Unmade Black Projects

The following black experience-related film and stage projects proposed by black entertainers were mentioned in the press but so far they have not been made:

1. Spike Lee (director)--A biopic about the 1938 boxing rematch between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling; A film adaptation of Porgy and Bess.

2. Barry Jenkins (director)--A biopic about the choreographer Alvin Ailey.

3. Jon Batiste (musician/composer)--A Broadway musical based on the life of the artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.

4. Alicia Keys (singer/pianist)--A biopic about the biracial piano prodigy Philippa Schuyler, whose father was the Harlem Renaissance writer and critic George Schuyler.

5. Jesse L. Martin (actor)--A biopic about the R & B singer Marvin Gaye.

The Man Who Coined The Word "Gig"

During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, when millions of people nationwide were laid off their jobs and had to apply for unemployment benefits from the state and federal governments, there was talk of including people who were part of the gig economy. These individuals, called gig workers, ordinarily didn't qualify for unemployment, because they were not on anyone's payroll. They were freelancers, independent contractors. Due to the unusual circumstances brought on by the pandemic, they got to collect unemployment checks.

That brings me to the origin of the word "gig." While reading a book called Footnotes: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way by Caseen Gaines (Sourcebooks, 2021), I learned where the word came from. It's "a term," writes Gaines, an award-winning New Jersey-based author and journalist, "[African-American band leader James Reese] Europe coined [in the late nineteen-teens] to describe a one-night performance, which quickly caught on in the jazz community."

Now we know who should receive credit for creating "gig," a word that has become applicable to people both inside and outside of show business.

Proofreading Cloris Leachman's Autobiography

Among the last books I proofread at Kensington Books was actress Cloris Leachman's autobiography called Cloris, which was actually ghostwritten by her husband, George Englund, who predeceased her. (Ms. Leachman recently died at age 94.) It was the first and only celebrity autobiography I ever proofread.

She was in her 80s at the time (this would be around late 2008 or early 2009) and I guess because of her age, she misremembered certain things. Whenever there was a factual error, I pointed it out on the galley proof. The one error I remember correcting was the one where she said she replaced June Lockhart as the mother on the television series Lassie. Actually, it was the other way around, it was Lockhart who replaced her.

While visiting the Countee Cullen branch of the New York Public Library in Harlem, about two or three years later, I found a copy of Cloris on the shelf in the Biography section. Skimming through the book, I couldn't find that particular error. Maybe they deleted it from the finished book. Or maybe the correction was there and I couldn't find it among the thousands of words because I couldn't remember the page it appeared on. Unfortunately, I neglected to photocopy those pages for future reference. Anyway, I might try to track the book down and do a careful page by page search for that correction.

Hollywood Honesty

From among some old newspaper and magazine clippings, I came across this quote that appeared in a brief news item in TV Guide (December 10, 1988) about actor Scott Valentine, who was a cast member of NBC's Family Ties.

In the article he stated that "Men run the studios and the networks, and that makes it easy to be a white male in this world."

More than thirty years later, people in Hollywood are still talking about the lack of racial and gender diversity, especially behind the camera and in the executive suites.

Gays And Lesbians Were A Part Of "The Twilight Zone" Series

In one biography of television writer Rod Serling, it was stated that he was homophobic.If that was true, he obviously didn't let that keep him from hiring for his iconic science fiction/fantasy series The Twilight Zone those who were either gay or lesbian.

For example, Justis Addiss directed episodes for The Twilight Zone and Keogh Gleason designed sets for them. (Addiss's life partner was actor Hayden Rorke of the sitcom I Dream of Jeannie.)

Among gay and lesbian actors who appeared in the show were Richard Deacon, Agnes Moorehead, James Daly, James Milhollin, Alan Sues, and Cesar Romero.

So if Serling was homophobic, he was a benevolent homophobe.

Note: Today is the beginning of Black History Month. 

"Hollywood Babylon" Books On TV?

I don't know if Kenneth Anger published a third or fourth sequel to his books Hollywood Babylon (Straight Arrow Books, 1975) and Hollywood Babylon II (Dutton, 1984), but if he hasn't he should. Both books are sitting side by side in my bookcase.

These books are focused on the dark side of Tinseltown fame--suicides, murders, drug addiction, sex scandals, mental breakdowns, etc.

