The late Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier first met in the 1940s, sparking a deep friendship

Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte. Photo: Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty

Harry Belafonte, who died Tuesday at age 96, held a decades-long friendship with his frequent costar and fellow civil rights activist Sidney Poitier.

The two groundbreaking artists — Belafonte was the first Black person to win an Emmy Award, while the late Poitier was the first Black man to win a Best Actor Oscar — met in the mid-1940s as they worked at The American Negro Theatre in New York City, both age 20.

Poitier started out working as a janitor at the theater while taking acting classes, while Belafonte worked as a stagehand. The pair bonded over their similar upbringings and West Indian heritage. When Belafonte fell ill during the run of his debut stage performance, Poitier stepped in as his understudy. According to a 2017 story published by The New York Times, Belafonte considered Poitier “his first real friend in life.”

Hulton Archive/Getty

Outside of their shared love for performing, Poitier and Belafonte were active participants in the civil rights movement. The pair, who were both friends with Martin Luther King. Jr, each helped plan the 1963 March on Washington and King’s memorial following his 1968 assassination.

After Poitier’s death at age 94 in Jan. 2022, Belafonte’s daughter Shari Belafonte told PEOPLE: “Losing Sidney is probably the most difficult thing my father has had to fathom, more so than losing Martin L. King.”

Harry Belafonte’s Life in PhotosFilm Publicity Archive/United Archives via Getty

“They were closer than brothers,” Shari, 68, said at the time. “They have known and loved each other for more than 70 years, collaborating, living life to the fullest. While Harry was much more vocal and seemingly more instrumental in the civil rights movement via his stage presence and his navigating the dynamics between Leaders and politicians, Sidney broke those barriers in a much more creative way by taking a stand in the characters he portrayed so brilliantly on film.”

She added, “They both focused on making this world a better place for all people, not just people of color. We grieve for his loss and for his wife and 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘥ren, our extended family.”

Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier in ‘Uptown Saturday Night’. Getty

In 1964, Belafonte convinced Poitier to help him deliver $70,000 to Freedom Summer volunteers in Mississippi; members of the Ku Klux Klan chased and fired at the pair along the way, according to The New York Times.

In the aftermath of King’s assassination, the pair grew estranged “for a few years” after a disagreement over whether the civil rights icon’s funeral and memorial should include a protest, a 2022 story on their friendship by The Los Angeles Times reported.

However, upon Poitier’s arrival as a filmmaker in the early 1970s, he turned to Belafonte for roles in his films. The pair costarred in 1972’s Buck and the Preacher as well as 1974’s Uptown Saturday Night, both of which Poitier directed. In later years, Poitier introduced Belafonte at 1989’s Kennedy Center Honors ceremony. His friend returned the honor when he hosted Poitier’s lifetime achievement honors by the American Film Institute in 1992. Poitier also presented his friend with the Spingarn Medal at the 2013 NAACP Image Awards.

In his own statement at the time of Poitier’s death in 2022, Belafonte said: “For over 80 years, Sidney and I laughed, cried and made as much mischief as we could. He was truly my brother and partner in trying to make this world a little better. He certainly made mine a whole lot better.”