Lonette McKee
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Lonette Rita McKee (born July 22, 1954) is an American actress and singer. She made her big screen debut starring as Sister Williams in the original 1976 musical-drama film '' Sparkle''. McKee later appeared in films '' Which Way Is Up?'' (1977), '' The Cotton Club'' (1984), ''
Brewster's Millions ''Brewster's Millions'' is a comedic novel written by George Barr McCutcheon in 1902, originally under the pseudonym of Richard Greaves. The plot concerns a young man whose grandfather leaves him $1 million in a will, but a competing will from ...
'' (1985), '' Round Midnight'' (1986), '' Gardens of Stone'' (1987), ''
Jungle Fever ''Jungle Fever'' is a 1991 American romantic drama film written, produced and directed by Spike Lee. Starring Lee, Wesley Snipes, Annabella Sciorra, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Samuel L. Jackson, Lonette McKee, John Turturro, Frank Vincent, ...
'' (1991), ''
Malcolm X Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little, later el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz; May 19, 1925 – February 21, 1965) was an African American revolutionary, Islam in the United States, Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figur ...
'' (1992), '' Men of Honor'' (2000), ''
Honey Honey is a sweet and viscous substance made by several species of bees, the best-known of which are honey bees. Honey is made and stored to nourish bee colonies. Bees produce honey by gathering and then refining the sugary secretions of pl ...
'' (2003) and '' ATL'' (2006). McKee became the first African American to play the coveted role of Julie and received critical acclaim for her performance in Broadway musical ''
Show Boat ''Show Boat'' is a musical theatre, musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. It is based on Edna Ferber's best-selling 1926 Show Boat (novel), novel of the same name. The musical follows the lives of the per ...
'' in 1983, for which she received a
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ce ...
nomination for Best Actress in a Musical. She also starred in '' The First'' and played
Billie Holiday Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Fagan; April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959) was an American jazz and swing music singer. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner, Lester Young, Holiday made significant contributions to jazz music and pop ...
in ''
Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill ''Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill'' is a play with music featuring several of Billie Holiday's most famous songs. The play was written by Lanie Robertson and recounts some events in the life of Holiday. It premiered in 1986 at the Alliance T ...
''. McKee also received three Drama Desk and three
NAACP Image Awards The NAACP Image Awards is an annual awards ceremony presented by the U.S.-based National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) to honor outstanding performances in film, television, theatre, music, and literature. The over 40 ...
nominations during her career.


Early life and education

Born in
Detroit, Michigan Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...
, McKee was the second of three daughters of Dorothy McKee, of Swedish descent, and Lonnie McKee, an
African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
bricklayer and auto manufacturer employee. Lonette's mother was Scandinavian American. McKee's older sister, Kathrine "Kathy" McKee, is also an actress and performer. McKee attended St Martin De Porres High School, but dropped out after her freshman year, moving to Los Angeles, California, to live with her older sister. As a young girl Lonette performed at record hops, dances, and small night clubs in her hometown of Detroit with help from her mother.


