( ticking ) >> shortages in personal protective equipment still persist, especially as the pandemic spikes again. we found a market full of upstarts trying to peddle p.p.e. i'm going to read something to you, and you tell me what they all have in common: idaho state police; florida department of law enforcement; north carolina state's bureau of investigation; arizona's department of public safety. what do they have in common? >> law enforcement, of course. >> no, they placed orders with you that weren't fulfilled. ( ticking ) >> this year, at least 30

universities have cut almost 100 sports programs: soccer, squash, golf, gymnastics. football powerhouse clemson cut men's track and field. stanford eliminated 11 sports. more than 1,500 student-athletes will no longer have a team to compete for. >> it was kind of a surgical strike, if you will-- a 15- minute call to tell them that "your life as you know it is now changed forever." ( ticking ) >> viola davis is currently the youngest actor to have won an oscar, an emmy and a tony award. and as you'll hear tonight, she knew that she needed to slip poverty's grip if she were ever going to slip into character. >> what about my life? i needed something to catapult me out of this like a rocket booster. the dreams, they couldn't be casual dreams. >> did you know you had talent deep down? >> abso-freakin-lutely. ( ticking )

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renew active. stronger, only from unitedhealthcare. ♪ watch it ♪ sweat it ♪ bend and stretch it ♪ track it ♪ share it ♪ and compare it renew active gives you so many ways to be healthy. get medicare with more. >> stahl: we're nine months into the pandemic, and healthcare workers still find themselves scrambling for p.p.e, personal protective equipment. the shortages are more and more acute, as cases keep rising in practically every state, and we're gearing up to launch a nationwide program of

vaccinations. with no effective federal coordination early on, desperate governors, mayors, doctors and sheriffs were left fending for themselves and bidding against each other for supplies like masks and gloves. the global hunt for inventory has created a free-for-all market that's attracted speculators, self-starters, and outright scammers, leading to congressional and criminal investigations. tonight you'll meet someone who got into the game, and in his first month in business, racked up orders worth roughly $630 million. but then, things didn't go quite as planned. >> john thomas: i think i underestimated the challenges, where the entire world was looking for these same supplies. >> stahl: john thomas is the

president of blue flame medical, a p.p.e. supply company. he and his partner, mike gula, were republican strategists who jumped into the business as covid hit, despite having zero experience in importing medical supplies. you, right away, before you were even up and running practically, advertised yourself as "the largest global network of covid- 19 medical suppliers." now, that couldn't be true in a million years. >> thomas: well, so here's what i did. we started with my long-time relationship with a large chinese manufacturer. that was our base. and then i started working my connections, from vietnam to mexico to malaysia. so, we felt comfortable. now, was it a frenetic pace? yes. was the airplane being built while in flight? yes. but every claim we've made, i stand behind. >> stahl: their marketing brochure claimed they could"

deliver our goods betwee happened. the brochure goes on, "we pride ourselves on taking care of" our clients. of the four specifically listed, three never got the p.p.e. they ordered, and the fourth just got part of their order filled. but state agencies in desperate need had little time to vet blue flame. on its second day in business, the state of california ordered masks for well over half a billion dollars. then came tennessee and alabama. all using tax payer dollars. how much did you rely on your political connections in the conservative republican world? >> thomas: i can't think of a time that we used any political connections to get a contract. >> stahl: so, we have emails that we've acquired from freedom of information requests in a number of states, and it seems your network of political

contacts actually did kick n for you-- wrote letters, made phone calls, on your behalf. that's what i call "connections." what do you call it? >> thomas: i'd call it happy customer references. >> stahl: tiffany waddell, a republican advisor to the governor of maryland, wasn't a customer. she called herself a "good friend" of thomas' partner, and vouched for blue flame. that led maryland to order a million and a half masks and 110 ventilators. the ventilators that you contracted to maryland cost $41,000 apiece? >> thomas: oh, yeah. oh, yeah. >> stahl: well, wait a minute. i mean, that's crazy, actually. >> thomas: yeah. these usually cost $5,000 apiece. >> stahl: how did you get a contract for $41,000 apiece for ventilators? >> thomas: yeah, that's an example of how heated the marketplace was. but the pricing was being driven from the manufacturers. >> stahl: but signing contracts

