"LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL" (Louis Jordan, 1939)
Louis Jordan (1908-75) is one of the most important figures in Black music in the Post WW2 era with his stripped down and jumped up version of Swing being cited as one of the central building blocks of Rhythm & Blues, Rock & Roll and Jamaican Ska but what is less well known is that he was also briefly the biggest, if most unlikely stars of 1940's Black Cinema.
THE KING OF THE JUKEBOX;
Born in Arkansas, Jordan's father James was a sax and clarinet player with the Rabbit Foot Minstrels, a popular travelling revue that toured through the South in the 1900's. Minstrelsy was a genre of musical comedy that had its roots in the Antebellum South originally starting with black performers doing musical and comedy skits gently mocking the high class dances and exaggerated and dress manners of the fancy dress cotillions of the white plantation class. Soon white audiences, most not entirely in on the jokes, found these shows entertaining and travelling shows soon toured the entire country and would lead to white minstrel groups imitating the black groups and performing in blackface. These blackface troops were so wildly popular that in the weird inverted logic of a deeply racist society many black performers themselves had to "cork up" and perform in blackface (or sometimes whiteface) including stars like Bert Williams and Wilbur Sweatmen and young not-yet stars like Scott Joplin, WC Handy and Gus Cannon who all later reported that they had started out performing in blackface. Minstrelsy was by far the most popular form of entertainment for more than a generation from the Antebellum Era until the 1880's when it was finally replaced by Vaudeville although obvious traces of it would continue into the post WW2 era in figures like Amos & Andy and even in the white Hayseed comedy of the Grand Ole Opry and later carried on into the 1970's with the TV show "Hee Haw".
By the time Louis was in his late teens and old enough to leave home and join the Rabbit Foot Minstrels in the 1920's the audience for such revues was mostly in black communities in the South where a troupe would set up outside town in a large tent and stay for several days giving multiple performances, thus coining the term "tent-shows". Given the audiences were now entirely black the more degrading blackface elements were omitted in favour of risque comedy and dance numbers and the bands included the new sounds of Ragtime and Jazz. The Rabbit Foot Minstrels were one of the most popular of these troops and at various times included such stars as Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, Ida Cox, Half Pint Jaxon, Big Joe Williams and a young Rufus Thomas. While playing with the Minstrels Louis would learn the basics of what would be his later crowd pleasing style. Instead of the clarinet, and instrument associated with the now old timey New Orleans jazz bands, he would focus on the sax, a louder, sexier and more danceable instrumental. But it was enough not to be a good sax player, if one wanted to stand out he also had to be an all-around entertainer singing, telling jokes, clowning around, telling stories, pulling faces, doing a few dance steps, anything to win the audience over, Louis would do it. He would carry this crowd pleasing attitude on through his career even after he left the largely rural audiences of the tentshows in favour of the bright neon lights of the big city Jazz clubs.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "YOU GOTTA HAVE A BEAT";
By the 1930's Louis Jordan himself had left the troupe and made his way to New York where he was a good enough sax player to find work with the Jazz pianist Clarence Williams (who had also recorded Bessie Smith), eccentric Jazz violinist Stuff Smith and in the Big Band of Chick Webb (which included Ella Fitzgerald). With Stuff Smith and Chick Webb Jordan would show he could not only play but sing up-tempo numbers and provide comic relief and by the late thirties he was a big enough name to start his own band and get a residency at a club in Harlem before heading to Los Angeles. He would puckishly name his band Louis Jordan and His Tympany Five (or Six) in spite of the fact that his bands could have anywhere from five to nine members none of whom actually played the tympany drum. Heavily influenced by the Zoot Suited scat singing shows of Cab Calloway (then the house band at the legendary Cotton Club) Louis would work out his own stripped down version featuring his blaring sax playing fast paced big beat dance numbers that he would punctuate with his jive talking lyrics and good time endless party persona. Once he started recording with Decca he was an immediate success and would rack up a stunning fifty four hits on the "Race Music" (ie Black) top ten charts with eighteen number ones making him one of the biggest sellers of all time and earning him the title of "Jukebox King". Besides recording for Decca Records during WW2 he would record for the V-Disc label run by the US Armed Forces Network thus getting around wartime shortages of shellac as well as reaching a potential audiences.
