HOME
*





Tom Southern
Tom Southern, also known as Tommy or Thomas Southern, was an actor in American film and stage productions as well as a songwriter. He was a theater actor with the Lafayette Players. In 1933, he wrote several songs together with Lionel Hampton. For a few years before 1937, Southern was absent from acting in films and theater; the ''Pittsburgh Courier'' stated he "gave up acting as a career" around 1936 and became a journalist. In 1938, he was the managing magazine editor, editor for the launch of the magazine ''Silhouette Pictorial''. Southern acted in a supporting role in the Western film, ''Two-Gun Man from Harlem''. He acted in the "all-colored cast" film ''Mystery in Swing''. In a review, the ''Pittsburgh Courier'' said he gave the best individual performance by a male. War Perkins of the ''Chicago Defender'' newspaper listed Southern and three others as giving the best performances in the film. Around 1940, Southern partnered with drummer Lionel Hampton on a musical film proj ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Lafayette Players
A number of theatre companies are associated with the Harlem Renaissance. Lafayette Players (1916–1932) Anita Bush, a pioneer in African American theater, began an acting company after seeing a show at the Lincoln Theater in Harlem. She wanted an all-Black group that performed Broadway plays, to combat the popular "racial stereotypes of African Americans as singers, dancers, and slapstick comedians."http://content.ebscohost.com/pdf9/pdf/2008/6LP/01Sep08/35545793.pdf?T=P&P=AN&K=35545793&S=R&D=f3h&EbscoContent=dGJyMNLe80SeqLU4zdnyOLCmr0meprVSrqy4SbSWxWXS&ContentCustomer=dGJyMPGut0yyrq5LuePfgeyx44Dt6fIA According to Bush, she wanted to prove that Blacks can do the same thing as whites. They were called the Bush Players. After performing at the Lincoln Theater for two years, the owner, Marie Downs, wanted to change their name to the Lincoln Players. Anita refused and took her company to the rival theater, The Lafayette Theatre. In 1916, due to financial difficulties, Bush sold ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Phonograph Record
A phonograph record (also known as a gramophone record, especially in British English), or simply a record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts near the periphery and ends near the center of the disc. At first, the discs were commonly made from shellac, with earlier records having a fine abrasive filler mixed in. Starting in the 1940s polyvinyl chloride became common, hence the name vinyl. The phonograph record was the primary medium used for music reproduction throughout the 20th century. It had co-existed with the phonograph cylinder from the late 1880s and had effectively superseded it by around 1912. Records retained the largest market share even when new formats such as the compact cassette were mass-marketed. By the 1980s, digital media, in the form of the compact disc, had gained a larger market share, and the record left the mainstream in 1991. Since the 1990s, records co ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Year Of Birth Missing (living People)
A year or annus is the orbital period of a planetary body, for example, the Earth, moving in its orbit around the Sun. Due to the Earth's axial tilt, the course of a year sees the passing of the seasons, marked by change in weather, the hours of daylight, and, consequently, vegetation and soil fertility. In temperate and subpolar regions around the planet, four seasons are generally recognized: spring, summer, autumn and winter. In tropical and subtropical regions, several geographical sectors do not present defined seasons; but in the seasonal tropics, the annual wet and dry seasons are recognized and tracked. A calendar year is an approximation of the number of days of the Earth's orbital period, as counted in a given calendar. The Gregorian calendar, or modern calendar, presents its calendar year to be either a common year of 365 days or a leap year of 366 days, as do the Julian calendars. For the Gregorian calendar, the average length of the calendar year (the ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Harlem Renaissance
The Harlem Renaissance was an intellectual and cultural revival of African American music, dance, art, fashion, literature, theater, politics and scholarship centered in Harlem, Manhattan, New York City, spanning the 1920s and 1930s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after ''The New Negro'', a 1925 anthology edited by Alain Locke. The movement also included the new African American cultural expressions across the urban areas in the Northeast and Midwest United States affected by a renewed militancy in the general struggle for civil rights, combined with the Great Migration of African American workers fleeing the racist conditions of the Jim Crow Deep South, as Harlem was the final destination of the largest number of those who migrated north. Though it was centered in the Harlem neighborhood, many francophone black writers from African and Caribbean colonies who lived in Paris were also influenced by the movement, which spanned from about 1918 until ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

African-American Actors
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of enslaved Africans who are from the United States. While some Black immigrants or their children may also come to identify as African-American, the majority of first generation immigrants do not, preferring to identify with their nation of origin. African Americans constitute the second largest racial group in the U.S. after White Americans, as well as the third largest ethnic group after Hispanic and Latino Americans. Most African Americans are descendants of enslaved people within the boundaries of the present United States. On average, African Americans are of West/ Central African with some European descent; some also have Native American and other ancestry. According to U.S. Census Bureau data, African immigrants generally do not self ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


