Cicely Tyson entitled to full pay for performance in short-lived Broadway play, court rules

Jet, Oct 19, 1998

Famed actress Cicely Tyson is entitled to full payment for her appearance in a short-lived Broadway play produced by actress Elizabeth Taylor, a U.S. Appeals Court in New York recently ruled.

The Appeals Court upheld an earlier ruling handed down in 1996 in favor of Ms. Tyson (JET, Oct. 7, 1996).

The dispute involved the play, The Corn is Green. The production closed shortly after it opened on Broadway in 1983.

Ms. Tyson was under contract to Ms. Taylor's production company to act in stage and screen versions of the classic play.

After critics panned the play, Ms. Tyson was fired for taking a night off to attend a tribute to her then-husband, the late jazz musician Miles Davis (JET, Dec. 5, 1983). The play closed after less than two weeks.

Ms. Tyson maintained that she should be paid the full $750,000 as negotiated in her contract, even though the show closed early and a planned TV video of the production was never made.