Spencer Williams
Acting
Biography
Spencer Williams was an African American actor and filmmaker. He was best known for playing Andy in the Amos 'n Andy television show and for directing the 1941 race film The Blood of Jesus. Williams was a pioneer African-American film producer and director.
Born: July 14, 1893
Place of Birth: Vidalia, Louisiana, USA
Known For
Amos 'n' Andy
A sitcom set in Manhattan's historic black community of Harlem.
The Framing of the Shrew
Privacy Robson is a downtrodden husband who takes advice from his friend Florian Slappey. He eventually gets the upper hand after starting divorce proceedings, pretending to have a new girlfriend and refusing to eat anything she cooks him.
Juke Joint
Bad News Johnson, a con artist from Memphis, Tennessee, arrives in Dallas, Texas, accompanied by his dim sidekick July Jones with only twenty-five cents between them. The duo arrange to become boarders at the home of Louella "Mama Lou" Holiday, who is fooled into believing Johnson is an acting teacher from Hollywood. Mrs. Holiday agrees to give the men free room and board if they will provide poise lessons to her daughter, an aspiring beauty queen named Honey Dew.
The Blood of Jesus
Razz accidentally shoots his wife Martha when his hunting rifle drops on the floor and discharges. The church congregation gathers at Martha’s bedside to pray for her recovery, and during this period an angel arrives to take Martha’s spirit from her body, but she is tempted by the slick Judas Green, who is an agent for Satan.
Harlem on the Prairie
A cowboy helps a pretty young woman find lost gold. Restored by the Academy Film Archive with additional funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Hot Biskits
Virtually unseen for more than eighty years, Spencer Williams’s first film is a one-reel comedy short in which a rivalry between two men is played out in a high-stakes game of mini golf.
Bourbon Street Beat
"Bourbon Street Beat" is a private detective series produced by Warner Brothers Television which aired on the ABC network from October 5, 1959, to July 4, 1960. It featured Richard Long as Rex Randolph, Andrew Duggan as Cal Calhoun, Van Williams as Kenny Madison, and Arlene Howell as Melody Lee Mercer, the secretary at the New Orleans detective agency in which they worked. The show is set in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA and revolves around the lives of Rex Randolph (Long) and Cal Calhoun (Duggan), who run a detective agency called Randolph and Calhoun — Special Services. The agency is based in the Absinthe House, a French Quarter nightclub on Bourbon Street.
The Bronze Buckaroo
Bob Blake and his sidekick and four singing cowboys arrive at the Jackson ranch where Bob learns from Betty Jackson that her brother, Joe, is missing. Bob investigates and learns that there is gold on the Jackson ranch, and the neighboring rancher has kidnapped Joe in order to get his land.
Dirty Gertie from Harlem U.S.A.
A Harlem nightclub entertainer arrives on the Caribbean island of "Rinidad" to perform as the headliner in a revue at the Paradise Hotel. She quickly attracts the attention of several men.
Two-Gun Man from Harlem
A cowboy is wrongfully accused of murder. He winds up in Harlem, where he assumes the identity of a preacher-turned-gangster who looks like him. He infiltrates the gang to catch the men who framed him.
Filmography
as Self (archive footage)
as Andrew H. "Andy" Brown
as Bad News Johnson / Vanderbilt Whitney
as Old Hager
as Joe Phillips
as Bad News Johnson
as Frank Roberts - columnist
as Wesley Hill
as Big Jim Bottoms
as Razz Jackson
as Detective Nelson
as Terry
as Watson
as Pete
as Butch Carter
as Doc Clayburn
as Ezra
as Lawyer Evans Chew
as Webster Dill