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Pamela Suzette Grier (born 26 May 1949 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina) is an American actress. She grew up in Denver, Colorado, and is cousin to football player and actor Rosey Grier.

Career

Grier was discovered by quickie director Roger Corman, who cast her in his women-in-prison pictures The Big Doll House (1971) and The Big Bird Cage (1972). She became a staple of the blaxploitation movies of the early 1970s, playing big, bold, buxom, and essentially interchangeable roles in such films as Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974).

With the demise of blaxploitation, Grier's career went into hiatus for some years. She worked her way into progressively larger character roles in the 1980s, including notably the stoned prostitute in Fort Apache the Bronx (1981), a witch in Something Wicked this Way Comes (1983), and Steven Seagal's detective partner in Above the Law (1988). She became a regular on the hit television detective series Miami Vice in 1985.

Grier re-achieved leading lady status in 1997 as the titular stewardess in Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown, which many consider her best work so far. Grier is currently appearing in the television series The L Word.

Filmography

• Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)
• The Big Doll House (1971)
• Women in Cages (1971)
• Black Mama, White Mama (1972)
• Cool Breeze (1972)
• The Big Bird Cage (1972)
• Hit Man (1972)
• The Twilight People (1973)
• Coffy (1973)
• Scream, Blacula, Scream! (1973)
• The Arena (1974)
• Foxy Brown (movie) (1974)
• Friday Foster (1975)
• Sheba, Baby (1975)
• Bucktown (1975)
• Drum (1976)
• The Night of the High Tide (1977)
• Greased Lightning (1977)
• Fort Apache the Bronx (1981)
• Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)
• Tough Enough (1983)
• Stand Alone (1985)
• On the Edge (1985)
• The Vindicator (1986)
• The Allnighter (1987)
• Above the Law (1988)
• The Package (1989)
• Class of 1999 (1990)
• Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991)
• Posse (1993)
• Serial Killer (1995)
• Original Gangstas (1996)
• Escape from L.A. (1996)
• Mars Attacks! (1996)
• Fakin' Da Funk (1997)
• Strip Search (1997)
• Jackie Brown (1997)
• No Tomorrow (1998)
• Fortress 2 (1999)
• Jawbreaker (1999)
• In Too Deep (1999)
• Holy Smoke (1999)
• Snow Day (2000)
• Wilder (2000)
• 3 A.M. (2001)
• Love the Hard Way (2001)
• Ghosts of Mars (2001)
• Bones (2001)
• Baby of the Family (2002)
• The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002)
• A Decade Under the Influence (2003) (documentary)

External links

• Pam Grier at IMDb
• Cult Sirens: Pam Grier
• From Foxy Brown to Jackie Brown--a '70s icon returns to claim her throne. An interview with E!Online

• 1949 births
• American actors
• Film actors
• African-American actors
• People from North Carolina
• Actors and actresses appearing on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit