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#3426: Katherine Dunham : comments from Ray Carrier
From: Ray Carrier <raycadien@hotmail.com>
Katherine Dunham was a trail-blazing pioneer who, perhaps more than anyone
else was responsible for opening up Broadway, Hollywood and Las Vegas to
black entertainers. When she first began performing in New York in the late
30s, there had been practically no serious roles for black performers in the
major centers for the performing arts in the USA other than in demeaning
roles (I think the only exception had been Porgy and Bess a couple of years
earlier.) She became not only the director of the largest dance troupe in
the world, but was also the lead dancer and choreographer for her
performances, and later several members of her troupe, such as Talley
Beatty, went on to become famous as dancers and choreographers in their own
right. (I have a copy somewhere of a resume which a student wrote up for
her some time ago, talk about impressive! Its possible to find videos of
some of the classic movies she performed in, such as Stormy Weather, in
major outlets like Blockbuster.)
Unfortunately, she is less well known than she should be - virtually no one
in the younger generation of musicians today, for example, for whom making a
video featuring choreographic performances is standard procedure - is aware
that she was really one of the first artists to create and design such dance
acts. This is mainly because when she was at her peak, in the 40s, 50s and
60s, the USA was still segregated and her troupe was unable to tour in most
parts of the country, particularly the Deep South, without considerable
difficulty (it was impossible to find suitable hotel accommodation for her
large troupe of 30 to 40 members.) Once when they performed in Tennessee to
a standing room audience, the seating arrangement was such that only whites
were sitting in the front of the audience, while blacks had to be satisfied
with watching the show from far in the back of the hall. After it was over,
to a standing ovation, Ms. Dunham came out to address the crowd, and she
told them that she could tell that everyone had greatly enjoyed her show,
but that she would never return there again until she knew that the
situation was changed so that the seating arrangement would be totally
integrated. As a result of these problems, she took the troupe on the road
internationally, performing in 57 countries over 25 years, where she was
always widely acclaimed, while in her own country very few people had the
opportunity to see live acts of her performances. Another time in Brazil,
hotel reservations had been made in advance, but the management tried to
change their mind when they found out that the performers were all black.
They quickly retracted their objections when Ms. Dunham threatened to throw
herself out of a window and create an international scandal. After this
incident the Brazilian government passed a law banning racial segregation in
hotels.
I consider having had the fortunate opportunity of meeting and getting to
know Katherine Dunham as one of the highlights of my life. Actually this
came about almost my accident more than 5 years ago, and before then, like
most persons of my generation or younger I had never even heard about this
formidable lady. A couple of years earlier, when I was a working as a Human
Rights Observer with the OAS, I had struck up a friendship with a fellow
Canadian, Cameron Brohman, who for almost 5 years, including the most
repressive period after the military coup of 1991, was the caretaker of her
home in Haiti, and it was through him that I got to meet her.
Ms. Dunham was born in Chicago in 1909; her father was a black
businessman, while her mother was a white Canadian (whose mother was a
Native American). She had one older brother named Albert (who she
considered to be the smart one in the family.) He was for several years a
professor of philosophy at Howard University and was a promising protege of
one of the top philosophers in the world at the time (I believe it was
Alfred Whitehead) until he died prematurely during the 1950s. Her husband,
John Pratt was a Canadian who had been the set and costume designer for
their shows.
She first came to Haiti as an cultural anthropologist in 1935 on a
fellowship grant to study local dance. In order to better understand and
learn from first hand experience, and to gain the confidence and friendship
of her subjects, this young black American woman did not hesitate to
socialize with people in all sectors of society, including the urban poor
and peasants, at a time when the local hierarchical society was even more
strictly separated than it is today, which did not endear her to the
snobbish elite. She participated in numerous Voodoo ceremonies and before
she completed her project underwent the initiation process, which she later
wrote about in Island Possessed. Among the many close friendships she
cultivated at the time was a young politician named Dumarsais Estime, who a
dozen years later became President of Haiti.
Later after she had become an international celebrity, she regularly
returned to Haiti for extended stays, frequently bringing the members of her
dance troupe along with her to recuperate between their many extended tours
and take the time to develop new routines for future performances. She
retained her interest in Voodoo and was initiated on numerous occasions to
become a mambo. On one of her earlier visits she was accompanied by her
former personal press promoter, Maya Deren, who also got interested in
Voodoo, later writing The Divine Horsemen and also making some movies about
her trance experiences. She later became a celebrity in her own right and
is now considered the mother of independent film makers.
