Hattie McDaniel arrived at her audition for the role of Gone With the Wind's Mammy wearing a maid's uniform. It wasn't a costume she was headed to work as a housekeeper later that day. She would, of course, win the part. Her warm and wise performance would also make Hattie the first Black performer to ever win an Academy Award.
An Oscar should have brought new opportunities Hattie's way, but it didn't. "Any work she could find was just playing a maid, servant or slave," explains author ReShonda Tate, whose new novel, The Queen of Sugar Hill (out Jan. 30), dramatizes the events of Hattie's difficult but inspirational life.
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