By Victor Trammell (Source: www.yourblackworld.net) – The 2021 Golden Globes showcased a night of historical splendor in epic proportion after a new, dazzling, and talented Black actress won the gold.
Various upscale publications of the arts reported on Sunday (February 28) that Andra Day (pictured) won big at the Globes in the Best Actress award category. Day, 36, believably portrayed a true Black American icon in the motion picture drama The United States vs. Billie Holiday.
No stranger to the entertainment industry spotlight, Day is a Billboard Music Award-winning singer. However, her appearance in the 2021 Billie Holiday biopic was actually her first rodeo in the film industry. Day’s eyes welled with tears of uncontrollable joy after winning her award. Day was flanked by her parents, other family members, and her friends.
In her stellar acceptance speech, Day praised Viola Davis–summing up the pioneer’s “giant” actress status and paid some well-deserved homage. Years ago, Davis was also nominated in the Best Actress category.
Holiday’s personal life struggles (heroin use, harassment by the FBI, and being rejected by her own people in the Black community) are well-documented.
However, Holiday (who was romanticized in hip-hop song form by the late but culturally immortal Tupac Shakur) certainly deserved to have her story told for necessary educational purposes. Like Shakur, Holiday was demonized by America’s mainstream for making truthful music–about Black America’s survival kit for enduring demonic eras of racial intolerance at the hands of white nationalists.
“It took me forever to get improper,” Day told the Hollywood Reporter when explaining in her magazine interview how she got into character.
“I did start smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol, and being more sexual,” she also said.
Also, Day thanked Holiday in her acceptance speech. “[Billie] transformed me with this role and her presence and her spirit,” she said.
