Happy Birthday, Regina King!

This Tuesday, January 15, 2019, marks the 48th birthday of actress Regina King.

Born January 15, 1971 in Los Angeles, California, King has been an actress since childhood. She made her mark playing the daughter to Marla Gibbs on the NBC comedy series 227, broadcast from 1985 to 1990, and which won fellow cast member Jackée Harry an Emmy in 1987.

In the 1990s, Regina King had roles in films like Boyz N the Hood (1991, which established John Singleton as the first black person nominated for the Oscar for best director), Poetic Justice (1993), and Fridays (1995), as well as a much-acclaimed turn as the wife of an Oscar-winning Cuba Gooding Jr. in Jerry Maguire (1996). In the 2000s, her film work included Down to Earth (2001) and another acclaimed turn opposite an Oscar-winning Jamie Foxx in Ray (2004).

On television, over the last roughly ten years, King has had roles on Fox’s 24, a lead role on NBC’s and TNT’s Southland, and HBO’s The Leftovers. Since 2015, her performances have landed her four Emmy nominations and three wins for ABC’s American Crime (2015, 2016) and Netflix’s Seven Seconds (2018).

Regina King is the frontrunner to win the 2018 Oscar for best supporting actress in If Beale Street Could Talk. This is a film by Barry Jenkins, the director of the 2016 winner for best picture, Moonlight, and it is based on the novel by James Baldwin. Since late-November 2018, King has swept the supporting-actress category from all four main film groups: National Board of Review, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, New York Film Critics, and National Society of Film Critics. On Sunday, January 6, 2019, she was awarded the Golden Globe. Although the Screen Actors Guild of America oddly left her off its list of nominations—which many consider a fluke—King is favored for the Oscar anyway. (Nominations come out Tuesday, January 22, 2019.)

This is an actress who is pure, soulful, and is as real as one can ask going from one role to the next. I have skipped watching live the Academy Awards ceremonies. But, also likely to win—and on her seventh try—is Glenn Close, as best actress, in The Wife. So, the upcoming 91st Academy Awards (ABC, Sunday, February 24, 2019) may be a little more worth tuning in than the most recent years. Then again, if the ceremony becomes too much about President Trump…I would be wrong.