Dancing In The Dark by Caryl Phillips

Author:Caryl Phillips [Phillips, Caryl]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Random House UK
Published: 2010-07-21T14:00:00+00:00

At the Victoria, Williams and Walker perform “The Detective Story” from their hit in the all-black musical In Dahomey. In the humorous sketch Walker tells stories about Nick Carter and the Old Sleuth. Williams sings his well-known songs “Nobody” and “Pretty Desdamone.”

HAMMERSTEIN’S VICTORIA PLAYBILL,

NOVEMBER 1905

Having unleashed every fighting phrase at his disposal, George now glares at their promoter and tries to control his desire to spit in the face of this fool. Why can Bert not see that this man is talking down to them? And if he does see it, why can he not open his mouth and say something? After all, they are stars. Williams and Walker are no longer boys fleeing Cripple Creek, and this is not the Barbary Coast. They have headlined on Broadway and in London’s West End, and it is to Broadway that they should be returning with their new show, Abyssinia, which, like their previous success, will eschew the razors, the chickens, the loose women, and the low talk of regular coon performances. They are the most important, and the most serious, colored performers in America so who is this man to suggest that they now play at Columbus Circle? George struggles manfully to control his temper, but Bert embraces silence and his partner looks helplessly at him. Sometimes Bert behaves as though his makeup is an extra layer of skin that he cannot rub away, and George worries that perhaps both Bert’s unfortunate blackface performance and his disturbingly accommodating personality are becoming somewhat confused in his partner’s mind. George Walker shakes his head for his disposition has now soured, trapped as he is between a damn fool promoter and a foolish friend, neither of whom seem to have noticed that they have entered the twentieth century.

Since their return from England, both Bert and George have been discovering something nearly akin to a new city. Long Acre Square was now proudly styling itself Times Square, while a novel subway system from City Hall, in the south, all the way north to 145th Street was enabling New Yorkers of all stations of life to ride either above or beneath the earth. Colored citizens and performers continued to flood uptown to Harlem, and although life at Marshall’s wasn’t what it used to be, Jimmie Marshall was still committed to working out the life of his lease. The pair of them greet a visibly deflated proprietor, and then sit quietly by themselves in the far corner of the lounge. It is clear to all who look on that there is no desire on the part of either man for social small talk, and so despite their fame nobody approaches them. George speaks first. “If we have to go to court, then we go to court. I keep telling you, ain’t no way we can play at Columbus Circle, not after Broadway. It makes no damn sense.” Bert slowly fingers his cigarette. He takes a long draw, then exhales, all the while looking directly at his partner, and George waits patiently until his friend is good and ready to speak.

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