Loretta Devine

Loretta Devine was born on August 21, 1949, in Houston, Texas, to James Devine and Eunice (Toliver). She grew up in the Acres Homes area of Houston, where her mother raised six children as a single parent. At George Washington Carver High School, Devine participated in the pep squad and performed in talent shows. She earned a Bachelor of Arts in Speech and Drama from the University of Houston in 1971, followed by a Master of Fine Arts in Theater from Brandeis University in 1976.

Devine's Broadway career spanned from 1977 to 1986. Her debut came in the 1977 revival of Hair, which ran for 43 performances at the Biltmore Theatre. The following year she appeared in A Broadway Musical, a production that closed after 14 previews and a single performance on December 21, 1978. Her third Broadway credit was Comin' Uptown, a Harlem-set musical adaptation of A Christmas Carol that featured Gregory Hines. Devine went on to originate the role of Lorrell Robinson in Dreamgirls, the 1981 Broadway musical loosely based on the history of The Supremes, with the character drawn from Mary Wilson. The show was developed through six weeks of workshops spread across three years, during which Devine, Sheryl Lee Ralph, and Jennifer Holliday improvised their characters. She later starred in Big Deal, rounding out her Broadway credits.

While rehearsing for Dreamgirls in 1981, Devine was cast in Will, directed by Jessie Maple and recognized as the first independent feature-length film directed by an African American woman. Her role in the low-budget production earned her $500. Smaller film appearances followed in Little Nikita and Stanley and Iris before she landed a prominent role as Gloria Matthews in the 1995 film Waiting to Exhale, alongside Whitney Houston, Gregory Hines, and Angela Bassett. That performance earned her an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture. Her next film, The Preacher's Wife, again paired her with Houston and Hines and brought her a second NAACP Image Award in the same category. She subsequently co-starred with Alfre Woodard in Down in the Delta (1998) and Funny Valentines (1999), and later appeared in the ensemble of Tyler Perry's For Colored Girls (2010), playing Juanita Sims, as well as Madea's Big Happy Family. She also has a cameo in the film adaptation of Dreamgirls.

On television, Devine appeared in the first season of NBC's A Different World as Stevie Rallen, a dormitory director at the fictional Hillman College. From 2000 to 2004 she starred as high school teacher Marla Hendricks on the Fox drama series Boston Public, a role for which she received three additional NAACP Image Awards. She also appeared in Urban Legend, Urban Legends: Final Cut, I Am Sam, and the 2005 film Crash during this period, and received both an Image Award nomination and an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Woman Thou Art Loosed (2004).

Devine earned a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series in 2011 for her recurring role as Adele Webber, Dr. Richard Webber's first wife, on the Shonda Rhimes drama Grey's Anatomy. She received a second Emmy nomination for the same role in 2012 and won a Gracie Allen Award for Outstanding Female Actor in a Feature Role for the series that same year. Additional television work includes a series regular role on the ABC comedy-drama Eli Stone (2008), a starring role on the short-lived ABC Family comedy State of Georgia (2011), a role on Being Mary Jane (2012), the voice of Hallie on the Disney Junior series Doc McStuffins, a two-season run on the Lifetime series The Client List as Georgia Cummings, the role of Cynthia Carmichael on NBC's The Carmichael Show, and a starring role on the Netflix series Family Reunion alongside Richard Roundtree and Tia Mowry-Hardrict, in which she played Amelia "M'Dear" McKellan beginning in 2022.