turned out to be a lot easier than filling them. delays and setbacks piled up right away. take the case of st. john's, a chain of clinics in south los angeles serving low-income communities. >> jim mangia: we were desperate, and we didn't have enough p.p.e. to last us through the week. >> stahl: jim mangia is the c.e.o. of st. john's. when the pandemic hit, his staff scoured the internet to find p.p.e. states and giant hospital chains kept outbidding them, so they were relieved to discover blue flame medical. mangia never heard of them, but on april 2, he placed a p.p.e. order for nearly $180,000. >> mangia: and then they come back and they say, "oh, there's a kink in the supply chain. it'll be a few more days." "it'll be a few more days." "it'll be a few more days." and then, at the end of april, they basically said, "we-- we're

not going to be able to deliver. the only thing we can deliver is gloves." and, "you're out of luck." >> stahl: the deal's finished. >> mangia: the deal is done. >> stahl: a lot of these smaller entities were left high and dry. >> thomas: the ones that wanted to be patient got their product. the ones that didn't want to be patient got a refund. there's nothing more i can do than that. >> stahl: but it wasn't just the smaller entities. blue flame sent the state of maryland similar delay notices. and yet, at that very same time, the company wrote to california, "we feel confident we can deliver large quantities quite quickly. we do not have any problems getting things out of country." why did you keep taking orders in mid-april when you were already having to tell customers that you couldn't deliver? >> thomas: because we had been finding alternate suppliers. and for us to step back and just say, "well, this is complicated, there are delays here or there, we're just going to stop"-- first of all, that's just not in

my nature to do that. it's a challenge. we're going to overcome it. and, secondly, people needed this product. >> stahl: he blames the delays on china, where many factories that could switched overnight to making p.p.e. he says it was a wild, wild west gray market where buyers showed up with cash in suitcases. thomas claims goods he ordered just kept disappearing. >> thomas: one of our delays was when china literally stole our inventory off the line for one of our state customers. what china was doing, instead of issuing an order saying, "we're not going to allow america to have medical supplies," they would arbitrarily change the rules, almost on a daily basis. >> stahl: because of the trade war that we're in? >> thomas: absolutely. they wanted america to hurt. so we would have product, came off the manufacturing line, it was-- it was waiting to be inspected at customs, and everything's moving fine.

moving fine. and then we would hear, "oh, well, china says everything needs to be re-inspected." "well, why?" "well, just because." and the-- so it-- it's-- imagine, like, you're driving on the road, and all of a sudden, a stop sign appears in front of your face. and then the speed limit goes up, and then the speed goes down, and it's all in an effort to make it harder to get-- >> stahl: squeeze us? >> thomas: whether it was ventilators or masks. >> stahl: okay. i'm going to read something to you, and you tell me, when i'm finished, what they all have in common, okay? idaho state police; florida department of law enforcement; north carolina state's bureau of investigation; iowa's d.c.i. crime lab; arizona's department of public safety; the tacoma park police. what do they have in common? >> thomas: law enforcement, of course. >> stahl: no, they placed orders with you that weren't fulfilled. nearly all states and public agencies that ordered from blue flame couldn't wait as cases kept rising, and the company had to send them refunds.

california cancelled after the bank handling the transaction inquired about its legitimacy, and blue flame is now suing that bank. maryland did eventually get the masks, and a third of the ventilators, after filing a legal claim against the company. so, you or blue flame have been the subject of scathing articles, investigations, congressional investigations. the f.b.i. has come in. boy, you've been under a lot of pressure. i guess my question is, why are you talking to us? >> thomas: yes, we have been under a lot of pressure. and while i couldn't disagree more in some of the things people have said about me and my company, i can assure you this, first and foremost, lesley: that my company and i have behaved 100% legally and ethically. >> stahl: are you saying you didn't exaggerate at all?

>> thomas: i don't think we did anything differently than anyone-- any company selling product and their ability to sell product-- i don't think we did anything differently. >> stahl: the p.p.e. market operates with few rules, and is rife with chaos and broken promises. there are videos circulating online warning of boxes arriving with bags of sand instead of product. these photos show imported gloves arriving damaged. a charity that ordered masks got instead these tissue-thin counterfeits they called a doll's bloomers. masks and gloves are hawked in chat groups on texting apps. fraud is so rampant that buyers have demanded sellers provide a proof of life video like this, where the goods are shown with the buyer's name and current date, like in hostage negotiations. how fast do you send it out? the most valuable players in

this precarious p.p.e. market may be people like rudy rong. >> rudy rong: usually when they call, we send it in the afternoon. >> stahl: we walked through mountains of stock in his warehouse in los angeles. the 26-year-old dabbled in crypto-currency, clubs, and cars before discovering p.p.e. how and why did you get into this business? >> rong: it started out by my friend, paul, called me, be like, "yo, rudy, any-- you got any masks?" and i was like, "what? what are masks?" so i was like-- ( laughter ) "okay, let's-- let me find out for you, bro." like, and i found some masks and then connected them. it turned out-- >> stahl: you mean masks-- you found them in china. >> rong: yeah, in china. then i brought them here. and after that it just piled up. >> stahl: unlike blue flame, which took orders in the u.s. and then went hunting for inventory in china, rudy's company, magic ice cube, buys massive amounts of p.p.e. in china before they have clients, and then resells it in the u.s.

to the highest bidder in p.p.e. sales lingo, he's an o.t.g.: on the ground. what are the advantages for someone here buying from you, as opposed to going directly to china? >> rong: well, the biggest advantage is that they can validate what they are buying, you know? they can come and test it out. also they can just get it quicker, because everything we sell are ready for picked up or shipped out. >> stahl: and what are the downsides? >> rong: well, it's just a little more expensive. >> stahl: it's a lot more expensive. it can be a lot more expensive. >> rong: it can be a little more expensive. >> stahl: whatever the pricing, it hasn't deterred buyers, he says, including kohl's, victoria's secret, the u.s. military and the f.b.i. he keeps replenishing his shelves, relying on his wealthy parents back in china and their connections; or, in chinese: guan xi. can an american without guan xi in china get into this business?

>> rong: it will be hard. it will be hard. we had a lot of clients try to do it themselves, got burned. now they're not getting their money back. they were calling me, "rudy? do you have any lawyer in china that can help me out?" i'm like, "bro, man, like, i don't know. i-- like, the lawyer don't really work in china like they do in the states." >> stahl: the most dire shortage right now is in gloves, which, with the pandemic, are worn in restaurants and factories, as well as hospitals. the need is expected to explode once a national vaccination program starts. there are calls for more domestic production of p.p.e., but meanwhile, one company still trying to import gloves is blue flame medical. are you still doing this? >> thomas: we are still in the business, successfully delivering, yeah. >> stahl: you're kidding! you're still getting p.p.e. from china, and delivering it? >> thomas: we are. there's still a big need.

so, we're going to be here until that need disappears. ( ticking ) >> the cost of a national p.p.e. shortage. >> we were competing with multibillion-dollar hospitals. >> we were competing with multibillion-dollar hospitals. >> at 60minutesovertime.com.

>> whitaker: american universities have been rocked by the coronavirus pandemic. some have shut their campuses down completely. but schools that play big-time sports have gone to remarkable lengths to save their football and basketball seasons. some colleges are testing every player and coach for the virus every day, and even that hasn't stopped outbreaks; many games have had to be cancelled or re- scheduled. but still, they press on. they do it, of course, to keep

the tv money coming in from football and basketball. but at the same time, dozens of universities have been eliminating smaller, secondary sports like gymnastics and tennis and swimming. those sports are getting the axe because they don't generate much revenue, but the dreams of the athletes are no less real. >> mike burns: it was kind of a surgical strike, if you will, you know? a 15-minute call to tell them that "your life as you know it is now changed forever." >> whitaker: mike burns is the men's gymnastics coach at the university of minnesota. on september 10, he and the 18 student athletes on his team were about to start practice when their phones all began to buzz. >> burns: we had a text message at about 1:20 p.m., and it said, "you need to be on a zoom call at 2:00 p.m." >> whitaker: on that call,

minnesota athletic director mark coyle told them that the men's gymnastics program would be eliminated, along with men's tennis and men's track and field. >> mark coyle: again, these are not easy decisions. >> whitaker: coyle said the covid pandemic had blown a multi-million dollar hole in the university's athletic budget. he said they were cutting salaries and costs wherever possible, but that cutting entire sports was necessary too. >> shane wiskus: i do not regret coming to the university of minnesota one bit. but i'm still mad. >> whitaker: senior shane wiskus is the star gymnast on minnesota's team, which two years ago finished second overall at the n.c.a.a. championships. >> nice! ( cheers and applause ) >> wiskus: i think the team that we have right now is arguably one of the most talented teams we've ever had. so to see that a lot of these guys are going to have to be done with the sport, it breaks my heart. >> whitaker: i mean, just looking at it from the outside, it almost seems like, you're on

that high bar, and when you do one of your dramatic releases, they pull the high bar away. >> wiskus: that's exactly how it felt at first, i can tell you that much. >> whitaker: when shane's coach, mike burns, was competing as a college gymnast at penn state back in the 1970s, more than 150 universities had men's gymnastics programs. by the beginning of 2020, that number was down to 15. now, with iowa and minnesota axing their teams, it's down to 13. and mike burns is out of a job. do you think the athletic director was looking to get rid of the gymnastics program and is sort of using the covid-19 pandemic as-- as an excuse? >> burns: i think every athletic director who's dropping programs is using the covid pandemic as an excuse. there's financial issues everywhere, i get it. but, i-- i feel like athletic

directors have a manual on their top shelf. "athletic director's manual." let's pull it out. oh, "financial struggles. solution 1: cut programs." psshh. put it back up, we're going to cut some programs. >> whitaker: and cut they have. this year, at least 30 universities have cut almost 100 programs; soccer, squash, golf, gymnastics. football powerhouse clemson cut men's track and field, stanford eliminated 11 sports. schools are honoring existing scholarships, but more than 1,500 student-athletes, both men and women, will no longer have a team to compete for. >> victoria jackson: you have a budget crisis and so you've got to trim it in some way, and so you strip opportunities from both sides. there are other ways to trim the budget. >> whitaker: victoria jackson won an n.c.a.a. championship in the 10,000 meters while running for arizona state university. she's still running, and is now

on the faculty at a.s.u., where she specializes in the history of college sports, including the history of secondary sports getting the axe. during the great recession after 2008, colleges and universities responded the same way, and they cut these non-revenue-generating sports. this is a pattern. >> jackson: that's right. every time there's an economic downturn, you protect the core business, which is football, which means that other sports are on the chopping block. >> announcer: morgan rolls, and throws! >> whitaker: minnesota and the big-ten conference where its teams play provide a perfect illustration. even as three big-ten schools eliminated a total of nine non- revenue sports, the conference moved heaven and earth to get football players back on the field, and back on the air, in order to preserve tv revenue. >> jackson: higher education is operating a professional

football league. but then, the athletes, the labor, the players who are playing football, are considered to be amateur. if you can't offer high school recruits a salary, you spend money in different ways. so you get the best coaches. and those coaches enjoy increasing salaries. you build the best facilities. we've seen a facilities arms race. >> whitaker: you call it an arms race. what do you mean by that? >> jackson: i mean that if alabama builds, i mean, an unbelievable locker room facility, now every other school that's competing with alabama for recruits has to build something like that to showcase to recruits. >> whitaker: minnesota's own palatial locker room is in the shape of a football. its football coach, p.j. fleck, has taken a pay cut to help cope with the covid crisis, but he'll still make more than $4 million this year. schools will spend almost any