I'm surprised that HBO, Showtime, the History Channel or one of the other cable networks hasn't done a documentary series based on the Hollywood Babylon books. If they did, I'm certain the number of viewers would be astronomical.

Remembering Forgotten Actors And Other Entertainment People

A website I stumbled upon recently is called forgottenactors.blogspot.com. I discovered it when I was looking up info on an actor named Sam Buffington, who I had seen on television in an episode each of Alfred Hitchcock Presents and Highway Patrol. Both episodes were filmed in the 1950s. I learned that Buffington, a promising talent, died in 1960 at the age of 28, a victim of suicide. Buffington was a gay man at a time when being gay was not considered a cool thing.

I began thinking that Entertainment Weekly, a publication to which I subscribe, should do a column each issue devoted to forgotten members of all branches of the entertainment industry like Buffington, actor James Edwards (the up-and-coming black actor before Sidney Poitier), et al.

There should also be a "Where Are They Now?" feature in the magazine that brings readers up to date on the whereabouts and doings of people no longer prominent in the entertainment industry.


Note: Today is Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.

Carol Channing's Secret Racial Heritage

"In her 2002 autobiography, 'Just Lucky I Guess,' Ms. [Carol] Channing," wrote the New York Times,"revealed that when she was 16 her mother told her that her father was part black;she kept her racial heritage a secret, she wrote, for fear that it would be bad for her career."(Carol Channing, who died recently at age 97, was a Broadway musical star. She is best known for her role as Dolly Levi in Hello, Dolly.)

I wonder if  Carol Channing had ever been approached by professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. to appear on his public television series Finding Your Roots to discover more about her father's side of the family.

Carol Channing Entered A Look-Alike Contest

Film critic Jeffrey Lyons, on WCBS News Radio Eight-Eighty in New York, told the story of the time Broadway star Carol Channing, who recently died at age 97, entered a drag queen Carol Channing look-alike contest and won third place.

A Movie Studio Grows In The South Bronx

On December 27, 2012, I posted on this blog an unpublished letter-to-the-editor that I wrote in July 1977 in which I suggested that the abandoned buildings in the South Bronx be torn down and replaced by "a huge television and motion picture sound stage."

Forty years later, that sound stage in the South Bronx has come into existence and is called Silvercup Studios North.

My suggestion was way ahead of its time.

A Gay Gossip Columnist

One book I plan to read for the second time is Mike Connolly and the Manly Art of Hollywood Gossip by Val Holley (McFarland & Co., 2003).

Connolly, a columnist for the Hollywood Reporter in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, was a political conservative and a staunch anti-Communist. He was also a gay man.

It's been a few years since I last read the book but I vaguely recall the author depicting Connolly as closeted and homophobic towards other gay men, especially those in Hollywood who were in the public eye like actor Rock Hudson and director George Cukor. Those traits would not be too far off the mark for a gay man living and working during those extremely closeted and homophobic times.

I would love to see a documentary film  made about the life and times of Mike Connolly. It would give us a behind-the-scenes look at gay Hollywood back then, warts and all, told from many different points of view, gay and straight.

Darnell Williams Gains Success On A Daytime Drama

For actor Darnell Williams of All My Children, the popular ABC-TV daytime soap, television stardom can be at times a heavy crown to wear. Especially when overzealous fans recognize him in public or go out of their way to seek him out.

While interviewing him in his dressing room at the ABC Television Center on West 67th Street [in Manhattan], I asked Darnell if he was by nature a private person. "More private now than I was before. I like to be outside now. I live in Brooklyn and it's a black neighborhood and black people are overenthusiastic. There was a time when they were at my door and knew where I lived and that kind of stuff. I can't deal with it. A couple of people got my phone number. My roommate was at the butt of all that attention  because I'm  hardly ever there. He works a different shift. One week he works a night shift, one week he works the day shift. He'd be sleeping. Ding dong. Twelve, fifteen girls."