Ms. Dunham took the opportunity during these visits to purchase various
properties throughout the country (she still has several in prime locations,
such as high above the city of Port-au-Prince at Bouthieres and above
Carrenage in Cap Haitien which she would like to sell). On one of these
properties, in the heart of Carrefours in the western suburb of the capital,
she commissioned Albert Mangonese, the Haitian architect who directed the
renovation of La Citadelle fortress near Cap Haitien and who has been called
the Frank Lloyd Wright of the Caribbean, to construct her Residence, which
turned out to be one of the most lovely homes in the country. Often when
she was living there during the 60s and 70s, many tourists would come to
witness sensational Voodoo ceremonies at the large beautifully decorated
peristyle located right behind her house.
She also owns the large wooded property across the road from this which in
the mid-70s she leased to a French entrepreneur named Coquelin. This land
was rumored to have been the location of the house belonging to General
Leclerc and his wife Pauline Bonaparte during the time of the French colony.
A large modern hotel was constructed there which included 44 villas, 11
swimming pools, a gourmet restaurant, discotheque and casino, and it was
named Habitation Leclerc. During its heyday, it was advertised as a
hide-out for the rich and famous and catered almost exclusively to the
international jetset society, including European nobility and famous rock
stars such as Mick Jagger. When it operated during the late 70s and early
80s, 2 of its villas were priced at $1500 a night, and the minimum rate was
$350 a night, extremely expensive for those days, and it was rated as one of
the top 10 hotels in the world. Unfortunately after the AIDS scare killed
tourism in Haiti in the early 80s, it was forced into bankruptcy and looters
rampaged through the place, ripping out and stealing anything worth
salvaging.
Today Ms. Dunham would like to convert this property, which contains one of
the few remaining rain forests in the region, into what could be the model
Botanical Garden of the Caribbean and renovate the buildings which were
formerly villas to house a Cultural Center for the Arts. Several years ago
a team of botanists from the University of Puerto Rico conducted a study of
cataloging its incredibly diverse plant life (for years it was spared from
robbers cutting the trees for firewood because the stream running through it
was considered sacred to Voodoo worshiper) and concluded that it was ideally
suited for this purpose. Later the Kew Gardens in London sent a couple of
young botanists to continue this work, and contacts were established with
the Fairchild Gardens in Miami and the New York Botanical Gardens who
expressed an interest in participating in this project. Former President
Aristide was also highly supportive, but regretted that his government was
unable to provide any funding for assistance. However due to the inability
to raise any funds to move it forward, the project remains unfortunately
dormant, and a large group of squatters have moved in to occupy the ruins of
the former villas and will soon ruin the property unless action is taken
soon. (Ms. Dunham is aware that I am most interested in helping her find a
way to get this project off the ground, and we would greatly appreciate any
assistance in the form of advice on how to write up a proposal for funding,
which specific foundations to contact, etc. Anyone interested in getting
involved with this project should contact me. Although I will be absent
from home for the next few weeks, I usually live in Washington DC.)
The first time I met Ms. Dunham was in early 1995, when after a long
absence, she returned to Haiti at the personal invitation of President
Aristide. He wanted to formally thank her at the Palace on behalf of his
government for the assistance she had provided by her 1992 hunger strike (47
days when she was 83 years old!) in giving greater international recognition
to the plight of the boat-people and the discriminatory policies of the Bush
administration during the time following the military coup. She returned
again a year later when he presented her with the highest medal of honor the
Haitian government can award to a foreigner, and while there she was also a
guest of honor, along with Celia Cruz and another famous older Cuban female
singer, at a major gala ceremony held in Petionville.
Last year, after being urged by several old friends, including Harry
Belafonte and his wife Julie (who used to dance with her), Ms. Dunham moved
back to live in New York City. When I visited her a few weeks ago, I saw
that she is still strong and vigorous for someone of her age, and she spends
part of her time working on writing her autobiography. Movie director
Jonathan Demme, of the Oscar-winning movies Silence of the Lambs and
Philadelphia, and Debbie Allen, choreographer of the Broadway musical Fame
and producer of the recent movie about the slave ship Amnistead, have
indicated an interest in making a movie soon about her life story.
On June 22 Ms. Dunham will be 91 years old but for her advanced age she is
still going strong and continues to keep busy. Just after this celebration
she will as usual be a lecturer at the 2-week seminar for Dance Masters
which she has regularly sponsored in St. Louis for the past 30 years, whose
participants come from all around the world. Then later on in the middle of
the summer she will be the guest of honor at a major week-long dance seminar
instructing her dance techniques to young dancers which will take place at
the City Center of New York, where dancers from mainly the New York/New
Jersey region will participate (the center can hold approximately 2,000
participants).
Ray Carrier
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