Beah Richards was born Beulah Richardson on July 12, 1926 in Vicksburg, Mississippi. She was the daughter of a Baptist minister and a seamstress. To her, a good education didn’t mean a secure job and a continuation of middle-class existence, for her it meant freedom and rejection of a life in a town in which she claimed to have suffered racism every day of her life.

In 1948, she graduated from Dillard University in New Orleans, and upon graduating she decided to pursue a career in acting. In 1950, she moved to New York City. Her career began at a time when roles for black actors were becoming less stereotypical. Richards was a straight actress, not an entertainer, Richards never achieved star status, and specialized in feisty character roles, usually older than her years.

Beah’s first role was in an off-Broadway show called Take a Giant Step. In the play she portrayed an eighty-four year old grandmother. Her first authored play was All’s Well that Ends, which talked about issues of racial segregation. Her next role was Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner in 1967 in which she played a peacemaking mother and was nominated for an Oscar. In 1988 she won an Emmy Award for her performance in Frank’s Place.

Richards was stricken with emphysema when she performed on The Practice in 1997. In the year 2000 she was awarded an Emmy Award for that performance just a few days before her death. Beah Richards died on September 14, 2000.

Some other performances included: In the Heat of the Night (1967), The Great White Hope (1970), Mahogany (1975), One Special Victory (1991), Inside Out (1992), Out of Darkness (1994), and Beloved (1998). She also had roles on television series such as ER, The Cosby Show, The Practice, and Capitol, Matlock, Designing Women, Murder, She Wrote, Family Matters, 227, and L.A. Law.