Jordan's hits included such classics as "Caldonia", "Choo-Choo-Cha-Boogie", "Saturday Night Fishfry", "Five Guys Named Moe", "Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens", "Is You Is Or Is You Ain't My Baby", "Reet Petite & Gone", "I'm Gonna Move On Out To The Outskirts Of Town" and "Let The Good Times Roll" and would almost single handedly kick-off the switch from the Big Bands of the War years to the Post War Rhythm & Blues scene that would lead directly to the early Rock & Roll bands and gained him the title of Father Of Rhythm & Blues. His many records struck a constant theme in his insistence that life was an endless party and were the opposite of the smooth ballads of the other major hitmaker of the forties Nat King Cole (who would still cover one of Jordan's songs) as was his persona of a happy-go-lucky Zoot Suited scamp. He would be cited as a major influence on the first wave of Rock & Roll and R&B stars Bill Haley, Lloyd Price, Smiley Lewis, Freddie Bell & the Bellboys, Rufus Thomas, Roy Brown, Wynonie Harris, Screamin Jay Hawkins, Chuck Willis, Chuck Berry (who later said that if he had to play in anybody else's band it would be for Jordan) and Jackie Wilson who would take Jordan's "Reet Petite & Gone" into his own classic "Reet Petite''. The term "Rhythm & Blues" became commonly used to describe his records as being clearly more song oriented and energetic than the Big Bands but also more Jazzy and danceable than the guitar based Blues records or the piano based Boogie Woogie records. Besides his influence on the next generation of R&B and Rock & Roll singers his influence would make its way (partly through the V-Discs carried by black sailors) to the Caribbean where it would show up in the bouncy, sax driven Jamaican Ska.
Given the success of Jordan's records it was probably inevitable that he would be tapped to appear in films. Several white singers had already been made into screen stars including Bing Crosby and Gene Autry and there was also a mini genre of short musical "Soundies" which could be played as opening teasers on bills with other films as well as in Soundie Machines which were video versions of jukeboxes that were installed in Juke Joints and other Bars just as jukeboxes were. Soundies had already been made almost as soon as talkies came in by black artists like Bessie Smith (providing the only actual footage of her), Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie and Cab Calloway. These shorts usually featured a short intro to set up a musical number and Jordan's Soundie would feature one of his biggest hits "Caldonia".
"CALDONIA" (1945);
This short film had just the basics with Jordan and his band playing a song in a hotel room and that's it (Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway had done similar shorts) but showed Jordan's basic happy-go-lucky persona as he flashes his smile and mugs for the camera but while he may have been clowning he was no mere clown as he was also wearing an expensive suit while surrounded by a gaggle of admiring girls and the blaring power of his alto sax along with a nice muted horn solo is undeniable. As this was a short that could be easily added to any bill it would have also been seen by both black and white audiences aside from the black audiences who would normally see the series of all-black films made for the black theatres in the 1930's and forties.
From the 1920's to the 1950's era of Jim Crow era segregation there existed a network of movie theatres in black communities just as there was an older network of black vaudeville and music halls known as the Chitlin Circuit that featured black music, dance and comedy acts. These theatres meant that there was an audience for all-black movies as well so by the 1930's there were made a series of films with all-black casts, usually made by black directors to fill this niche. These films were rarely seen by white audiences, did not make it to TV and have been largely forgotten.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "JACK YOU DEAD";
During the Vaudeville Era a network of black owned theatres sprang up across the both the Northern and Eastern cities as well as the segregated South to cater specifically to black audiences which was referred to as the Chitlin Circuit which helped to further nourish a star system of black music, dance and comedy acts and eventually this would lead to a similar network of black owned movie houses. Besides the black owned theatres many white owned theatres in black neighbourhoods would sometimes run these films at special times especially at midnight showings that were known as "Midnight Rambles". These theatres meant that there was an audience for all-black movies as well so by the 1930's there were made a series of films with all-black casts, usually made by black directors to fill this niche. These films were rarely seen by white audiences, did not make it to TV and have been largely forgotten until relatively recently when they've been picked up by the BET network and released on limited home video.
In the silent era director Oscar Michaud (who I already wrote about here) started things off with his response to DW Griffith's "Birth Of A Nation" and continued to make films into the sound era. His films were serious minded and intended to offer messages of moral and racial uplift, sometimes with a religious subtext although he did make a few genre pictures. Others would make films of a decidedly less serious nature, especially actor/writer/producer Spencer Williams who made a number of low budget comedies as well as the "Son Of Ingagi" horror film (which I wrote about here). Equally low-budget musicals (including some starring Cab Calloway), musical revues and Film Noir crime films were also made but the most popular, and oddest films, were a series of westerns made in the late thirties and early forties starring singer Herb Jeffries (who I wrote about here). Setting aside Michaux's more ambitious films most of these films were low budget B-movies of mediocre quality but they do have some cultural value.