American Actors
American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, people who self-identify their ancestry as "American" ** American English, the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States ** Native Americans in the United States, indigenous peoples of the United States * American, something of, from, or related to the Americas, also known as "America" ** Indigenous peoples of the Americas * American (word), for analysis and history of the meanings in various contexts Organizations * American Airlines, U.S.-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas * American Athletic Conference, an American college athletic conference * American Recordings (record label), a record label previously known as Def American * American University, in Washington, D.C. Sports teams Soccer * Ba ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Look-Out Sister
''Look-Out Sister'' is a 1949 film featuring Louis Jordan. Directed by Bud Pollard, it is a satirical, Western-themed musical and "horse opera". The film was produced by Astor Pictures. John E. Gordon wrote the story. The film remains in existence and is available online. Jordan performs numerous songs in the film. The plot features Louis Jordan as a burnt out musician who heads to a sanitorium to recover and the dreams of going out west to a dude ranch. A poster for the film advertises it as including 11 great song hits and features the tagline "when he's not singin' he's shootin, when he's not shootin" he's lovin'. Louise Franklin plays a featured role in the film. The film was directed by Bud Pollard and Louis Jordan. Excerpts from this film and his others, Beware (1946) and Reet, Petite and Gone (1947), as well as soundies were released as ''Louis Jordan: films and soundies The Jazz Society of Chicago and Chicago Film Society scheduled a showing of the film in 2019 calling i ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Harlem Rides The Range
''Harlem Rides the Range'' is a 1939 American Western race film directed by Richard C. Kahn. It followed the groundbreaking 1937 Western musical film '' Harlem on the Prairie''. Plot Bob Blake (Herb Jeffries) and his sidekick Dusty ( Lucius Brooks) are two cowboys riding across the countryside in search of adventure. They come across a ranch where it appears a murder has taken place but they find the victim of the crime, Jim Dennison (Leonard Christmas), still alive. Dennison is hiding in fear of his life after what had taken place at the ranch. Bob sees a picture of the rancher's daughter Margaret (Artie Young) and falls in love at first sight; he cannot stop talking about how beautiful the girl in the picture is. Bob drops a glove when he leaves the ranch, which causes problems later. The villain, Bradley (Clarence Brooks), wants to seize the ranch after terrorizing Dennison. Bob sets out to save Margaret and narrowly escapes a plot to frame him for the murder of one of the ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Double Deal (1939 Film)
''Double Deal'' is a 1939 American drama with an all-black cast (a genre at the time called "race films"), written by Arthur Hoerl, produced by George Randol, directed by Arthur Dreifuss and released on the independent states-rights market by Sack Amusement Enterprises and Astor Pictures Corp. Plot summary Two men, Tommy McCoy and Dude Markey, are in love with Nita, a beautiful nightclub singer/dancer. Markey robs a jewelry store and gives the haul to a local gangster. Later, he steals the jewelry from the gangster's safe and frames McCoy for the robbery in the hope that the gangster will kill him, thereby getting rid of his rival for the lovely Nita. Cast *Monte Hawley as Jim McCoy *Jeni Le Gon as Nita * Edward Thompson as Dude Markey *Florence O'Brien as Sally *Freddie Jackson as Tommy McCoy * Buck Woods *Maceo Bruce Sheffield as Murray Howard *Charles Hawkins *Jack Clisby *Tom Southern *Vernon McCalla *Charles Gordon as Lanny *Arthur Ray * F.E. Miller as Nightclub Comedian * ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Spirit Of Youth
''Spirit of Youth'' is a 1938 boxing film directed by Harry L. Fraser and starring then-heavyweight world champion Joe Louis in a story with similarities to his own real life. (According to IMDb, the Spanish title is ''La vida de Joe Louis'', which translates to ''The Life of Joe Louis''.) Plot A rising boxer is led astray by a woman. Cast * Joe Louis as Joe Thomas * Clarence Muse as Frankie Walburn * Edna Mae Harris as Mary Bowdin * Mae Turner as Flora Bailey * Cleo Desmond as Nora Thomas * Mantan Moreland as Creighton "Crickie" Fitzgibbons * Jewel Smith as Duke Emerald * Tom Southern as Dr. Bowdin * Jess Lee Brooks Jess Lee Brooks (June 10, 1894 – December 13, 1944), also known as Jesse Brooks, was an American actor. He is perhaps most famous for playing the African-American church preacher in the critically acclaimed motion picture ''Sullivan's Travels'', ... as Jeff Thomas (as Jesse Lee Brooks) * Marguerite Whitten as Eleanor Thomas (as Margaret Whitten) * Claren ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Bargain With Bullets
''Bargain with Bullets'' is a 1937 American film. The first film produced by Million Dollar Productions Million Dollar Productions was a movie studio in the United States active from 1937 until 1940. It was established to produce films with African American casts. It was a partnership between Harry M. Popkin, Leo C. Popkin and Ralph Cooper. Histo ..., it features an African American cast of actors and performers. The gangster film is about the Harlem underworld. It was described as the first Hollywood "all-Negro" film. The film features several musical performances. Toddy Pictures Company acquired Million Dollar Productions and re-released the film as ''Gangsters on the Loose''. The gangster themed film drew scrutiny from film censorship boards in the U.S. requiring extensive editing of the film. Cast * Ralph Cooper as Mugsy "Killer" Moore * Theresa Harris * Frances Turham * Lawrence Criner * Clarence Brooks See also *'' Dark Manhattan'' References External links * ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Helen Forrest
Helen Forrest (born Helen Fogel, April 12, 1917 – July 11, 1999) was an American singer of traditional pop and swing music. She served as the "girl singer" for three of the most popular big bands of the Swing Era (Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman, and Harry James), thereby earning a reputation as "the voice of the name bands." Childhood Forrest was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey on April 12, 1917. Her parents, Louis and Rebecca Fogel, were Jewish. Her father died from influenza when Helen was an infant so she was raised by her mother, who often blamed her husband's death on Helen's birth. She believed God had taken her husband because she had wished so much for a baby girl. Helen had three older brothers: Harry, Ed, and Sam. In Helen's early teen years, the family relocated to Brooklyn. Her mother married a house painter, whom Helen disliked. Soon, Helen's mother and stepfather turned the family's home into a brothel. At 14, Helen was nearly raped by her stepfather; she defen ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]