Sheryl Lee Ralph and Niecey Nash-Betts are both up for Golden Globes this year, and members of Black Hollywood decided to honor the veteran actresses ahead of the awards ceremony.
On Sunday, Ralph and Nash-Betts were flooded with love while attending A Golden Salute: A Luncheon to Celebrate Black Actresses, BET reports. The event was organized to celebrate their nominations at the 2023 Golden Globes.
Ralph is up for Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy or Musical for her role in Abbott Elementary,
and Nash-Betts is nominated for Best Supporting Actress in a Limited Series for her performance in Dahmer-Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.Organized by event planner William P. Miller, the star-studded event aimed to give Ralph and Nash-Betts their much-deserved flowers for decades of entertaining audiences and putting on for the culture.
“If we don’t celebrate the ones we love and ride with us, who will?” Miller said.
Miller, who planned Ralph’s 2005 wedding and met Nash-Betts at the nuptials, says the luncheon brought together “one big happy family.”
Those in attendance for the luncheon included Yvonne Orji, Colman Domingo, Marla Gibbs, Wendy Raquel Robinson, Vanessa Bell Calloway, and Ralph’s Abbott co-star, Lisa Ann Walter.
Bell Calloway, who starred alongside Ralph in the original Dreamgirls on Broadway, gave a speech where she performed a hilarious reenactment of Ralph’s unforgettable speech while accepting her Emmy Award last year.
“When you see Sheryl and Niecy take off you can’t help but be supportive because a win for them is a win for everybody,” Bell Calloway said. “It’s good to see because it also shows things are changing. She has reminded me not to give up. Because [in this business] you do get beat up a little bit.”
At one point, Bell Calloway asked for Ralph and Nash-Betts to stand up and take a look at all those in attendance.
“Take this into the Globes next week — the spirit of people who love you,” she said.
Ralph and Nash-Betts could be taking home their first-ever Golden Globe awards. Angela Bassett is also nominated for Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture, and it could be her second win following her 1994 Golden Globe for her role of Tina Turner in What’s Love Got to Do With It.