A10 WEDNESDAY, JULY 25, 2012 NATION LEXINGTON HERALD-LEADER | KENTUCKY.COM SHERMAN HEMSLEY 1938-2012 Star of ‘The Jeffersons,’ ‘Amen’ TV shows dies

By Adam Bernstein buted as on Evans). nobody really grows He fell in with gangs but Broadway in the 1970 musi- All The Washington Post the sitcom The program’s up. You just become quit after he was abandoned cal comedy Purlie. The show Sherman Hemsley, an actor in the Family, playing the theme song, Movin’ more confused.” during a fight broken up by made stars of Cleavon Little best known for his overbear- bombastic paterfamilias who on Up, conveyed Sherman Alex- the police. He dropped out of and Melba Moore, but Lear ing sitcom roles, notably the integrates a Queens neighbor- the comic situations ander Hemsley was school, joined the Air Force was taken with Mr. Hems- upwardly mobile and bigoted hood lorded over by Archie sparked by George’s born Feb. 1, 1938, in and became a desk clerk based ley and soon hired him for George Jefferson in the long- Bunker (Carroll O’Connor). borish and argumen- Philadelphia. He was in South Korea and Japan. George Jefferson. running show Jefferson, who owned a tative nature amid Hemsley raised by a single After his discharge at 22, After The Jeffersons folded, and the egotistical minister dry-cleaning store, was the their new neighbors. mother, who worked he attended a dramatic arts Mr. Hemsley played Deacon in Amen, has died in El Paso. black counterpart to Bunker’s Suspicious of white in a factory. His early school in Philadelphia and Ernest Frye in Amen, which He was 74. working-class racist, and the people, he doesn’t hesitate to life was a struggle, but he re- spent years acting in church aired on NBC from 1986 to The death was confirmed chemistry between the two call them “honkies.” called vividly the warm feel- and community theater 1991. The show, set in the by his agent, Todd Frank. performers allowed them to Mr. Hemsley said the role ing of being applauded in a groups while also working as fictional First Community No further details could be spew bluster and ignorance in was counter to his own dispo- school production about fire a mailman. A 1967 appear- Church of Philadelphia, was learned on when, where or comic droves. sition, telling The Washington safety. ance in the Jean Genet drama among the first popular sit- how he died. Like other secondary char- Post that Jefferson “seems like “I loved it, but had to The Blacks at a Philadelphia coms to revolve around reli- Mr. Hemsley, who had a acters from , a wild man to me.” In finding forget about acting after el- theater led to an offer to join gion. It focused on the tensions home in El Paso, grew up in the Jeffersons spun off into the core of the man who made ementary school because it the prestigious Negro Ensem- between the strutting veteran a rough Philadelphia neigh- their own series that aired on him popular with audiences was the sort of thing you just ble Company acting workshop deacon (Mr. Hemsley), whose borhood, quit high school CBS from 1975 to 1985. In for a decade, Mr. Hemsley didn’t do in my rough neigh- in New York. father started the church, and and served in the Air Force the new show, George Jeffer- added that George Jefferson borhood,” he told the Toronto Critics applauded Mr. a younger man with new ideas before becoming a mainstay son’s business success in dry is “like a little kid. You know, Star in 1986. Hemsley’s supporting role on (Clifton Davis). of a prominent black theater cleaning allows him to move company in New York. By the his family into a luxury high 1980s, television had made rise. Financial security didn’t WE INVITE YOU him the most visible and suc- stop George from bickering cessful black TV actor after with his wife, Louise (Isabel TO SEE FOR . Sanford), or their son, Lionel In 1973, Mr. Hemsley de- ( and later Damon YOURSELF! OUR FIRST CLASS SHOWROOM is smart!

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