Academy Award-nominated actress Ruby Dee was, by all accounts, an American icon. Her career spanned no fewer than three major movements in African-American culture — from the post-Harlem Renaissance era to the black pride voice of the 1970s to the commoditization of urban black culture in the 1990s. Throughout it all, the intellectual, smoky-voiced actress appeared on stage and screen in dramas that explored the black experience and celebrated its finest wordsmiths. Off-screen, Dee and husband/frequent collaborator, Ossie Davis, were devoted civil rights activists, whose career choices did as
