“Black Panther” and “Black-ish” were the big winners in the motion picture, and television categories at the 50th NAACP Image Awards ceremony, held at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre.
Marvel’s “Black Panther”–nominated for 13 awards—collected nine of them during the March 30 ceremony, including a win for Outstanding Motion Picture and Chadwick Boseman bringing home Outstanding Actor honors for lead actor Chadwick Boseman.
Boseman wasn’t alone, as castmates Michael B. Jordan and Danai Gurira took home top supporting actor and supporting actress honors, respectively, and Black Panther’s Ryan Coogler was declared best director.
ABC’s “black-ish” won six awards making a clean sweep of the acting categories, with Anthony Anderson chosen Outstanding Actor; Tracee Ellis Ross winning Outstanding Actress; Marcus Scribner grabbing Outstanding Supporting Actor and Marsai Martin snagging Outstanding Supporting Actress.
Singer Beyonce was chosen Entertainer of the Year and Los Angeles Rep. Maxine Waters (CA-43) received the Chairman’s Award.
Much of the focus leading up to the show was on actor Jussie Smollett, nominated for best supporting actor in a drama series for his role on “Empire.”
Smollett recently had charges dropped against him in Chicago after being accused of staging an alleged January hate-crime attack against himself in a well-publicized series of incidents.
He did not attend the event, but that didn’t keep comedian Chris Rock from firing a few barbs at the actor-singer during Rock’s time on stage. Smollett lost the supporting actor award to Jesse Williams, who was honored for his work on “Grey’s Anatomy.”