The number of films made by black filmmakers would increase along with movies made by white owned Poverty Row studios once they realized there was a sizable audience for films that could be made cheaply. These Poverty Row films often had white directors and producers but maintained all black casts. Collectively these films were given the name "Race Films" regardless of genre just as the recording industry had been referring to the profitable series of Jazz, Blues and Spiritual records as "Race Records".
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "LONG LEGGED LIZZIE";
These films exist in an alternative universe in which there are no white characters at all with every character being black regardless of their social status. Not only the usual servants, musicians, laborers, farmers, hustlers, gamblers, pool sharks, dancing girls, bellhops, and other lower class characters who might show up in a regular Hollywood production but establishment figures like doctors, lawyers, professors, bankers, businessmen, cops and judges were all black as well. White society was seldom even mentioned at all. This means that the villians in such movies including greedy bankers and landlords, corrupt cops and snooty wealthy toffs were all black as well. No doubt the black audiences for these films would have been perfectly happy to have the villians in these films be white but such a film would never have been shown in the South where a good portion of the theatres were.
The most popular Race Films were probably the Musicals and Musical Revues (the latter being straight forward music and comedy concerts) which could use already established musical stars with proven box office appeal. chief among them being Cab Calloway and Louis Jordan. Plot-wise these films were simple in the extreme consisting of the slightest storylines as an excuse to string together a bunch of musical numbers. The first of Jordan's musicals typifies this genre.
"BEWARE" (1946);
Directed by Bud Pollard
Cast;
LOUIS JORDAN ~ Lucious Jordan
FRANK WILSON ~ Prof Dury
EMORY RICHARDSON ~ Dean Hargreaves
VALERIE BLACK ~ Annabelle Brown
MILTON WOODS ~ Benjamin Ware
DIMPLES DANIELS ~ Long Legged Lizzie
WILD BILL DAVIS ~ Pianist
EDDIE BYRD ~ Drummer
PLOT (spoiler alert); Jordan plays a sax playing bandleader who just happens to be named Louis Jordan (formerly Lucious) who is a former student of a Ware College, a fictional privately owned black college in small town Ohio. Ware College is apparently small and resembles more like a highschool and it's also strapped for cash as its owner has died and his grandson, Benjamin Ware III (Milton Woods) who has inherited it is threatening to sell. The Dean (Emory Richardson) and Professor (Frank Wilson) plan to deal with this by inviting the school's various illumni to return to help raise funds, including Jarvis, who happens to be on tour, drops by anyway and is told of the school's problems. It turns out that Jarvis originally left the school and town under an unexplained cloud and was once in love with Annabelle (Valerie Black) another former student and current teacher who Benjamin Ware has designs on so he agrees to stay and help the school by playing a gig. His band agrees to stay as well. While he's waiting Jordan also puts in a call to his accountant to go through the school's books. At the big dance Ware shows up and offers to relent on foreclosing on the school if Annabelle agrees to marry him but she refuses. Jordan then arrives and Ware threatens to have Jordan arrested and run out of town again but Jordan reveals that his accountant has discovered that Ware has been cooking the books and the school doesn't need to be closed. Jordan punches out Ware and threatens to have Ware arrested instead. Ware backs down and announces the school will be staying open. Jordan and the students celebrate by playing the show while Ware slinks out. Jordan and Annabelle will live happily ever after. Finis.
