Born into a farming family in Miami, Florida, Sidney Porthier is a native of Kate Island in the Bahamas, despite being born in Miami. Sidney Portier, who grew up in poverty, received only 18 months of formal education. At the age of 18, Sidney Portier came to New York and saw the job of recruiting actors on it. So he applied for a job, but was turned away because he hadn't studied acting. To this end, Sidney Portier re-found a job as a dishwasher, and after earning enough money, enrolled in the Negro Theatre to study acting, and aspired to become an actor
In 1945, Sidney Portier starred in the Broadway stage play Lysistrata, playing a young soldier with twelve lines; a few months later, Sidney Portier became an extra in the stage play Anna Lucasta; in the same year, he starred in the film "The Boy of Naphro", which was his first appearance in the film.
He was inspired by twentieth century Fox producer Daryl M. F. Zhanouk's admiration, he took over the feature film "No Way Out", in which he played "Dr. Luther Brooks" who tried to rescue the robber, which was his first starring film.
In 1958, he co-starred with Tony Curtis in the crime film Break Free of the Chains, in which the two played prisoners with different skin colors but chained together, and Sidney Portier was nominated for Best Actor at the 31st Academy Awards, becoming the first black actor to be nominated.
In 1963, he starred in the feature film "Wild Lilies", in which he played the eager and helpful black young man "Homer Smith", for which he won the Best Actor Award at the 36th Academy Awards, becoming the first black actor to win the award.
In 2002, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 74th Academy Awards. In 2006, he won the French "Master of Art and Literature" award. In 2009, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by US President Barack Obama. In 2010, he appeared in the documentary Broadway: The Golden Age gone. In 2016, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 69th BRITISH ACADEMY Film and Television Arts Awards.