Robert Earl Jones (1910–2006) was a pioneering American stage and screen actor whose long career spanned early Black theater, classic Hollywood, and postwar Broadway. Born in Mississippi, Jones left school at a young age and worked with his family as a sharecropper before joining the Great Migration north. He first settled in Chicago and later moved to New York City, where he became part of the vibrant Black artistic world that emerged during the Harlem Renaissance.

Jones began acting professionally in the late 1930s, earning his first credited role in 1938. He made his Broadway debut in the mid-1940s and developed a reputation as a powerful character actor with exceptional emotional range. Although his career was interrupted in the 1950s when he was blacklisted for his political associations, Jones eventually returned to both stage and screen, continuing to work steadily for decades.

His film appearances included Lying Lips (1939), The Sting (1973), The Cotton Club (1984), and Witness (1985). In The Sting, Jones played the mentor to Robert Redford’s character, a role that brought him renewed national attention late in his career. He remained active not only in major films but also in local and independent theater and television productions well into his later years.

In 1984, Jones appeared alongside Englewood resident David Colman in a Bob and Linda Chase production for an NBC Thanksgiving Special. In the broadcast, Jones portrayed Colman’s step-grandfather, a compassionate elder whose guidance helps a younger family member confront and overcome his homophobia. The role reflected Jones’s enduring commitment to socially meaningful storytelling and to mentoring younger generations of performers.

Jones was married three times. His first marriage, to Ruth Connolly in 1929, ended in divorce in 1934. In 1938, he married Jumelle Jones; they divorced in 1950. Their son, James Earl Jones, would later become one of the most celebrated actors of his generation. Jones’s third marriage, to Ruth Williams in 1960, produced another son, Matthew Earl Jones.

In his final years, Robert Earl Jones lived at the Actors Fund Home in Englewood, New Jersey, where he remained connected to the performing arts community he had helped shape. He died in 2006 at the age of 96, leaving behind a legacy as a resilient trailblazer whose life traced the expanding possibilities for Black actors in American theater, film, and television.

"Stage and film actor was the father of James Earl Jones." National Post, 25 Sep. 2006, p. AL7.

“Robert Earl Jones.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 11 Sept. 2024.