Veteran and Award-winning Chicago-born and Los Angeles-based Theatre Artist and Excaliber Shakespeare Company of Chicago and Excaliber Shakespeare Company Los Angeles Archival Project Founder, Artistic Director, and Principal Actor Darryl Maximilian Robinson shares information and insights regarding his more than five decades of involvement in The Performing Arts.
Darryl Maximilian Robinson Provides Notes On MGM Screen Alums Lena Horne And Ricardo Montalban In A Historic Interracial Pairing In The 1957 Broadway Musical Hit "Jamaica"!
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YOUR HUMBLE SERVANT IN THE THEATRE, DARRYL MAXIMILIAN ROBINSON, IS PLEASED TO TAKE YOU TO LENA HORNE'S AND RICARDO MONTALBAN'S "JAMAICA"!
In 1957, Broadway megahit Producer David Merrick had hopes of creating a sensation in New York by starring Tony Award Winner and Smash Hit Calypso Singer Harry Belafonte ( whose second Calypso music album topped the Billboard charts and sold over a million albums ) in his new musical ( with a Caylpso music-style score by Harold Arlen, composer and Yip Harburg lyricist, and a book by Harburg and Fred Saidy ) entitled "Jamaica," and Merrick planned on featuring a predominantly African-American cast to support Belafonte.
But Harry Belafonte became ill and had to withdraw from the project.
Producer Merrick and the show's creative team ( which included Director Robert Lewis and Choreographer Jack Cole ) had to retool the show, reimagine the show and rethink the show.
Who was a big enough star that could step in and handle this score, and how much of the book and story would have to change to accommodate that performer?
"JAMAICA" was a simple love story about someone who lived on a small island off the coast of the big island of Jamaica, who longed to go to New York in America and see what life would be like with all the technology and modern appliances that were not available on that small island.
And the only thing keeping that person from leaving that island and permanently migrating to the states was that the person they cared for the most had no plans to leave the island because everything that person wanted or needed in life was right there.
ENTER LENA HORNE FOR THE FEMALE LEAD OF SAVANNAH.
Lena Horne was a realiable and bankable African-American screen star and experienced singer and nightclub performer.
She is noted for starring in several movies with other black music legends in a series of pictures in the 1940s and 1950s, and becamed adored as the pin-up girl for black military servicemen during World War ll.
Famous for campaigning for ( but not getting, due to a fixation on the glamourous Ava Gardner ) the role of the mixed-race Julie in MGM's musical "Show Boat", she had immortalized her signature hit song "Stormy Weather" on screen, on numerous television shows and on several well-received albums.
And though Calypso was not a style of music she was noted for, she was an adaptable and versatile performer willing to learn the Calypso style in order to star as Savannah in this new musical on Broadway.
"Jamaica's" composer Harold Arlen and lyricist Yip Harburg now had the star ( and a wonderful and flexible star ) who could handle the big numbers that had been written for Belafonte. That problem solved.
And now that the star vocal lead of ( THE SCORE ) is a famed female songstress and not a male, if Lena Horne's character of Savannah is the one who longs to leave the island, what male actor, which leading man is a Broadway audience going to buy as the reason her character is going to stay on this little island, never to experience the over commercialization of the U.S.A?
And folks, it better be someone who can carry a tune, turn a few steps in a dance, and is a leading man who is so handsome, so sexy, so romantic and serious enough and committed enough to his character that the audience BELIEVES LENA HORNE WILL NEVER WANT TO LEAVE THE ISLAND BECAUSE HE'S HER EVERTHING!
And The Mind Of Producer David Merrick computes that if you have a star of Lena Horne's stature on the playbill, you need a leading man who is going to make his tropical island musical work. You need another movie star, preferably a male lead of color.
ENTER RICARDO MONTALBAN FOR THE MALE LEAD OF KOLI.
Mexican-born, romantic leading man and intensely physical actor Ricardo Montalban had appeared in good roles in films as teenager in Mexico before he came to Hollywood to croon and swim beside leading lady Esther Williams in multiple, scantily-clad, MGM musicals.
He sang well. He moved well. He had a sense of humor, and could play comedy. And without saying a word, he could evoke romance.
And his undeniably powerful presence onstage and his genuine warmth as Koli, the man who wanted Lena Horne's Savannah to stay with him on the island, made the story ( THE BOOK OF "JAMAICA" BY HARBURG AND SAIDY ) completely WORK!.
And once you know you have the guns to make both the score and book of a new musical work...IT'S GAME ON!
Broadway Producer David Merrick's new musical "Jamaica" opened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for tryouts. Later, it moved to Broadway, opening at the Imperial Theatre on October 31, 1957 and closed on April 11, 1959 after 558 performances.
BY THE END OF IT'S FIRST SEASON, DAVID MERRICK'S 1957 PRODUCTION OF "JAMAICA" ( Featuring A Predominantly African-American Cast Including future world-acclaimed Choreographer ALVIN AILEY as A Principal Dancer, noted comedic character actor, playwright and 1958 Tony Nominee for Best Featured Actor In A Musical OSSIE DAVIS as Cicero, skilled, Haitian-born Calypso singer and 1958 Tony Nominee for Best Featured Actress In A Musical JOSEPHINE PREMICE as Ginger, blues and jazz singing legend ADELAIDE HALL as Grandma Obeah, talented young latino actor AUGUSTINE "AUGIE" RIOS as Savannah's Little Brother, seasoned actor ERICK RHODES as The Island's Governor and effective dramatic actor JOE ADAMS as businessman Joe Nashua ) HAD RECEIVED SEVEN 1958 TONY AWARD NOMINATIONS INCLUDING BEST LEADING ACTRESS IN A MUSICAL FOR LENA HORNE AND BEST LEADING ACTOR IN A MUSICAL FOR RICARDO MONTALBAN...AND BEST MUSICAL ON BROADWAY!
Screen stars LENA HORNE and RICARDO MONTALBAN were both a hit playing an interracial couple in a musical ON BROADWAY!
But they were both a hit during a highly controversial time in American Culture.
Remember, during the late 1950s the idea of an interracial romance was still considered TABOO for some audience members. Even though there were no references to race in the show's book. Even though the whole story of the musical was about FUN, ENJOYING THE BEST OF LIFE AND LOVE.
But around the country, around the city of New York, even just outside The Imperial Theatre on Broadway...A CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT WAS IN MOTION.
And, perhaps, just perhaps...RICARDO MONTALBAN'S CHARACTER OF KOLI WAS RIGHT IN NOT WANTING LENA HORNE'S CHARACTER OF SAVANNAH TO GO FROM THEIR ISLAND TO AMERICA.
There is NO HATE ON THEIR ISLAND IN "JAMAICA".
Here are some photos of the 1957 production of Lena Horne and Ricardo Montalban in Harold Arlen's, Yip Harburg's and Fred Saidy's "Jamaica".
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