Via IMDb, Roxie Roker — cousin to well-known television personality Al Roker — was born in Miami, Florida, in 1929, before moving with her family to Brooklyn, New York. From there, she attended Howard University in Washington D.C. She graduated with a degree in drama, performing in student productions and around the D.C. community, according to Encyclopedia. She further studied acting at the Shakespeare Institute in Stratford-upon-Avon, England.
Prior to her success on television, Roker did on-stage work in New York City, both on and off-Broadway, most notably in 1973 when she appeared in a Broadway production of "The River Niger," per the Internet Broadway Database. She earned an Obie award and a Tony nomination for the role. During this time, she also met and married NBC TV producer Cy Kravitz, with whom she had one son, Lenny, in 1964.
What's perhaps most exceptional about the life and career of Roxy Roker, though, are the numerous instances when the actress broke color barriers on stage and on television. In the late '60s she hosted a New York TV show called "Inside Bedford-Stuyvesant," the first ever New York TV program produced entirely by African Americans. She also belonged to the Negro Ensemble Company (NEC), a New York-based off-Broadway theatrical production company. Crowning her career, though, is her time starring in "The Jeffersons" (cast pictured, above), a revolutionary TV series depicting a middle-class African American family that was on the air for 11 seasons beginning in 1975, per IMDb.
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