amount to build winning football and basketball programs, so even in good financial times, their athletic budgets are more like the federal government's: deficit spending has become the norm. i have read that the median annual deficit among the 130 top colleges, schools, was $14 million. and that was before the pandemic. >> jackson: i think the schools mght consider that to be successful. that's a small shortfall. because the goal is to spend it all. so-- i think they would consider that to be-- ( laughs ) --to be a good job. >> whitaker: $14 million loss, or deficit, is just the cost of doing business? >> jackson: oh, absolutely. >> announcer: up ahead, they've got key! >> whitaker: the n.c.a.a. basketball tournament was cancelled this past spring due to the pandemic. in normal times, cbs and turner together pay the n.c.a.a. nearly a billion dollars a year to televise march madness.

by contrast, eliminating men's gymnastics, tennis, and indoor track and field will save the university of minnesota a total of $1.6 million. does cutting your program get anywhere close to balancing the budget? >> burns: if it does, i'd like to see those numbers. i know i don't-- i'm not the head of the math department, but that doesn't make sense to me. >> whitaker: minnesota insists that financial pressure isn't the only reason sports are being dropped. it also cites title ix, the federal law that requires schools to match the gender makeup of their student bodies in their sports teams. so if 54% of students are women, 54% of athletes should be, too. to get to that balance, schools often choose to cut men's sports, rather than create new ones for women. >> jackson: title ix is often the scapegoat when universities cut teams. again, it's to protect the core business, which is football.

but you can kind of use this gender justice shield to kind of throw men's non-revenue sports under the bus. >> whitaker: football is often what gets universities in trouble with title ix in the first place. minnesota has 115 men on its football roster, which means it needs 115 female athletes just to balance that single sport. >> wiskus: you kind of know that football's the top dog, and all the revenue sports are the top dog. but this is just a very clear, backhanded decision that, you know, it hurts. >> whitaker: shane wiskus has a very real shot at making team u.s.a. for next summer's olympic games in tokyo. but he worries that younger teammates now won't be able to pursue their olympic dreams. how important is being part of a college team? how important is that in-- in helping you pursue that dream of

reaching the olympics? >> wiskus: n.c.a.a. gymnastics i believe is a crucial component in preparing gymnasts for, you know, not only success for their team, but success for the united states on the world and olympic podiums. >> sarah wilhelmi: at its core, it is truly how we train our young people, and that is an asset we can't lose. >> whitaker: sarah wilhelmi ran track for the university of iowa. now she's in charge of college partnerships for the u.s. olympic committee. do you think that most americans understand how big a role colleges and universities play in producing our olympians? >> wilhelmi: 85% of our 2016 team, our medallists, were college athletes. we did a case study with u.s.a. swimming, and we looked over a ten-year period to see what our footprint was. there were 370 athletes that were on team u.s.a. in that ten- year period for swimming.

366 competed in college. >> whitaker: and because american colleges recruit many foreign athletes, it's not just team u.s.a. that benefits. >> wilhelmi: well, we did some homework in rio with the n.c.a.a., and there were over 600 international athletes from over 100 different countries that were competing in the n.c.a.a. and then went to rio to represent their country as well. >> whitaker: but the extraordinary olympic pipeline is now under strain, as more and more sports get the axe. >> wilhelmi: these athletes work their whole life to represent their school. it's a dream. and for them to lose the opportunity is-- it is devastating to them. and what i'm so impressed with, those athletes, but also those coaches, quickly turning to action-- what can we do to keep our sport intact? >> whitaker: in the days after their program was cancelled, mike burns and his team did come up with a plan to make their sport pay for itself, by

developing a money-making youth gymnastics club. >> burns: you know, we put together a-- a kind of a business model, if you will-- to create a self-sustaining gymnastics program. >> whitaker: and athletic director mark coyle? he didn't give you a chance to try to save the program, try to find other sources of funding? >> burns: nope. >> whitaker: mark coyle did not agree to be interviewed for our story. instead, he sent us a statement:" the university of minnesota believes that the changes it has made, however heart-breaking, will best position its department of athletics for sustainable, long-term success." in college sports, football does pay all the bills, doesn't it? >> wiskus: it does, yup. don't get me wrong, i-- i respect the football team and what p.j. fleck has done for them. but, their hard work is not any more important than our hard work. >> burns: so i kind of had this

