Cinema Chats with Lee Grant: “In the Heat of the Night”

Join us on Zoom with moderator Lucy Shahar and film icon Lee Grant to hear a behind-the-scenes account of this award-winning classic.

In the Heat of the Night (1967), starring Rod Steiger, Sidney Poitier, and Lee Grant, and directed by Norman Jewison begins when Black Philadelphia police detective Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) is arrested on suspicion of murder by Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger), the racist police chief of tiny Sparta, Mississippi. After Tibbs proves not only his own innocence but that of another man, he joins forces with Gillespie to track down the real killer. Their investigation takes them through every social level of the town, with Tibbs making enemies as well as unlikely friends as he hunts for the truth.

The film won the Academy Award for Best Film. The award for Best Actor in a Leading Role went to Rod Steiger.

Lee Grant (born Lyova Haskell Rosenthal; October 31, during the mid-1920s) is an Jewish American actress, documentarian, and director. She made her film debut in 1951 as a young shoplifter in William Wyler’s Detective Story, co-starring Kirk Douglas and Eleanor Parker. This role earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress as well as winning the Best Actress Award at the 1952 Cannes Film Festival.

In 1952, Ms. Grant was blacklisted from most acting jobs for the next 12 years. During this time, Grant appeared in plays on stage. She was removed from the blacklist in 1963 and started to rebuild her on-screen acting career. She starred in 71 TV episodes of Peyton Place (1965–1966), followed by lead roles in films such as Valley of the Dolls and In the Heat of the Night in 1967, as well as Shampoo (1975), for which she won an Oscar. In 1964, she won the Obie Award for Distinguished Performance by an Actress for her performance in The Maids. During her career she was nominated for an Emmy Award seven times between 1966 and 1993, winning twice.

Ms. Grant has earned multiple awards for her acting and directorial contributions, including two Lifetime Achievement Awards. She is passionate about social justice and women’s issues, directing critically acclaimed films from the 1980s-2000s exploring homelessness, domestic violence, access to childcare, the war in Iraq, and the fight to cure breast cancer.

Please see the Zoom link at the very bottom of your order confirmation email. This program is entirely virtual.

We recommend you watch the film in advance of this lecture. The film can be streamed on YouTube, Google Play, Apple TV, Vudu, and Prime Video.