Tag: A Different World

Debbie Allen

Deborah Kaye Allen (born January 16, 1950) is an American actress, dancer, choreographer, singer-songwriter, director, producer, and a former member of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities. She has been nominated 20 times for an Emmy Award (winning five), two Tony Awards, and has also won a Golden Globe Award and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1991.

Allen is best known for her work in the musical-drama television series Fame (1982–⁠1987), where she portrayed dance teacher Lydia Grant, and served as the series’ principal choreographer. For this role in 1983 she received a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy and two Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Choreography and was nominated for four Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. Allen later began working as director and producer, most notably producing and directing 83 of 144 episodes of NBC comedy series A Different World (1988–⁠1993). She returned to acting playing the leading role in the NBC sitcom In the House from 1995 to 1996, and in 2011 began playing Dr. Catherine Avery in the ABC medical drama Grey’s Anatomy also serving as an executive producer/director. She has directed more than 50 television and film productions.

In 2001, Allen opened the Debbie Allen Dance Academy in Los Angeles, where she currently teaches young dancers. She also taught choreography to former Los Angeles Lakers dancer-turned-singer, Paula Abdul. She is the younger sister of actress/director/singer Phylicia Rashad.

Born in Houston, TX, her father was a full-blooded Native American (Cherokee). She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honors from Howard University. Allen began her career on Broadway in the 1970s in the chorus of “Purlie,” “A Raisin In the Sun,” “West Side Story,” and “Anita,” which earned her a Tony Award nomination and a Drama Desk Award. She is probably best known for her role as Lydia Grant in the 1982 TV show Fame.

She was also a member of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities.

In 1988, she choreographed “Carrie” with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Allen has worked on TV’s “Good Times,” “The Love Boat,” “The Cosby Show,” “Touched By An Angel,” and “The Division.” “Fame” gave Allen international prominence.

Its popularity in the United Kingdom prompted a special cast tour in England. While still a cast member of “Fame,” she became the first African American woman hired by a television network as a director in prime time. In 1989, after directing episodes of “Fame,” she co-wrote, produced, directed, choreographed, and starred in “The Debbie Allen Special” for ABC. She received two Emmy nominations for the direction and choreography of this variety show. She also produced and directed “A Different World.”

In 1989, Allen directed a remake of the 1960 film “Pollyanna.” She also directed the sequel “Polly: Comin’ Home” in 1990, “Stompin At The Savoy,” “The Old Settler,” and was the producer of the 1997 film “Amistad.” Allen, the sister of actress Phylicia Rashad, has been married twice: to Win Wilford from 1975 to 1983 and former NBA star Norman Nixon in 1984. They have two children Written

by Dianne Washington

Dawn Lewis

Dawnn J. Lewis (born August 13, 1961) is an American actress, singer, voice actress , and songwriter. Lewis is best known for her role as Jaleesa Vinson–Taylor on the NBC television sitcom A Different World from the series beginning in 1987 until the end of its fifth season in 1992, in addition to being on the show; Lewis co–wrote the theme song.

Lewis’s other notable roles include portraying Robin Dumars on the ABC sitcom Hangin’ With Mr. Cooper for its first season (1992–93) and as Cheryl Spade in the 1988 film I’m Gonna Git You Sucka. Since then, Lewis has appeared in numerous TV series, including other sitcoms, and has also performed on stage.

Dawnn Lewis was born in Brooklyn, New York City, to Carl and Joyce Lewis, who are of African-American and Guyanese descent, She began singing at the age of four and acting at eleven.

Lewis graduated at 16 from the High School of Music & Art in New York City, now known as Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School. Then she majored in musical theatre with a minor in journalism at the University of Miami, graduating with a Bachelor of Music degree, cum laude, in 1982.

