It has been a long road.

The first black character in an American movie was Uncle Tom, featured in a 12-minute adaptation of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in 1903. It was an important first step, with a glaring flaw — the actor who played the character was a white man, made up in blackface.

In the century since, African-Americans have fought a long, uphill battle for decent roles and opportunities in the movies, both in front of and behind the camera.

The journey has never been an easy one, and progress has often come at a glacial pace … but today’s black actors and filmmakers are enjoying opportunities and earning triumphs that would have been unimaginable not so long ago.

When Denzel Washington and Hallie Berry swept the Best Actor and Best Actress awards at the 2002 Academy Awards, and when Jamie Foxx earned the Best Actor award at last year’s ceremony, it was a long way from those flickering first images from over 100 years ago.

This Saturday, Feb. 18, beginning at 5 p.m., the Meridian Museum of Art and the Delta Nu Zeta Chapter of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority will present “From Harlem to Hollywood,” a Black History Month Program that will remember the legacy and tell the story of African-American actors and filmmakers.

A reception will follow the program, which is free and open to everyone. The program is sponsored by the Community Foundation of East Mississippi.

“From Harlem to Hollywood” will cover the image and involvement of black Americans in the movies, “image” referring to the way that African-Americans have been portrayed in mainstream cinema, and “involvement” to their opportunities to be involved in those portrayals.

The program will include film clips from historic and contemporary movies, the documentary “Small Steps, Big Strides: The Black Experience in Hollywood,” a connecting narrative, artwork by Edward “Stix” Shadwick, a special youth art show, and live musical performances by the Mount Olive Church Choir, Geneva Jenkins, Edward “Stix” Shadwick, Eris Jordan and Kabana.



The movies



The film clips that will be shown during the program will help demonstrate the changing roles of black actors and filmmakers in the movie industry, as well as the changing image of African-Americans in mainstream American culture.

The clips will come from movies such as:

• “Birth of a Nation” (1915)

• “The Emperor Jones” (1933)

• “Gone With the Wind” (1939)

• “Casablanca” (1942)

• “Stormy Weather” (1943)

• “Cabin in the Sky” (1943)

• “No Way Out” (1950)

• “Carmen Jones” (1954)

• “The Defiant Ones” (1958)

• “In the Heat of the Night” (1967)

• “The Great White Hope” (1970)

• “Shaft” (1971)

• “Sounder” (1972)

• “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman” (1974)

• “Roots” (1977)

• “An Officer and a Gentleman” (1982)

• “Beverly Hills Cop” (1984)

• “A Soldier’s Story” (1984)

• “The Color Purple”(1985)

• “Do the Right Thing” (1989)

• “Glory” (1989)

• “Soul Food” (1997)

• “Barbershop” (2002)

• “Ray” (2004)



The People



“Why should I complain about making $7,000 a week playing a maid? If I didn’t, I’d be making $7 a week being one”

— Hattie McDaniel



“I was the only black person on the set. It was unusual for me to be in a circumstance in which every move I made was tantamount to representation of 18 million people.”

— Sidney Poitier



Both Hattie McDaniel and Sidney Poitier were important pioneers in black Americans’ struggle to be seen and heard on the nation’s movie screens.

McDaniel was the first black performer to win an Academy Award, winning the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance in “Gone With the Wind” — although she earned it, of course, while playing a servant, very much of a piece with the subservient roles that were the only ones available to black performers in that era.

By the time Sidney Poitier became the second black performer to win an Oscar, for Best Actor in the 1963 film “Lilies of the Field,” he was one of the most popular actors in Hollywood but, at times, it seemed as if the movie industry thought he was the only black actor in Hollywood.

Their stories will be told during the program, along with those of Oscar Micheaux, Stephen Fetchit, Paul Robeson, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Lena Horne, Ethel Waters, the Nicholas Brothers, Dorothy Dandridge, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Brock Peters, Jim Brown, Bill Cosby, James Earl Jones, Richard Roundtree, Pam Grier, Billy Dee Williams, Cicely Tyson, Richard Pryor, Louis Gossett Jr., Eddie Murphy, Whoopi Goldberg, Spike Lee, Angela Bassett, Morgan Freeman, Danny Glover, Samuel L. Jackson, Cuba Gooding Jr., Halle Berry, and multiple-Oscar winner Denzel Washington.

“This moment is so much bigger than me. This moment is for Dorothy Dandridge, Lena Horne, Diahann Carroll … It’s for the women that stand beside me, Jada Pinkett Smith, Angela Bassett, Vivica A. Fox … and it’s for every nameless, faceless woman of color that now has a chance, because the door tonight has been opened,” said Halle Berry during her Oscar acceptance speech.

The goal of the evening’s program is not only to celebrate the accomplishments of African-Americans actors and filmmakers; it’s also to remind us of the struggles it took to get there, and of the many black Americans who fought against long odds to leave a lasting impression on the silver screen.

It will be a night to celebrate the triumphs, and remember the toils, of those who have been part of the fascinating journey down the “long road” from Harlem to Hollywood.