Review: 'Sunday Best' Reclaims Ed Sullivan as a True Ally for African American Artists

Review: 'Sunday Best' Reclaims Ed Sullivan as a True Ally for African American Artists

In "Sunday Best", a new documentary directed by Sacha Jenkins and now streaming on Netflix, viewers are invited to revisit the legacy of Ed Sullivan—not as a staid television host, but as a fierce and often overlooked advocate for African American performers. As a reviewer, I didn’t expect to be moved. But what Jenkins unpacks here is nothing short of revelatory.

The Ed Sullivan most Americans think they know is the one who introduced the Beatles to the country and stood poker-faced before a live studio audience every Sunday night for over two decades. But "Sunday Best" makes a different and urgent case: Ed Sullivan wasn’t just a conduit for pop culture—he was a white man who, at the height of the civil rights movement, used one of the most-watched platforms in America to elevate African American excellence long before it was safe, acceptable, or marketable.

The documentary opens with a jolt: Billy Preston, dressed in a chartreuse suit, tearing through a performance with the intensity of a man delivering a sermon. Next comes Ray Charles, mid-laugh, about to launch into a turbo-charged rendition of “Agent Double-O-Soul.” From there, the film weaves through breathtaking archival footage featuring Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone, James Brown, Smokey Robinson, Harry Belafonte, and Berry Gordy—icons who didn’t just perform on The Ed Sullivan Show but helped shape its legacy. They were the culture. Ed Sullivan knew it, and he made sure America saw it.

And he paid a price. Sullivan didn’t just book African American artists—he defended them. When sponsors and southern affiliates warned him about backlash, he didn’t back down. “You can’t do so-and-so because the South will not accept it,” Belafonte recalls being told. Sullivan, however, pushed the envelope as far as it could go.

A sports writer before his television career, Sullivan had already gone on record in the 1930s criticizing NYU’s football program for benching an African American player when the University of Georgia came to town. Racism wasn’t just wrong to him—it was dangerous, senseless, and small-minded.

Born in 1901 and raised in a Harlem neighborhood filled with Irish and Jewish immigrants, Sullivan inherited a working-class awareness of injustice. In a 1969 interview with David Frost, he recalled, “My parents knew these things were wrong... it wasn’t broad-minded, it was just sensible.” That sensibility would later shape The Ed Sullivan Show, which aired from 1948 to 1971 and reached millions of homes each week. If culture is a mirror, Sullivan made sure African American America could see itself fully reflected.

"Sunday Best" makes it clear: Ed Sullivan stood taller than many of his contemporaries not because he shouted, but because he never sat down. At a time when the nation commodified African American talent while denying its humanity, Sullivan gave artists a national stage and the dignity of prime-time visibility.

To toss in the why of why this documentary matters, I lean on a quote from producer Effie T. Brown—not from the film, but from my own reference and point of view:

“When you see a person accurately and fully realized, it humanizes them and makes it harder for people to treat them inhumanely.”

Sunday Best is streaming now on Netflix. Not rated. Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes.

Watch it—and learn who Ed Sullivan really was.