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May Britt, 91, Dies; Her Marriage to Sammy Davis Jr. Sparked Outrage
May Britt, 91, Dies; Her Marriage to Sammy Davis Jr. Sparked Outrage
She was a white actress, he was a popular Black entertainer, and their relationship elicited racist reactions in 1960, worrying John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign.
May Britt in a publicity portrait for the film “Murder, Inc.” in 1960, the year she married Sammy Davis Jr. 20th Century-Fox/Getty Images
By Clay Risen
Published Dec. 22, 2025
Updated Dec. 24, 2025
May Britt, the Swedish-born actress whose marriage to the Black entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. in 1960 drew racist reactions in Hollywood and elsewhere, all while the civil rights movement was gathering momentum, died on Dec. 11 in Los Angeles. She was 91. ... Her son Mark Davis confirmed the death, in a hospital.
Ms. Britt, whose first name was pronounced “My,” was an up-and-coming movie star when she met Mr. Davis at a Los Angeles nightclub in 1959. ... The civil rights movement was then making gains against school segregation and workplace discrimination but having far less impact regarding the laws and mores around intimate relationships. Interracial marriage, while legal in California, was still illegal in many American states — it wasn’t until 1967 that it was legalized nationwide by the Supreme Court’s decision in Loving v. Virginia — and interracial dating was considered taboo even in supposedly liberal places like Hollywood.
After Ms. Britt and Mr. Davis began dating, they became the target of death threats, streams of hate mail and neo-Nazi pickets outside venues where Mr. Davis was performing. The reaction grew only more intense when they announced their engagement in July 1960.
The intolerance spread into that year’s presidential campaign, during which Mr. Davis was a vocal supporter of Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts, the Democratic nominee. At the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles in July, Mr. Davis was booed by delegates from Southern states. ... “You know as well as I do why they booed,” Mr. Davis told a reporter from United Press International.
Ms. Britt and Mr. Davis at their wedding in November 1960. It was reported that the event had been delayed from October at the request of John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign to avoid negative attention before the election. Hulton Archive/Getty Images
{snip}
Ms. Britt’s marriage to Mr. Davis largely brought her film career to an end after a promising start. She had begun acting in Italy, where she starred in 11 movies produced by Carlo Ponti, before going to Hollywood in 1957 on a contract with 20th Century-Fox.
{snip}
A correction was made on Dec. 24, 2025: An earlier version of this obituary misspelled Ms. Britt’s given name at birth — it was Maybritt, not Majbritt — and misspelled the name of her third husband: He was Lennart Ringquist, not Lennert Rindquist. The earlier version also misstated the number of grandchildren who survive her. It is six, not five.
When we learn of a mistake, we acknowledge it with a correction. If you spot an error, please let us know at nytnews@nytimes.com.Learn more
Clay Risen is a Times reporter on the Obituaries desk.
A version of this article appears in print on Dec. 25, 2025, Section B, Page 9 of the New York edition with the headline: May Britt, 91, Dies; Interracial Marriage Ended Movie Career. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
See more on: Sammy Davis Jr.
She was a white actress, he was a popular Black entertainer, and their relationship elicited racist reactions in 1960, worrying John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign.
May Britt in a publicity portrait for the film “Murder, Inc.” in 1960, the year she married Sammy Davis Jr. 20th Century-Fox/Getty Images
By Clay Risen
Published Dec. 22, 2025
Updated Dec. 24, 2025
May Britt, the Swedish-born actress whose marriage to the Black entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. in 1960 drew racist reactions in Hollywood and elsewhere, all while the civil rights movement was gathering momentum, died on Dec. 11 in Los Angeles. She was 91. ... Her son Mark Davis confirmed the death, in a hospital.
Ms. Britt, whose first name was pronounced “My,” was an up-and-coming movie star when she met Mr. Davis at a Los Angeles nightclub in 1959. ... The civil rights movement was then making gains against school segregation and workplace discrimination but having far less impact regarding the laws and mores around intimate relationships. Interracial marriage, while legal in California, was still illegal in many American states — it wasn’t until 1967 that it was legalized nationwide by the Supreme Court’s decision in Loving v. Virginia — and interracial dating was considered taboo even in supposedly liberal places like Hollywood.
After Ms. Britt and Mr. Davis began dating, they became the target of death threats, streams of hate mail and neo-Nazi pickets outside venues where Mr. Davis was performing. The reaction grew only more intense when they announced their engagement in July 1960.
The intolerance spread into that year’s presidential campaign, during which Mr. Davis was a vocal supporter of Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts, the Democratic nominee. At the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles in July, Mr. Davis was booed by delegates from Southern states. ... “You know as well as I do why they booed,” Mr. Davis told a reporter from United Press International.
Ms. Britt and Mr. Davis at their wedding in November 1960. It was reported that the event had been delayed from October at the request of John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign to avoid negative attention before the election. Hulton Archive/Getty Images
{snip}
Ms. Britt’s marriage to Mr. Davis largely brought her film career to an end after a promising start. She had begun acting in Italy, where she starred in 11 movies produced by Carlo Ponti, before going to Hollywood in 1957 on a contract with 20th Century-Fox.
{snip}
A correction was made on Dec. 24, 2025: An earlier version of this obituary misspelled Ms. Britt’s given name at birth — it was Maybritt, not Majbritt — and misspelled the name of her third husband: He was Lennart Ringquist, not Lennert Rindquist. The earlier version also misstated the number of grandchildren who survive her. It is six, not five.
When we learn of a mistake, we acknowledge it with a correction. If you spot an error, please let us know at nytnews@nytimes.com.Learn more
Clay Risen is a Times reporter on the Obituaries desk.
A version of this article appears in print on Dec. 25, 2025, Section B, Page 9 of the New York edition with the headline: May Britt, 91, Dies; Interracial Marriage Ended Movie Career. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
See more on: Sammy Davis Jr.
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