Pamela Suzette Grier born May 26 1949 is an American actress Described by Quentin Tarantino as cinemas first female action star she achieved fame for her starring roles in a string of 1970s action blaxploitation and women in prison films for American International Pictures and New World Pictures Her accolades include nominations for an Emmy Award a Golden Globe Award a Screen Actors Guild Award a Satellite Award and a Saturn Award Grier came to prominence with her titular roles in the films Coffy 1973 and Foxy Brown 1974 her other major films during this period included The Big Doll House 1971 Women in Cages 1971 The Big Bird Cage 1972 Black Mama White Mama 1973 Scream Blacula Scream 1973 The Arena 1974 Sheba Baby 1975 Bucktown 1975 and Friday Foster 1975 She portrayed the title character in Quentin Tarantinos crime film Jackie Brown 1997 and also appeared in Escape from LA 1996 Jawbreaker 1999 Holy Smoke 1999 Bones 2001 Just Wright 2010 Larry Crowne 2011 and Poms 2019 On television Grier portrayed Eleanor Winthrop in the Showtime comedydrama series Lincs 19982000 Kate Kit Porter on the Showtime drama series The L Word 20042009 and Constance Terry in the ABC sitcom Bless This Mess 20192020 She received praise for her work in the animated series Happily Ever After Fairy Tales for Every Child 1999 Description above from the Wikipedia article Pam Grier licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia