Louis Gossett Jr.

Gossett made his stage debut at seventeen and shortly after landed the Broadway play Take a Giant Step. Through the late fifties and sixties he worked in critically acclaimed theater — A Raisin in the Sun in 1959, The Blacks in 1961, Tambourines to Glory, The Zulu and the Zayda. In 1977 he appeared in the miniseries Roots and won the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor for a Single Appearance. Five years later he took the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor as Gunnery Sergeant Emil Foley in An Officer and a Gentleman, the first African-American to win in that category. He continued across film…