Actress Gloria Foster Succumbs At Age 64

Jet, Oct 22, 2001

Gloria Foster, the noted stage actress who, during the 1960s and 1970s, played roles previously inaccessible to Blacks, died of complications from diabetes at her Manhattan home. She was 64.

Foster won acclaim on Broadway in 1995 for her role in Haying Our Say. She portrayed Sarah "Sadie" Delany, the 103-year-old former teacher who lived with her 101-year-old sister, Dr. Bessie Delany, a former dentist, in Mount Vernon, NY, for more than 30 years. Actress Mary Alice portrayed Bessie.

In 1999 Foster played the grand-motherly Oracle in the blockbuster sci-fi flick The Matrix.

Her other movie roles included Nothing But A Man, To All My Friends On Shore and Leonard Part 6. Foster also appeared in the TV movies Separate But Equal and The Atlanta Child Murders.

She made guest appearances on such TV shows as "I Spy," "The Cosby Show," "Law & Order," and "Soul Food."

No immediate family members survive.