There's not much to be said about this movie as a film. The plot is perfunctory even by the standards of B-movie musicals of the era. The acting (setting aside Jordan for the moment) is blandly competent as is the direction. There are only five different sets in total, all of them simple indoor sets, and the camera work is similarly by-the-numbers. But of course what sells the movie is the presence of Louis Jordan and his music and there is plenty of both. Jordan's music is full of innocent joy and charm and sometimes silliness (as with "Don't Worry Bout That Mule" which comes out of nowhere) with equal parts catchiness and danceability. Jordan's infectious sense of fun is nicely shown in the outro of one number as Jordan leads the students out of the classroom doing the stroll. Accordingly the ratio of music-to-plot is accordingly higher than in most musicals. Note that while Jordan's trademark was bouncy Jump Blues and rambling comedy numbers he did do the occasional smooth ballad and he gets a couple here.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "GOOD MORNING HEARTACHE";
Jordan is of course no actor but he does have a natural charm while playing the same persona that he had already developed on stage for over a decade and is perfectly at home on screen. The movie all but acknowledges this by not even giving his character a name and instead just calling him Louis Jordan and getting on with the story. Gene Autry films often did the same thing. As for the rest of the cast, many were veterans of the legitimate black stage and screen. Emory Richardson (1894-1965) had a few screen credits while Frank Wilson (1885-1956) had an even longer career in both the Black cinema and in Hollywood including in "The Emperor Jones" (1933) with Paul Robeson. Milton Woods (1917-1966), who plays the slimey Benjamin Ware III, was known as "The Black Basil Rathbone" although he spent much of his career outside of the Black Theatre and Cinema was spent in minor and sometimes demeaning roles in jungle B-Movies and TV shows like "Tarzan', "Ramar Of The Jungle", "Sheena; Queen Of The Jungle", "Superman" and "Amos & Andy". As for Jordan's band, two members went on to notable careers on their own. Drummer Eddie Byrd would lead his own band while pianist Wild Bill Davis (1918-1995) would become an influential figure on the Jazz organ playing with the likes of Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Eddie Cleanhead Vinson, Ella Fitzgerald, Arnett Cobb, Johnny Hodges, Illinois Jaquet, Eddie Lockjaw Davis, Ray Brown, Sonny Stitt and Slam Stewart as well as solo.
"REET PETITE & GONE" (1947);
Directed by
LOUIS JORDAN ~ Louis Jarvis/Schyler Jarvis (as a young man)
BEA GRIFFITH ~ Honey Carter/Lovey Linn
MILTON WOODS ~ Sam Adams (Louis' Manager/Friend)
JUNE RICHMOND ~ June
LORENZO TUCKER ~ Henry Talbot (Schyler's Lawyer)
VANITA SMYTHE ~ Rusty
DAVID BETHEA ~ Dolph the Butler
PAT RAINEY ~ Pat Rains (Louis' Singer)
J LOUIS JOHNSON ~ Schyler (older man)
Plot Synopsis (spoiler alert); The second Jordan vehicle is even slimmer and more nonsensical as Jordan plays another sax playing bandleader, albeit this time named Louis Jarvis instead of Louis Jordan. Jarvis is playing a radio session when he is called away to New York where his father Schuyler (also played by Jordan) is dying. At the same time Honey Carter (Bea Griffith) has also been summoned by Schuyler along with her friend June (June Richmond). In a flashback Schyler (also played by Jordan) was also a bandleader and Honey's mother Lovey Linn (also played by Griffith) was a singer in his band and they were romantically involved. Louis and Honey knew each other as kids but haven't seen each other or Schuyler since. Schuyler dies before they arrive but he leaves a will which leaves his fortune to Louis on the condition that he marry a girl who is described as having a specific height and hair colour. Meanwhile Schuyler's lawyer Henry Talbot (Lorenzo Tucker) and his secretary Rusty are scheming to also get his fortune and they alter the will to add specific measurements that match Rusty (Vanita Smythe) and the lawyer then tries to convince Louis to marry her but Louis refuses. Instead Louis and his manager/friend Sam (Milton Woods) come up with their own plan to find the right girl by holding auditions for an upcoming Broadway revue that will include dancing girls using a new stage show during which measurements will be taken. Meanwhile Honey and June have arrived in town to be met by Talbot who tells them Schyler has died and tries to convince them to leave but they decide to stay and then come to the audition. At the audition Jordan plays several songs but none of the girls match the measurements. Honey and June arrive and June is hired as a singer and Honey is reunited with Louis who he signs as a dancer for the revue. Schuyler's butler Dolph (David Bethea) suspects that the will has been altered and before the show it is revealed that Talbot and Rusty had altered the will to trick Louis into marrying Rusty and they are arrested and Louis and Honey will be married. The film ends with some musical numbers at the revue.