image of the seven athletic directors in the big-ten that have men's gymnastics, and they're sitting around the poker table with their visors down and their stogies and their glass of whiskey over here, and they go, "okay, i'm going to-- i'm going to call your men's gymnastics and raise your men's tennis." "oh, that's a good bet! i'll call your men's tennis. what do you got?" and, like, using us as-- as poker chips in a way, you know? and-- but it's more than just a poker chip. it's somebody's life, you know? >> whitaker: the university of minnesota cancelled its football game this weekend, after more than 45 players and staff tested positive for covid-19. ( ticking )

( ticking )

>> wertheim: the triple crown of horseracing is hard to come by. same goes for the triple crown of acting-- that's an oscar, an emmy and a tony in an acting category. of the 24 performers who have pulled off the feat, viola davis is currently the youngest, and the first african american. on stage, or when the cameras roll, davis will rip your heart out, but with a surgeon's touch. she doesn't overwhelm, so much as she inhabits a role. perhaps because of this classical approach to the craft, she didn't vault to a-list status, but rather worked her way up, letter by letter. her next performance is davis in full ascent. she headlines a netflix movie, out later this month, adapted from august wilson's canon of plays. at age 55, davis put on weight and padding, put in gold teeth, and plays the irrepressible title character in the film" ma rainey's black bottom." >> ma rainey: ♪ my bell rang

this morning ♪ didn't know which way to go >> wertheim: ma rainey was the real-life "mother of the blues," whose cabaret-style tent shows in the 1920s south led her to a lucrative recording career. >> ma rainey: ♪ daddy, daddy, please come home to me ♪ >> wertheim: ma sang from her gut and proudly declared her bisexuality in her lyrics. viola davis swivels into the character, a diva with heft. a role she didn't see herself playing at first. >> viola davis: no, i did not. here's the thing about acting. it's a weird peter pan syndrome that happens. so, i still saw myself as that 19-year-old girl, going, "i can't play ma rainey-- i'm too young. you got to get a more formidable actress, who's been out there for 40, 50 years." until i realize "viola, you're actually a little bit older than

what ma rainey is." >> ma rainey: they don't care nothing about me. >> wertheim: davis has been out there acting for three decades, first on stage, then in a string of films as the best friend, the junkie, the widow, the maid... >> ma rainey: and they going to treat me the way i wanna be treated, no matter how much it hurt them. >> wertheim: ...but ma is different. >> ma rainey: where's my coke? i need a cold coca cola. >> wertheim: take this scene: before recording tracks on a sweaty summer day, ma demands that the white guys profiting from her music first bring her a coke. >> irvin: let's do this one song, ma. >> ma rainey: you're too cheap to buy me a coca-cola? i'll buy my own. >> wertheim: did you get all that coke down in one take? >> davis: yes i did. yeah, i drank the whole coke. yes. >> wertheim: what's really going on in that scene? >> davis: what's really going on is, it's not about the coke. it's about what i deserve. it's about what i've worked for, and what i've earned. >> ma rainey: what you all say don't count with me, you

understand? >> wertheim: if ma rainey was unapologetic about her worth, viola davis took a while to get there herself, nudged along by the late playwright august wilson, the man who wrote her breakout stage role, vera, in the 1996 broadway production of "seven guitars." >> vera: you might have been in love. love don't know no age, and it don't know no experience. >> rose maxson: what about my life, what about me? >> wertheim: 15 years later, her layered portrayal of devoted wife rose maxson in another wilson classic, "fences," earned davis first a tony award... >> rose maxson: i've been right here with you, troy. >> wertheim: ...and then an oscar, in the film adaptation. what is it about august wilson that clearly resonates so deeply with you? >> davis: first of all, he creates real human beings. and he makes the most common black man, black woman, into kings and queens. but i think that there is a common understanding that when

