Denise Nicholas
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| Denise Nicholas | |
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| Born | Donna Denise Nicholas July 12, 1944 Detroit, Michigan,  United States |
| Spouse(s) | Jim Hill Bill Withers (divorced) Gilbert Moses (divorced) |
Denise Nicholas (born Donna Denise Nicholas on July 12, 1944 or 1945[1]) is an American actress. She is primarily known for her roles on sitcoms and television and is also social activist who was involved in the American Civil Rights Movement.
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Early life
Nicholas was born in Detroit, Michigan to Louise and Otto Nicholas. She spent her early years in Detroit. With the remarriage of her mother to Robert Burgen, she then moved to Milan, a small town south of Ann Arbor, graduating from Milan High School in 1961. Nicholas is the middle child of three, an older brother, Otto and younger, now deceased sister, Michele. She attended the University of Michigan for two years then joined the Free Southern Theater during the turbulent days of the civil rights movement. After spending two years touring the deep south with the FST, Nicholas went to New York and joined the Negro Ensemble Company participating in its rigorous training program and working in all productions during the first season of that acclaimed theater ensemble. From the stage of the St. Marks Playhouse in New York, Nicholas was cast as Liz McIntyre, the Guidance Counselor on the soon to be very popular and innovative ABC series, Room 222. Nicholas received her BA degree in Drama from the University of Southern California after living in Southern California for a number of years.
[edit] Career
Nicholas began her television acting career in 1968, with an episode of It Takes a Thief. She has since appeared in many popular movies and television shows. She is probably best known for her role as Liz McIntyre on the show Room 222 (1969-1974), as well as her role as Harriet DeLong on In the Heat of the Night (1988-1994). Nicholas wrote six episodes of the dramatic show, "In the Heat of the Night" and thus began her second career as a writer. When that show was cancelled, she enrolled in the Professional Writing Program at the University of Southern California eventually finding her way to the Journeymen's Writing Workshop under the tutelege of author, Janet Fitch. She worked with Fitch for five years. Nicholas also attended the Squaw Valley Community of Writers Workshop and the Natalie Goldberg Workshop in Taos, New Mexico.
Her first novel, Freshwater Road, was published by Agate Publishing in August, 2005 to critical acclaim including a starred review in Publisher's Week and was selected as one of the best books of 2005 by The Washington Post, The Detroit Free Press, The Atlanta Journal Constitution, Newsday and The Chicago Tribune. The novel won the Zora Neal Hurston/Richard Wright Award for debut fiction in 2006 as well as the American Library Association's Black Caucus Award for debut fiction the same year. Freshwater Road is currently available in paperback from the Pocketbooks division of Simon & Schuster.
Brown University has commissioned Nicholas to write a staged adaptation of Freshwater Road which will be presented in May 2008.
Denise continues to do book events and speaking engagements around the country and is at work on her second novel.
[edit] Personal life
Nicholas is divorced, has no children and continues to make her home in southern California.
[edit] Filmography
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Please help improve this article or section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (May 2007) |
- Room 222
- Baby I'm Back
- Let's Do It Again
- A Piece of the Action
- In the Heat of the Night (TV series)
- Ghost Dad
