Sidney Poitier’s remarkable climb to stardom had a direct influence on his marriage.  The famed actor married his Juanita Hardy in 1950, but they divorced in 1965. 

This happened a year after he won an Oscar for “Lilies of the Field,” and he battled to combine the temptations of success with his marriage, as detailed in the book  “Sidney Poitier:  Man, Actor, Icon,” according to Closer Weekly.

More than a decade later, in 1976, the movie legend remarried to Joanna Shimkus. 

Poiter was ready to settle down at this point, and the pair had two children together, including Sydney Tamiia Poitier, who followed in his footsteps and became an actress too.

Who is Joanna Shimkus, Sidney Poitier’s second wife?

According to IMDb,  Joanna Shimkus was born in Nova Scotia, Canada, and moved to the United States in the 1960s. She had a flourishing acting career there. The actress made her film debut in 1964’s “All About Loving,” and by the end of the decade had appeared in films such as “Zita” and “The Uninvited.”

Closer Weekly reported that Shimkus met her future husband Sidney Poitier while working on the film “The Lost Man” in 1969. 

Shimkus had begun to retire from acting by the 1970s. She featured in “A Time For Loving” in 1972, but it was her final part until she returned for a television movie in 2018.

Shimkus had a great acting career, but it was never a job she desired.