Lewis appeared for the first five of the six-season run as Jaleesa Vinson (later Vinson–Taylor) from 1987 until 1992. Lewis co-wrote the theme song to A Different World, with Bill Cosby and Stu Gardner, and co-performed the song for the first season. In A Different World, Although her character was married to another of the main characters on the show, her character disappeared from A Different World without explanation, like Chuck Cunningham of Happy Days. Lewis appeared in a special week-long segment of A Different World called the Hillman College Reunion airing on Nick At Nite, along with Lisa Bonet, Jasmine Guy, Kadeem Hardison, Darryl M. Bell, Cree Summer, and Sinbad. On her Super Password appearance in 1988, she was paired with Dallas star Ken Kercheval, not any of her co-stars.

In 2006, Lewis starred as Melba Early in the film adaptation of Dreamgirls. Lewis released her debut CD, entitled Worth Waiting For, in 2006. She most recently played Addaperle in The Wiz with New York City Center’s Encores! In 2009, Lewis played Denise Fields on One Tree Hill. In 2010, Lewis played a minor recurring role as Lauren’s mother in The Secret Life of the American Teenager. In 2012, she voiced Malora in Strange Frame. She also appeared as Dr. Knapp on Days of Our Lives in 2012–2013. As of 2015, Lewis is playing a recurring role on Major Crimes as Patrice, a love interest for Lt. Provenza, whom he met during a case. In that same year, she also voiced Ruby’s mother Helen Hanshaw in one episode of Sofia The First .

In March 2016, Lewis was cast in Disney Junior’s animated series Doc McStuffins as the voice of Grandma McStuffins. In 2017 she provided the voice of Maybelle Mundy in the film Bunyan and Babe.

In 2018 she began voicing Fannie Granger on DreamWorks’ Spirit Riding Free, and in 2019 began voicing The Chief on Netflix’s animated Carmen Sandiego.

Lewis was married to former NBA player Johnny Newman in 2004. They divorced in 2006.

A Different World: The 30th Anniversary

After the success of the popular 1980’s sitcom, The Cosby Show, a spinoff show hits the airwaves that started off showcasing the college experience of Denise Huxtable. 30 years ago, on September 24th, 1987, A Different World was aired. The show starts off all about Denise, the daughter of both Heathcliff and Claire Huxtable who in the beginning struggles to find her own way in college life. She’s slacking off, grades not looking too good, she’s trying to find a job to pay off what she owes, and not staying focused on her studies, all the while, occasionally dealing with a southern belle who goes by the name Whitley Gilbert. Whitley is a bit of an uptight, snotty and spoiled young woman who comes from a family who has money. Later on she becomes the star of the show after the first season. As well as Whitley, Denise also puts up with a guy named Dwayne Wayne. He’s a stylish, skinny kid whose smart and very good at math but in the first season, he kind of comes off as annoying and a bit creepy the way he’s always in Denise’s face trying to get with her. After the first season, it was said that Denise drops out of Hillman to go traveling and the show focuses more on Dwayne and Whitley and then everyone else. As the show progresses, each episode gives the viewer a closer and closer anticipation of the friendship between Whitley and Dwayne. They went from hating one another to being an on and off couple to being husband and wife in the end. Besides their love affair, we also get a taste of the other characters on the show who are like the pieces of the puzzle on the show. Each character has their own uniqueness and way of shining on the screen with the way they all connect and made you believe that Hillman was an actual college and that you wanted to attend. There’s Dwayne Wayne’s close friend Ron Johnson, Freddie, Kim, Shaza Zulu, Jaleesa, the lost goes on. The show was important in a way that focused on black students being productive and positive college students with dreams while also touching on worldly topics and issues that mattered. Especially for black people. It was an overall positive show that made you laugh, cry, it was suspenseful, knowledgeable, insightful and powerful. It’s something that needs to be shown on television again today. Something so moving and enjoyable. 30 years later, the show is still just as popular as it was then. It was on Netflix a year or two ago and still being played on television with reruns of the episodes. It’s definitely my favorite sitcom of all time. One of the greatest.