you have playwrights and writers like arthur miller, and eugene o'neill, and edward albee, and shakespeare, that they're writing a universal language, because they're white. i think that you could see yourself in an august wilson play. i do. >> wertheim: you don't get to meet shakespeare. you don't get to meet tennessee williams. you met august wilson. what was the most memorable thing he ever said to you? >> davis: that i was beautiful. it was during "seven guitars." she has a monologue that absolutely is like an aria. and he said he would always watch it, and he would always say, "viola, you are just so beautiful." and-- i don't know. i never felt feminine. i never felt like i could fit into that sort of confines of what it meant, or the stereotypical ways of what being a woman was about, until i did "seven guitars." >> annalise keating: how to get away with murder... >> wertheim: for the last six years, davis pushed the

boundaries of femininity on the small screen, as criminal defense lawyer annalise keating in "how to get away with murder," once famously removing her wig and makeup on camera. did you know in advance of the role that that scene was coming? >> davis: yes, because i told them that they had to write it for me. >> wertheim: they had to write that scene? >> davis: absolutely. i wanted to humanize her as much as i could, and i wanted to put my stamp on her as much as i could. >> wertheim: in her work, davis will choose reality over vanity every time. she strips away any veneer in telling her own story, too. she grew up in central falls, rhode island, one of six children in a family gripped by poverty. >> davis: there was one apartment that we lived in that was just infested with rats. they were everywhere. they were in the cabinets, they were in the walls, they were under our beds. and just, never having any food. >> wertheim: you speak very openly about growing up in poverty. >> davis: yeah. >> wertheim: why do you do that? >> davis: i do that because i

think that there's a lot of shame involved with poverty. that you wouldn't be poor if you did the right thing. when you're poor, what happens is, it seeps through your mind. it's not just a financial state. it's an invisibility state. it's a worthlessness state. >> wertheim: as a girl, she dealt with these feelings in part by creating alter-egos, an early exercise in slipping into character. >> wertheim: who were jaji and jaja? >> davis: jaja, jagi darling. ( laughs ) they were our imaginary friends. ( laughs ) me and my sister deloris, who were the closest in age, and we would play these, like, two rich white women from beverly hills. we would imagine all these fabulous dishes that we would be eating. and at the same time, as a way to escape our lives into these sort of shadow characters who were everything that we weren't. >> wertheim: by the time she got to high school, davis was calling herself an actor and

imagining herself on a professional stage. >> davis: i needed something to catapult me out of this, like a rocket booster. the dreams, they couldn't be casual dreams. >> wertheim: did you know you had talent deep down? >> davis: oh yeah. >> wertheim: you did? >> davis: abso-freakin-lutely. >> wertheim: she studied theater in college and then got a scholarship to juilliard, the exclusive performing arts conservatory in new york city. >> wertheim: what was juilliard like for you? >> davis: juilliard, i compared it to mucinex. >> wertheim: mucinex the drug? >> davis: mucinex, yeah, the cough syrup. mucinex, it works. ( laughter ) but it tastes really bad going down. they critique your body, your personality, your speech, everything. >> wertheim: so, what is that like to hear? this isn't, "viola, you're not a particularly good dentist," this is you. >> davis: it's devastating. >> wertheim: she came into her own on theater stages around the country. "scorching" and "illuminating"

were among the raves critics lavished on her early performances. you played this house. >> davis: i sure did. >> wertheim: despite recent foot surgery, davis kept her date with us at the ahmanson theater in los angeles where she performed in the '90s. this is really cool. >> davis: oh man. i know. >> wertheim: the stage still fills her with awe. what's the first t t through your head when you're on davis: wow. it's that big rush of adrenaline. >> wertheim: this theatre's been dark for almost nine months now? >> davis: yeah. >> wertheim: to what extent do you worry about the performing arts? >> davis: i worry about the performing arts all the time, even before covid. i know acting is not rocket science, i really do. but it's an art form, and it has its place. we need people to feel. we need people to know that they're not alone. that's what the theatre does. >> mrs. miller: look, sister. i don't want any trouble. >> wertheim: the stage actress vaulted to hollywood star when she stole a scene from meryl streep in the 2008 movie

