on the establishment as hip coeds. As cult figures, they contributed greatly to that period of filmmaking aimed at the teenage audience who frequented the drive-ins of America. They frolicked, screamed, and danced their way into B-movie history in such diverse films as Eve, Teenage Millionaire, The Girls on the Beach, Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, Three in the Attic, Wild in the Streets, and Paradise, Hawaiian Style. This book is a celebration of the actresses' careers. They have for the most part been overlooked in other publications documenting the history of film. Fantasy Femmes addresses their film and television careers, focusing on their view of the above genres, their candid comments and anecdotes about their films, the people they worked with, and their feelings in general regarding their lives and the choices they made. The book is well illuminated and contains a complete list of film and television credits.

A stunning photography book that explores the power, rebellion, and resilience held within the voices of trailblazing Black female musicians. From entertainment journalist and fashion stylist Marcellas Reynolds, the author of Supreme Models and Supreme Actresses, comes the third installment of the celebrated series, Supreme Sirens: Iconic Black Women Who Revolutionized Music, the first-ever art book to honor the Black female singers and musicians who dominate the music industry. Supreme Sirens chronicles the most influential and successful Black performers—from legendary jazz chanteuse Billie Holiday to the queen of soul Aretha Franklin and from glamorous girl groups such as the Supremes to modern, iconic superstars including Beyoncé, Rihanna, and Janet Jackson. Through exquisite photographs, personal interviews, short biographies, and career milestones, Reynolds details how these women’s music and careers have become the soundtrack of our lives. Supreme Sirens shares the power and wisdom of women who are at the forefront of entertainment; women who have overcome racial prejudices and redefined contemporary notions of Black women by breaking glass ceilings and tearing down barriers in the recording studio and on stage and screen. Includes Color Images

The films, the stars, the filmmakers-all get their due in Hollywood Black, a sweeping overview of blacks in film from the silent era through Black Panther, with striking photos and an engrossing history by award-winning author Donald Bogle. The story opens in the silent film era, when white actors in blackface often played black characters, but also saw the rise of independent African American filmmakers, including the remarkable Oscar Micheaux. It follows the changes in the film industry with the arrival of sound motion pictures and the Great Depression, when black performers such as Stepin Fetchit and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson began finding a place in Hollywood. More often than not, they were saddled with rigidly stereotyped roles, but some gifted performers, most notably Hattie McDaniel in Gone With the Wind (1939), were able to turn in significant performances. In the coming decades, more black talents would light up the screen. Dorothy Dandridge became the first African American to earn a Best Actress Oscar nomination for Carmen Jones (1954), and Sidney Poitier broke ground in films like The Defiant Ones and1963's Lilies of the Field. Hollywood Black reveals the changes in images that came about with the evolving social and political atmosphere of the US, from the Civil Rights era to the Black Power movement. The story takes readers through Blaxploitation, with movies like Shaft and Super Fly, to the emergence of such stars as Cicely Tyson, Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, and Whoopi Goldberg, and of directors Spike Lee and John Singleton. The history comes into the new millennium with filmmakers Barry Jenkins (Moonlight), Ava Du Vernay (Selma),and Ryan Coogler (Black Panther); megastars such as Denzel Washington, Will Smith, and Morgan Freeman; as well as Halle Berry, Angela Bassett, Viola Davis, and a glorious gallery of others. Filled with evocative photographs and stories of stars and filmmakers on set and off, Hollywood Black tells an underappreciated history as it's never before been told.

THE STORY: In the opening scene, two Supreme Beings plan the beginning of the world with the relish of two slightly sadistic suburban wives decorating a living room. Once they've decided on the color scheme of the races, a little concerned that whi