Bert Williams and George Walker, the vaudeville team “Williams & Walker”
Bert Williams and George Walker, the vaudeville team “Williams & Walker” circa 1900s. I am proud to include these gentlemen in my next book, Vintage Black Glamour: Gentlemen’s Quarters which will be released in April 2016 (you can preorder at VBGmen.com) Williams & Walker billed themselves as “The Two Real Coons,” in order to stand out in the crowd of white entertainers performing in blackface. Only Williams, who was light-skinned, wore actual blackface while the dark-skinned Walker wore no makeup. The men conspired to add nuance and dignity to their performances by purposely having Walker play the suave “dandy” - the straightman to Williams’ comic character in blackface. A savvy businessman, Walker negotiated their contracts (Williams said, “Walker used to insist on having things decided his way - our way. In a business deal where the other party decided against us, I was usually willing to consider it settled rather than argue. Not so with Walker.”) Born in Antigua, Williams called their 1903 command performance in “In Dahomey” before King Edward VII “the proudest moment of my life” - but was offended by reporters who would attribute his talent to his non-black ancestry, often asking him directly “if all great negroes did not have white blood in their veins.” His response to one such inquiry: “White blood make a black man any smarter! I guess not! Why, what kind of white blood do we get! The very worse and lowest and meanest there is. And when a man with some of this in his veins becomes famous do you say the bad white blood did it - the blood of a race of … scalawags - or do you say black blood did it in spite of the corpuscles from some poor white trash.” Such an outburst was unusual for him but Walker was not shy about talking race to the media. As they grew in popularity and played bigger venues for white audiences, Walker made several statements to assure black audiences that they were not forgotten. “[W]e want our folks to like us. Not for the sake of the box office, but because over and behind all the money and prestige which move Williams and Walker, is a love for the race. Because we feel that, in a degree, we represent the race and every hair’s breadth of achievement we make is to its credit. For first, last, and all the time, we are Negroes.” Photo: Schomburg Center. -- source link
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