"doubt." >> mrs. miller: you hurt my son to get your way. >> sister aloysius beauvier: it won't end with your son. >> mrs. miller: throw the priest out then. >> sister aloysius beauvier: i am trying to do just that. >> mrs. miller: then what do you want from me? >> wertheim: was there added pressure playing alongside meryl streep? >> davis: what do you think? and you know she's going to bring her game. so, you have to match it. you just want to look like you belong in the movie. ( laughs ) >> wertheim: the performance, remarkable as much for what it holds back as what it reveals, made such an impression that streep lobbied for davis by name at the screen actors guild awards. >> meryl streep: viola davis. my god, somebody give her a movie! >> wertheim: that must've knocked you over. i mean, that must've-- >> davis: oh, my god. it was everything. >> wertheim: as bigger roles came her way, davis says she still felt stalled. she's been critical of hollywood for providing too few opportunities to black actors, and for assuming movies with black leads won't sell. >> davis: and even after you so-

called have "made it," it's still a fight every single day. and what we're fighting, as african americans, we're fighting the movie-making business that has already decided who you are and how you're marketable. i could deal with you if you're just a part of the story, but you're just a secondary part of the story, you're not the main focus. >> ma rainey: you don't sing to feel better. you sing because that's the way you understanding life. >> wertheim: davis is, unmistakably, the main focus of her latest film. even if the character she plays doesn't get top billing on history's call sheet. there wasn't a lot of material on this woman. there are not so many photographs. this is one. probably the best known one. >> davis: yeah, i love this one. i love this picture because i'm always wondering, "who is she? who is she really?" beyond the gold teeth, beyond the sereneness you see in this? >> wertheim: what do you think? >> davis: she was a combination of a woman from her time period,

which is right in that-- smack dab in jim crow. feeling worthless, but, at the same time, knowing who she was deep inside. >> levee: just 'cause i say" yes, sir" don't mean i'm spooked up by them. i know what i'm doing. >> wertheim: ma rainey also marks the final performance of chadwick boseman, who died of colon cancer last august. >> levee: levee got to be levee. >> davis: we were just watching a great artist absolutely give himself over to a role-- which is what you do. you give yourself. you sacrifice yourself. >> wertheim: since the pandemic, davis has repaired to her home in the san fernando valley which she shares with her 10-year-old daughter and her husband, julius tennon. an actor himself, tennon appreciates the depths davis can go in her work. >> julius tennon: this woman's getting ready to do "ma rainey," and she's showing me a fat suit. she's going, "honey! my fat suit!" she's excited about the transformation. i mean, that's the epitome of an actor who really wants to

disappear. and viola disappears when she's working. there's a few other small changes in there. >> wertheim: together, they run juvee productions, which pushes projects the studios might otherwise ignore. the latest movie in their pipeline? it's about a real-life all- female army in west africa. tell me about "the woman king." ( laughter ) >> tennon: oh, man. >> davis: whooo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo! ( laughs ) i always wanted a black female "braveheart." this is it. >> wertheim: the movie is set to start filming next year. this performer, who toiled for decades, waiting for hollywood to catch up to her talent, is now calling the shots. how do you take the measure of this journey you've been on? >> davis: i have to say, two things. number one, i always have to tell myself that i'm not poor anymore, that i'm not that girl anymore. but at the same time, i have to honor that young girl, and allow her to squeal with delight at

the 55-year-old she gets to become. >> wertheim: that's an acknowledgment of the whole journey. >> davis: absolutely. ( ticking ) >> cbs sports hq presented by progressive insurance. i'm james brown with the score today. feeling dangerous over the titans. and a field goal saifs the day for minnesota: the giants save the day. >> and two seconds of time. derrick carr breaks the hearts of the jets, 24/7 news and highlights at cbs sports hq.com. it happens to all of us. we buy a new home, and we turn into our parents. what i do is help new homeowners overcome this. what is that, an adjustable spanner? good choice, steve. okay, don't forget you're not assisting him. you hired him. if you have nowhere to sit, you have too many.

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