At the same time as Sidney Poitier, who imposed the figure of the black actor on Hollywood in major films (Porgy and Bess, 1959; Paris Blues, 1961; In the heat of the night and Guess who’s coming to dinner, 1967), Harry Belafonte – died on Tuesday April 25 at the age of 96 – was, in the 1950s, an emblematic figure in the defense of the civil rights of African-Americans alongside his friend Martin Luther King. He took up the torch from Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald who were, through jazz, the first ambassadors of the black cause.
A singer influenced by African and Caribbean music, he popularized the style of calypso, which became a very popular dance, and climbed all levels of the profession. An essential figure in popular music, his message of justice and peace crossed borders to spread in Europe and on the African continent.
He became famous in France thanks to his appearance, alongside Nana Mouskouri, in a setting of Greek ruins. Two great voices united for a planetary hit: “Try To Remember”. It was 1979, Harry Belafonte was 52 years old.
His Broadway debut
A native of Harlem, Harry Belafonte dreams of the stage, of the theatre, and enrolls in a course attended in particular by Marlon Brando and Tony Curtis. He was barely 20 years old, with a handsome physique and a slightly veiled voice which enabled him to perform in jazz clubs on Broadway, notably the Royal Roost where he met Miles Davis, Charlie Parker and Max Roach. We are in the early 1950s, in the golden age of musicals. He was quickly spotted and engaged in John Murray Anderson’s Almanac, which immediately earned him a Tony Award.
In 1956, Harry Belafonte released an album, Calypso, which made history with titles like “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)” and “Jump in the Line”, which would be covered much later by Tim Burton in his film Beetlejuice (1988). Very quickly, Calypso took over the Billboard chart and remained there for thirty-one weeks in a row. Velvet voice, beauty of a young first, Harry Belafonte imposes his charm, his natural elegance, his swaying style. He becomes the first black artist to sell a million copies and break down racial barriers, achieving what is known as “crossover,” bringing together white and black audiences.
Little by little, Harry Belafonte, who drew his inspiration from the Caribbean but also from American folklore, built up a repertoire with Calypso, followed by a hit, “Matilda”, popular songs (“Lead Man Holler”) and ballads like “Scarlet Ribbons”. He performed in major venues and garnered big bucks with appearances in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and New York in front of predominantly white audiences.
His success on Broadway earned him being courted by Hollywood, where he quickly became the first black actor to win alongside his friend Sidney Poitier. He made some twenty films, including Carmen Jones by Otto Preminger (1954), An Island in the Sun by Robert Rossen (1957), an interracial romance on a Caribbean island that was controversial at the time, Buck and his accomplice Sidney Poitier (1972) and, more recently, BlacKkKlansman: I Infiltrated Spike Lee’s Ku Klux Klan (2018).
Accompanying the peaceful action of Martin Luther King until his brutal death on April 4, 1968, in Memphis (Tennessee), Harry Belafonte continued the fight for civil rights alone, becoming, in 1987, goodwill ambassador to the Unicef ??and organized Nelson Mandela’s rally at Yankee Stadium on June 21, 2016. In 2013, Amnesty International presented him with the Ambassador of Conscience Award to crown his life as a committed artist. Just ten years after leaving the stage, aged 76, after a moving farewell show.