Career

McKee's career began in the music business in Detroit as a child prodigy, where she started writing music and lyrics, singing, playing keyboards, and performing at the age of seven. In 1968, McKee, then aged 14, recorded her first record entitled "Stop! (Don't Worry About It)". It became an instant regional pop/ R&B hit. McKee wrote the title song for the film ''Quadroon'', in which her sister Katherine McKee starred, when she was fifteen. Several years later, McKee was launched to stardom with her critically acclaimed performance in the hit 1976 musical drama film '' Sparkle''. McKee's career further took off throughout the mid 1970s to late 1980s, with her starring alongside comedy superstar
Richard Pryor Richard Franklin Lennox Thomas Pryor Sr. (December 1, 1940 – December 10, 2005) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. Known for reaching a broad audience with his trenchant observations and storytelling style, he is widely regarded ...
in the 1977 comedy film '' Which Way Is Up?'', and in the 1985 comedy film ''
Brewster's Millions ''Brewster's Millions'' is a comedic novel written by George Barr McCutcheon in 1902, originally under the pseudonym of Richard Greaves. The plot concerns a young man whose grandfather leaves him $1 million in a will, but a competing will from ...
''. During this period, McKee played as an African American woman passing as white in both
Julie Dash Julie Ethel Dash (born October 22, 1952) is an American filmmaker, music video and commercial director, author, and website producer. Dash received her Master of Fine Arts, MFA in 1985 at the UCLA Film School and is one of the graduates and filmm ...
's 1982 short film, ''
Illusions An illusion is a distortion of the senses, which can reveal how the mind normally organizes and interprets sensory stimulation. Although illusions distort the human perception of reality, they are generally shared by most people. Illusions may ...
'' and in
Francis Ford Coppola Francis Ford Coppola ( ; born April 7, 1939) is an American filmmaker. He is considered one of the leading figures of the New Hollywood and one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. List of awards and nominations received by Francis Ford Coppo ...
's 1984 musical crime drama ''The Cotton Club''. She has written and produced three solo LPs. ''Natural Love'' was produced for
Spike Lee Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee (born March 20, 1957) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, actor, and author. His work has continually explored race relations, issues within the black community, the role of media in contemporary ...
's Columbia 40 Acres and A Mule label in 1992. Ed Hogan, reviewing for ''AllMusic'', wrote, "'Natural Love' shows that the singer/songwriter's muse knows no stylistic bounds. As with her earlier effort, McKee co-writes all of the songs while sharing production credits with Bryant McNeil, Gene Lake Jr., and labelmate Raymond Jones of State of Art." McKee scored the music for the well-received cable documentary on the
Lower Manhattan Lower Manhattan, also known as Downtown Manhattan or Downtown New York City, is the southernmost part of the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of Manhattan. The neighborhood is History of New York City, the historical birthplace o ...
African Burial Ground, as well as numerous infomercials. McKee has toured extensively throughout the world singing concert performances, including the JVC Jazz Festival at
Carnegie Hall Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhattan), 57t ...
. McKee studied film directing at
The New School The New School is a Private university, private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with an original mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for p ...
in New York and apprenticed directing with the filmmaker Spike Lee. McKee also studied singing with Dini Clark and ballet with Sarah Tayir, both in
Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...
. She also appeared on the CW sitcom '' The Game'' as Mrs. Pitts, the mother of Jason (played by Coby Bell), in 2007. McKee won critical acclaim for her Broadway debut performance in the musical '' The First'' in 1981, co-starring in the role of
Jackie Robinson Jack Roosevelt Robinson (January 31, 1919 – October 24, 1972) was an American professional baseball player who became the first Black American to play in Major League Baseball (MLB) in the modern era. Robinson broke the Baseball color line, ...
's wife
Rachel Rachel () was a Bible, Biblical figure, the favorite of Jacob's two wives, and the mother of Joseph (Genesis), Joseph and Benjamin, two of the twelve progenitors of the tribes of Israel. Rachel's father was Laban (Bible), Laban. Her older siste ...
."Lonette McKee"
''Playbill''. Retrieved May 10, 2020.
She became the first African American to play the coveted role of Julie in the Houston Grand Opera's production of ''
Show Boat ''Show Boat'' is a musical theatre, musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. It is based on Edna Ferber's best-selling 1926 Show Boat (novel), novel of the same name. The musical follows the lives of the per ...
'' in 1983 on Broadway, for which she received a
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ce ...
nomination for Best Actress in a Musical. McKee's tragic portrayal of jazz legend
Billie Holiday Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Fagan; April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959) was an American jazz and swing music singer. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner, Lester Young, Holiday made significant contributions to jazz music and pop ...
in the one-woman drama with music, ''
Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill ''Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill'' is a play with music featuring several of Billie Holiday's most famous songs. The play was written by Lanie Robertson and recounts some events in the life of Holiday. It premiered in 1986 at the Alliance T ...
'', won critical acclaim, standing ovations, and a 1987
Drama Desk Award The Drama Desk Awards are among the most esteemed honors in New York theater, recognizing outstanding achievements across Broadway, Off-Broadway, and Off-Off-Broadway productions within the same categories. The awards are considered a signific ...
nomination (Outstanding Actress in a Musical). She reprised the role of Julie on Broadway in the 1994 revival of ''Show Boat'' directed by Hal Prince. In 2012 she starred in New Federal Theatre’s production of ''Sowa’s Red Gravy''. In 2013, McKee expressed a desire to establish a performance arts center in the New York tri-state area. She performs her one-woman memoir with music on stages throughout the US. She produced her first feature film, ''Dream Street'', which she wrote and directed.


Personal life

McKee has been married once and has no children. She dated the actor and stand-up comedian Freddie Prinze for a time during 1976, while he was still married and after his wife had given birth to their son.David Henry, Joe Henry,
Furious Cool: Richard Pryor and the World that Made Him
', Algonquin Books, 2013
McKee was married to Leo Compton, a youth counselor, from February 1983 to 1990. In the mid-1990s, she lived in an Upper East Side
brownstone Brownstone is a brown Triassic–Jurassic sandstone that was historically a popular building material. The term is also used in the United States and Canada to refer to a townhouse clad in this or any other aesthetically similar material. Ty ...
with her companion, the musician Bryant McNeil. They met while they were working together on McKee's ''Natural Love'' album. McKee teaches a master acting workshop at Centenary College of New Jersey, where she is an adjunct professor in the Theater Arts department.


Discography

* ''Lonette'' (
Sussex Sussex (Help:IPA/English, /ˈsʌsɪks/; from the Old English ''Sūþseaxe''; lit. 'South Saxons'; 'Sussex') is an area within South East England that was historically a kingdom of Sussex, kingdom and, later, a Historic counties of England, ...
, 1974) * ''Words and Music'' (
Warner Bros. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (WBEI), commonly known as Warner Bros. (WB), is an American filmed entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California and the main namesake subsidiary of Warner Bro ...
, 1978) * ''Natural Love'' ( 40 Acres and a Mule/ Columbia, 1992)


Filmography


Film


Television


References


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:McKee, Lonette 1954 births Living people American people of Swedish descent American film actresses American musical theatre actresses American soap opera actresses American television actresses Actresses from Detroit Actresses from New Jersey 20th-century African-American women singers 20th-century American women singers 20th-century American singers 21st-century African-American actresses 21st-century American actresses