Surprising Choices Nov 8, 2008
Broadway played a big supporting role in Moreno's Rrazz debut, but not necessarily in the most familiar songs from shows like "Chicago," from which she offered a comically over-the-top version of "Class," or the celebrated collaboration between Harold Arlen and Truman Capote, "House of Flowers." That show, which featured Ethel Waters and introduced Diahann Carroll, is probably best known for "A Sleepin' Bee," but Moreno reminded her audience of just what a rich musical trove the show was with "I... (San Francisco Chronicle -- Entertainment)
Black presidents we have known Nov 3, 2008
Fantasy of a different order is on view in (1933), a bizarre Vitaphone musical short in which a black mother (the great jazz-blues singer Ethel Waters) dreams that her little boy (an immediately recognizable Sammy Davis Jr.) has been elected president. A modern viewer barely has time to register the aspiration before recoiling at the racial slurs that were common to that day: black voters lured to the polls with free pork chops; Rufus celebrating his victory with a half-eaten piece of chicken; a... (Salon)
Lee Young, at 94; drummer with roots deep in New Orleans jazz, brother of saxophonist Aug 12, 2008
He began playing with Mutt Carey, a trumpeter and bandleader who had gotten his start in New Orleans, and also toured with Ethel Waters. He made his first records at 23 as Fats Waller's drummer. (Boston Globe)
Female voices in spotlight Aug 12, 2008
BRT favorite Demetria Joyce Bailey, last year's Ethel Waters star, adds a blues note with Hammerstein and Kern's "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man" from "Showboat" and heats up Gary Geld and Peter Udell's "I Got Love" from "Purlie.". Legit soprano Erin Mosher joined the last musicale celebrating Harold Arlen, after coming off an Asian tour of "Jekyll and Hyde" and a wide array of roles from a nun in "The Sound of Music" to Sheila in "Hair." She covers the subject of man trouble in "Maybe This Time"... (NJ.com -- Times)
QTIP's Black Cultural Arts Festival has soul Apr 4, 2008
Reaves-Phillips, like Denmark, is a devotee of musical icons of jazz , soul and R show, "The Late Great Ladies of Jazz and Blues," gives what Reaves-Phillips describes as an "essence" of blues music icons such as Ethel Waters, Mahalia Jackson, Dinah Washington and Billie Holiday, presented as a mixture of poetry, monologues, song and interplay with the audience. Reaves-Phillips has been performing the show since 1980 but manages to never tire of it, and one gets the sense from her childlike... (Bayside Times, NY)
New on DVD: Oscar nominees and old favorites Feb 15, 2008
Back story: Social outcasts in the South; mesmerizing Ethel Waters; Oscar-nominated Julie Harris; precocious Brandon de Wilde; one of the most glistening black-and-white prints ever on DVD; potent Fred Zinnemann styling that feels like his direction of From Here to Eternity, which immediately followed. Extras, extras: The box includes previously released 1953 jewels that Kramer produced: Dr. Seuss' The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T and Marlon Brando's The Wild One. (USA Today -- Life)
The PG's Barbara Cloud says, 'Thanks for all the wonderful moments' Jan 6, 2008
I still want to be an actress, but while I never made it to a Broadway stage, I experienced theater vicariously by interviewing Ginger Rogers, Katharine Cornell, Jessica Tandy, Audrey Hepburn, Lisa Kirk, Lana Turner, Ethel Waters, Walter Pidgeon, Joan Crawford and Joan Fontaine, among others. I've had chats with many of the great entertainers of my generation: Tony Bennett, Carmen Cavallaro, Andy Williams, Hildegarde, Cyd Charisse, Phyllis Diller, Julie Newmar, Al Martino and Mary Lou Williams. (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, PA)
Public radio Dec 15, 2007
The Montana Standard. The Montana Standard. (Montana Standard, MT)
SCSU exhibit focuses on first half of triumphant photographic display Oct 18, 2007
Photographs include those of Harlem's literary greats -- Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen and Richard Wright; its politicians -- Marcus Garvey, Malcolm X and Adam Clayton Powell Jr.; and its musicians -- Ethel Waters, Duke Ellington and Billie Holiday. The exhibit also includes photographs of everyday people who gave life to the legendary community. (Orangeburg Times and Democrat, SC)
In London, Carson McCullers's 'The Member of the Wedding' Sep 18, 2007
Some will certainly know McCullers's 1950 script from her own source novel or, perhaps, from the 1952 film version that preserved the stage performances of Julie Harris, Brandon de Wilde, and, in the role of the cook Berenice now taken by Portia, the formidable Ethel Waters. Portia has a more slender build than Waters, and something about her innately raised theatrical temperature recalls the late, great Broadway actress Lynne Thigpen. (International Herald Tribune -- Arts)
