A work in constant progress (and occasional regress).
Alias:
Alton White
Birthplace:
Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
Born:
September 10, 1960
Alton White's journey from his boyhood home in a Cincinnati housing project to the grandeur of Broadway's Minskoff Theatre is remarkable, but one that many will find touchingly recognizable and relatable. Struggling with feelings of inferiority, he doggedly tried out for role after role and happily accepted whatever was offered to him however modest, approaching each with passion and dedication. His gifts were ultimately recognized and rewarded with major roles. White is the only black actor who has played in a lead role in five hit shows on Broadway; John in Miss Saigon; Ken in Smokey Joe's Cafe (he originated the role in London's West End); Coalhouse Walker Jr. in Ragtime: The Musical; Mister in The Color Purple; and King Mufasa in The Lion King.
Most data and links to images for the Movies section come from TheMovieDB (TMDB).
Additional data for Film Titles come from The Open Movie Database (OMDb).
At least one plug-in comes from IMDb.
Data are -- hey, it's a plural -- subject to the limitations of their sources. (For example, TMDB search results currently max out at 20.) I am limiting myself to free data sources for now. (No, a "free trial" is not free.)
While much of the above data are retrieved directly from outside APIs and other such sources, data from American Film Institute (AFI) and British Film Institute (BFI) were manually entered the old fashioned way into a MySQL database. Re BFI I took the following liberties:
Regarding profile removals and data corrections:
Filtering is applied here to film projects flagged as "adult" by TheMovieDB. Pending "popular demand" I am contemplating a login and profile system with preferences (such as whether to allow adult images to appear) and permissions (such as data entry).
Whereas the overall purpose of this website is to serve as a personal demo/portfolio/workshop of web and data skills, this Movies section is not meant to compete with or substitute for far more definitive movie websites.
Whether or not he still clings to an award which he won in 1986 as a film critic for his college's newspaper, Jeffrey Hartmann is not responsible for the texts of overviews and biographies supplied by external data sources.