Exclusive: Oscar Winner Costume Designer Ruth E. Carter On Her Hollywood Walk Of Fame Star & Coming 2 America
On February 25, 2021 Oscar winner Ruth E. Carter will become the first Black costume designer to have a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame. She will also be the second person in her field, behind the famed Edith Head. Carter won the Academy Award for her work on Black Panther, making history as the first Black woman to receive the Oscar for costume design.
Carter began her career working with director Spike Lee, who hired her for his second film, School Daze, and with whom she worked on a number of films thereafter, including Do The Right Thing, Mo’ Better Blues, Jungle Fever, Malcolm X, Oldboy, Da Sweet Blood of Jesus, and Chi-Raq, Carter other film credits includes The Five Heartbeats, Baby Boy, Four Brothers, Butler, Selma & Marshall to name a few. Prior to Oscar win this year, Carter had
received an Emmy nomination for her wardrobe work on History Channel’s remake of Roots and garnered two Academy Award nominations for Best Costume Design for her work on Lee’s Malcolm X (1992), and Amistad (1997) directed by Steven Spielberg.
Her latest film is the upcoming “Coming 2 America,” a sequel to the 1988 classic “Coming to America” starring Eddie Murphy and directed by Craig Brewer which will be released globally on March 5th exclusively on Amazon Prime Video. Carter won the 2020 Critics’ Choice Award for Best Costume Design for Brewer’s Dolemite Is My Name, which also starred Murphy.
Set in the lush and royal country of Zamunda, newly-crowned King Akeem (Eddie Murphy) and his trusted confidante Semmi (Arsenio Hall) embark on an all-new hilarious adventure that has them traversing the globe from their great African nation to the borough of Queens, New York – where it all began.
Original cast favorites from Coming to America return including King Jaffe Joffer (James Earl Jones), Queen Lisa (Shari Headley), Cleo McDowell (John Amos), Maurice (Louie Anderson) and the motley barbershop crew. Joining this star-studded ensemble are Wesley Snipes, Leslie Jones, Tracy Morgan, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Garcelle Beauvais, Jermaine Fowler, Bella Murphy, Rotimi, KiKi Layne, Nomzamo Mbatha and Teyana Taylor, making Coming 2 America the most anticipated comedy film of the year.
BlackFilmandTV.com’s Wilson Morales spoke with Carter on her crowning achievement and working with Murphy again on Coming 2 America.