Stairway to Paradise May 12, 2007
Jenkins channels Ethel Waters also in "My Handy Man Ain't Handy No More" from "George White's Scandals," bumping her hips with nonchalant sexy attitude. Jenkins and Chenoweth make an odd but appealing pair on hot hell raiser, "Pack Up Your Sins and Go to the Devil," from the 1922 Berlin show, "The Music Box Revue.". (Variety)
'Wild' show is solid blues primer Feb 26, 2007
The show ends with "His Eye is on the Sparrow," Craig as Ethel Waters - a cappella and potent. In the end, "Wild Women Don't Get the Blues" is about a half-hour too long, big songs unfortunately balanced against small talk, and the Craig-Schroeder bantering proves to be painful. (Buffalo News -- Entertainment)
Black History makers laid the foundation Feb 26, 2007
The twenties saw jazz and the blues emerge as recognized art forms, each displaying a rhythmic complexity or "collective improvisation." It was a period of such timeless starts as Paul Robeson, Ethel Waters, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and Eubie Blake. Eighty years later, with the Democratic sweep of the 2006 mid-term elections, African-Americans are at the peak of their political power and point with pride to the election of two Black governors and lieutenant governors, and Congressmen who have... (Buffalo News -- Opinion)
Chester High grad's book hits all the right notes Feb 13, 2007
After signing copies of the book Saturday at a reunion of sorts at the Towne House, Lutton recalled the heyday of the city schools' bands and music programs which produced a plethora of musicians and vocalists including Al Raymond, Bill Haley omets, the Four Aces and Ethel Waters, among others too numerous to count ... On an easel were displayed numerous photos, including the 1966 Chester High School band, country/western singer Duke Snow, Bill Haley with saxophonist Rudy Pompilli, jazzman... (The Delaware County Times, PA)
Chester High School grad Chuck Lutton pens book depicting city’s rich musical history Feb 11, 2007
After signing copies of the book Saturday at a reunion of sorts at the Towne House, Lutton recalled the heyday of the city schools bands and music programs which produced a plethora of musicians and vocalists including Al Raymond, Bill Haley omets, the Four Aces and Ethel Waters, among others too numerous to count ... On an easel were displayed numerous photos, including the 1966 Chester High School band, country/western singer Duke Snow, Bill Haley with saxophonist Rudy Pompilli, jazzman Marcus... (The Delaware County Times, PA)
'Norbit' belongs in the stereotype hall of fame Feb 9, 2007
"No. But what's weird is how she's not meant to be a satire on a particular type of person. She's like just a pure living nightmare, the reason why so many men chase Paris Hilton and the Pussycat Dolls. Norbit never loved her. He married her because her no-good idiot brothers -- two bodybuilders and one slick dude -- pretty much force him to. She goes crazy when Thandie Newton shows up playing his childhood sweetheart, who's a lot thinner. The dark-skinned fatty versus the fatless hottie. It's... (Boston Globe -- Living)
Delco to kick off Black History Month Feb 1, 2007
The speakers Braun has selected are consistent with much of the rich history of Chester, which was reportedly a stop for abolitionist Harriet Tubman on the Underground Railroad, birthplace to celebrated singer and actress Ethel Waters and home to Nobel Peacelaureate, the Rev. Martin Luther King from 1948 to 1951. Nilgun Anadolu-Okur, a professor of African-American history at Temple University in Philadelphia, will present "From Slavery to Freedom: Pennsylvania s Role in the Development of the... (The Delaware County Times, PA)
Ubuntu in Motion Feb 1, 2007
Beginning at 7 p.m. on Feb. 6 and 20, prior to the film features, two extremely rare segments of Beulah, a television program from the 1950s, will be featured; one with Ethel Waters and the other with Hattie McDaniel. Display cases, set up by Jay Conrad, chairperson for the Bach to Books group, will feature local black artists paintings, original record albums, artifacts and books to draw in the community to the incredible stories and culture of an oppressed group of people. (McKinney Courier-Gazette, TX)
'Cabin' its own reward (Gary Arnold) Jan 25, 2007
Freshly garbed in angel wings, the hapless small-town gambler called Little Joe Jackson, played by Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, is accompanied heavenward by his steadfast spouse Petunia, a conjugal-melodic tower of strength in the person of Ethel Waters. Petunia's faith has redeemed husband and wife, but there's a playful hint that Joe, an incorrigible backslider on Earth, might not place complete trust in what awaits him at the summit. (Washington Times, DC)