In spite of having a plot that is even more threadbare and frankly dumb but it's probably the best of the Jordan films simply because it has more music and the music has more variety along with some duets and revue numbers including dancing girls. Guest stars include the return of Milton Woods, the slimey villain of "Beware" although here he plays Louis' friend and manager which is inherently less interesting and he would have been put to better use as the greedy, arrogant lawyer. June Richmond as Honey's friend is ebullient and a strong singer. However there are a couple weaker members; David Bethea, as Dolph the Butler, is an older actor whose few other film credits include the Cab Calloway musical "Hi-De-Ho", has a disconcerting habit of looking directly into the camera while talking. Bea Griffith as the love interest sports some scantily clad outfits but she's wooden and it's notable that while she is added to Louis' Revue at no point does she display any actual musical talent, she doesn't sing and doesn't really dance either. Griffith does blandly sing a number with Louis while playing the mother but even his manager says she's not very good. It turned out to be Griffith's only film credit. Far better to cast in the romantic lead would have been the nameless model who wordlessly flirts with Louis at the audition. I don't know who she is (she isn't named and has no lines) but she is awfully cute and steals the scene. She is also the girl on one of the posters.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "WHAM BAM" & "WHAT YOU PUTTING DOWN";
Jordan's band is not billed this time but clearly has several different members with the two most prominent members Wild Bill Davis and Eddie Byrd are absent. Singers June Richmond and Pat Rainey had musical careers of their own. Richmond was an established figure having sung with Cab Calloway and Andy Kirk. She was the first major Black singer to sing with a White band with Jimmy Dorsey and had appeared in another film. After which she would have other film roles and would appear on Broadway but her career would be cut short with her sudden death of a heart attack in 1962 at the age of 47. Pat Rainey would have a considerably more checkered career. After this film she would record a few moderately successful singles and appeared regularly in small Jazz clubs in New York. However she seems to have developed a heroin habit and was arrested in 1952 on charges of prostitution and drug possession and found guilty but, somewhat unusual for the era the judge showed leniency and gave her a suspended sentence on the condition that she return home to Boston with her parents and get treatment. Whether she did or not months later she was billed as performing at a Jazz club in Boston. Getting a second chance after such serious charges was even more unusual in that era but while she seems to not have recorded again she did tour Europe where she was reported to have had an affair with the notorious playboy King Farouk of Egypt in 1952. After these headlines however her career slowed down and she retired from music by 1961 returned to Boston married and dropped out of sight living quietly until her death in 1998 aged 72. One of the dancing girls in Jordan's Revue was appropriately named Roxy Joynes who had previously appeared in Jordan's short film Soundie "Caledonia". A model and showgirl, she had no other film credits but became tabloid fodder when she married baseball player Roy Campanella in 1964. She retired from showbiz and devoted herself to charity and they would stay married until his death in 1988. She died in 2004.
There would be one last quickie Jordan musical that year and it would be even sillier than the previous two.
"LOOK OUT SISTER" (1947);
Directed by Bud Pollard
CAST;
LOUIS JORDAN ~ Himself
SUZETTE HARBIN ~ Betty Scott/Nurse
MONTE HAWLEY ~ Mack Gordon
BILL DOGGETT ~ Piano Player
PAUL QUINICHETTE ~ Tenor Sax Player
Plot summary (Spoiler alert); Once again Jordan is paying himself as a bandleader who has worked himself to exhaustion and after a photo montage of the band on tour (lifted from "Beware") gets sent to a sanatorium to relax. He befriends a nurse (Suzette Harbin) and a young boy who is also recovering at the sanitorium who is a fan of Westerns. While Louis sleeps he dreams he is at a Dude Ranch in Arizona as Two Gun Jordan, leader of a Western Swing band. The "H & H" Ranch (stands for "Health & Happiness") is an old fashioned western ranch with horses and a stagecoach and everybody wearing cowboy outfits and guns. The ranch is owned by Betty (also played by Suzette Harbin), a young woman and her brother Bob who are in debt to banker Mack Gordon (Monte Hawley) who holds the mortgage and is threatening to foreclose unless he is paid or she agrees to marry him. Betty is counting on Jordan to help by entertaining guests until Van Damme, a wealthy benefactor arrives. Unbeknownst to Betty Mack has discovered oil on the property and he sends Van Damme a letter telling him an infection has hit the ranch and he cancels his trip. Betty tells Louis they can't afford to pay him but he offers to help by staying with his band and playing for free as well as calling his friends in Hollywood for help raising the cash they need. Louis discovers Mack has discovered oil on the property so Mack frames him as a horse thief. A young boy who has befriended Louis overhears Mack plot to frame Louis. When Mack brings the sheriff to arrest Louis a fight breaks out and Louis and Bob saddle up and makes a run for it with Mack and a posse in pursuit. Louis shoots Mack but as the rest of the posse closes in he wakes up and announces he is going to send the children at the sanitorium to visit the the H&H Ranch and Nurse Betty falls in love with him as the film fades out.
