Television
In the NBC/CBS television series In the Heat of the Night, Tibbs was depicted as a native of Sparta, Mississippi who left the South and eventually became a police detective in Philadelphia. During a visit to his hometown, he worked on a murder case with Sparta police chief Bill Gillespie (who was a bit more racially tolerant than in the novels or the film). After the case was solved, Tibbs was hired as Chief of Detectives, making him second-in-command in the Sparta Police Department. Thus, he left Philadelphia and moved back to Sparta, bringing his wife Althea with him.
Tibbs was portrayed in the series by Howard Rollins, who had garnered critical acclaim for his work in the film A Soldier's Story, and for his Academy Award-nominated performance in the film Ragtime. However, because of consistent substance abuse problems, Rollins' appearances on the series began to decrease. Eventually, he was fired and the Tibbs family was written out of the series.
Read more about this topic: Virgil Tibbs
Famous quotes containing the word television:
“Anyone afraid of what he thinks television does to the world is probably just afraid of the world.”
—Clive James (b. 1939)
“Addison DeWitt: Your next move, it seems to me, should be toward television.
Miss Caswell: Tell me this. Do they have auditions for television?
Addison DeWitt: That’s all television is, my dear. Nothing but auditions.”
—Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1909–1993)
“Laughter on American television has taken the place of the chorus in Greek tragedy.... In other countries, the business of laughing is left to the viewers. Here, their laughter is put on the screen, integrated into the show. It is the screen that is laughing and having a good time. You are simply left alone with your consternation.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)