"The visibility of an actor," explains Darnell, who plays Jesse Hubbard, the 17-year old black streetwise kid, "is just incredible. Even more so than movies because there are so many people that watch soaps and see it every day. [They] see me two or three times in a week. I'm on often enough to be recognized constantly. In the beginning, it's great. Me and my brother were trying  to go out and count how many people recognized me. But after awhile, after a year, it just gets to be a pain in the ass. A regular person can't deal with that stuff [excessive recognition] and they [the fans] don't understand. I wish there was a way that they could understand." But despite the agony of being "recognized constantly," whenever a fan approaches him for an autograph, "I usually smile, show my teeth, and sign," says the 5-foot, eleven-inch actor who was nominated for (but did not win) the Daytime Emmy for Best Supporting Actor.

Darnell, who describes  himself as a "nice, easy-going, soft-spoken" person, was born in London, England on March 3, 1954, the second of eight children. And because his father was a career Air Force officer, the family moved all over the globe which offered Darnell the chance to experience and appreciate other cultures. (This probably explains his liking for Japanese food.)

Darnell appeared in several school plays and in 1974 he began acting professionally, a decision he came to after watching the old TV series Lost in Space. (Although as a kid he dreamed of becoming a teacher.)

The year 1975 found him studying under the tutelage of veteran black actor Glynn Turman who "was my first acting teacher. He had a great impact on me. To me, he was great."

Darnell believes that acting study is a way of "sharpening your craft. It's like keeping your car tuned. Some people feel they don't need it. I felt that way for awhile, too."

The one thing Darnell had prior to acting study was confidence. "I just knew it was a matter of time, a matter of a vehicle, a national vehicle before everybody would say 'Hey, this guy is great.'"

During this early stage of his career, Darnell felt and was told by others that he "had the instinct for an actor."

This instinct and skill led him to play roles in such TV productions as The White Shadow and Rich Man, Poor Man. And eventually All My Children, which was conducting a routine audition. "Fred Hudson down at the Frederick Douglass [Creative Arts] Center produced a play I was doing, Maurice Hines's Reach for the Sky, and some months after the show had closed he called me and said 'Listen, they're looking for Jesse.'" And, as the saying goes, the rest is history.

"This soap opera," says Darnell, "has a tremendous black following. It's probably even doubled since I've been on the show. Jesse has caught on like wildfire. It's time for them [network brass] to sit up and check out the demographics."

The Jesse character and storyline has caused a lot of controversy in spite of Darnell's comment that all of his "feedback has been positive," which would include his fan mail. The controversy arose, writes Linda Yearwood in the Amsterdam News (August 8, 1982), "for reasons ranging from his [Jesse's] overt, anti-white militarism to his quelled love affair turned platonic, with a local white maiden (the rumor flying around the daytime circuit was the viewer response was so vehemently opposed to this romantic entanglement, that the writers were forced to find Jesse a soulmate." Says Darnell: "The more controversy the better. I'm here for awhile, it can't do me any harm." (Williams has a three-year contract with AMC.)

Has his popularity on the show resulted in any movie offers? "I haven't been offered a wet sock yet," he replies. "If someone offered me a movie and it was pretty much like Jesse, [but] there was no positive growth, then I wouldn't do that."

Williams has not yet reached the point in his career where he can pick the roles he wants to do--"It's about getting whatever is there"--but he hopes some day he'll be able to do so.

One goal he has in mind once he's finished with AMC is to "produce and direct eventually." If black actors and actresses want to bring about change in the entertainment industry, says Darnell, "they have to stop acting and start producing and directing." He does feel, however, that the image of blacks on TV is "changing a little bit but not as quickly as it needs to."

Money coming in is certainly not a worry for Darnell Williams anymore. Being on All My Children, says Darnell, has made him "a little sure, able to pay [my] bills on time and [able to] buy a few things for [myself]. It just makes [me] a little more positive, a little more secure."

This is an excerpt of an article that was originally published in the Harlem Weekly newspaper (February 16-22, 1983).

Hollywood In The South Bronx

Voice of the People
New York Daily News
220 East 42nd Street
New York, NY 10017
July 5, 1977

Dear Editor:

If the city had torn down some of the abandoned buildings in the South Bronx and replaced them with a huge television and motion picture sound stage, it would have helped the city's financial situation enormously. New jobs would have been created, companies providing goods and services would have benefited, and it would have given Hollywood some tough competition.

Sincerely yours,
Charles Michael Smith

The above letter was not published.

Note: There are today film studios in Brooklyn and Queens.