LOUIS JORDAN;
Unlike the Herb Jeffries westerns which were copies of the Autry westerns and were intended to be such, Jordan's film is basically a parody of a Gene Autry western even though it's not really all that different from the actual Autry films. The difference can be seen in Jeffries performance which is relatively straight considering the inherent silliness of the genre. Jeffires doesn't wink at the camera or break character, while Jordan does. Jeffries plays the typical white hat wearing, two fisted, gun toting hero while Louis plays for comic effect. Jeffries could plausibly play a western hero because he looked like a matinee idol; tall and handsome while Jordan is short and slightly pudgy. Jeffries could ride a horse and looked believable in a fist fight while Jordan clearly can do neither. Not only does Louis play "himself" he makes a point of joking that he can't shoot a gun or ride a horse although he does at the end, albeit very awkwardly. The fight scene at the climax is filmed as sped up to look more slapstick and it also has the effect of reminding the viewer that this is supposed to be a dream which Louis is in fact about to wake from. The Autry films existed in a strange alternate universe where staples of the Old West existed alongside the modern world so Cowboys, Indian and outlaws ride horses and stages and shoot six guns while other characters (often greedy bankers) wear modern suits and fedoras, drive cars and use telephones and Autry uses a microphone and broadcasts on the radio. Jordan's film shares the same tropes but unlike the Autry films as a dream Jordan's film is aware of its silliness. Making the film a dream sequence, which is something none of the Jeffries or Autry films ever did no matter how outlandish their stories, makes clear that this is meant to be a parody aimed at adults rather than children.
The audience for the original Autry films as well as their various imitators like Roy Rogers and Hopalong Cassidy were children who became devoted fans, excitedly attended the Saturday afternoon matinees and bought the wildly successful lines of merchandise. This included black kids even though they were not represented in these films and Herb Jeffries always said it was his explicit intention to do a Black version of Autry's film specifically saying that he wanted "little black children to have their own hero" and he was also hoping to market his own merchandise, although that didn't turn out to happen. Jordan on the other hand already had a large audience as a genuine musical star (Jeffries had also been a Big Band singer but was not exactly famous) that his previous film clearly played to and they were not children. Jordan's music was full of sly double entendres which were common in Blues but which would have gone over the heads of kids while still being subtle and gentle enough to avoid censors and the same is true in his movies. They were made for his existing fans as this film is aimed at adult audiences who would understand that it's a parody in a way that Jeffires superficially similar westerns were not. Having the by then rather pudgy and noticeably not a screen idol Jordan stumbling around, falling off his horse, clumsily twirling his gun and getting into an awkward slap fight while mugging for the camera is meant to entertain an adult audience who would understand he was parodying the tall, broad-shouldered two fisted heroes of white westerns, not imitate them. Note that the name of the ranch as the "Health & Happiness Ranch" is probably a reference to the "Health & Happiness" radio show hosted by Hank Williams which would have been familiar to the Southern members of his audience but not something kids would have picked up on. Thus this film, while hardly any sort of classic, is objectively a better film than the Jeffries films. Besides the fact that it has much better music of course.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "LOOK OUT SISTER";
The cast doesn't have any real notable figures. Monte Hawley was a veteran of the Black Stage as well as several of Oscar Michaux's films and one of Duke Ellington's. He died in 1950. Pianist Bill Doggett would have a successful solo career including a hit single in "Honky Tonk" (1951) and worked with Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, Lucky Millinder, Wynonie Harris, Johnny Otis and the Ink Spots. He died in 1996 aged 80. Sax player Paul Quinichette would have a successful Jazz career playing with Count Basie, Jay McShann, John Coltrane, Dinah Washington, Billie Holiday and Benny Goodman earning the nickname Vice Pres by way of tribute, with Lester Young being the Prez. Young himself called him "Lady Q" which was still considered a compliment. He died in 1983.
This would be Jordan's last feature film although there would be a few guest spots but like Herb Jeffries his brief career as a film star was over. The entire genre of Race Films essentially came to an end in the fifties for some of the same reasons that Poverty Row B-Movies did as television changed movie going habits forever and many smaller theatres closed down and the Poverty Row studios went out of business. Others switched to making the sort of Teen Exploitation movies that could play in the new network of drive-ins. For Jordan movies were never more than a sideline anyway but tastes in music were changing as well the Rock & Roll era began.
Although Jordan is now widely acknowledged as one of the founders of Rock & Roll and would be cited as an influence by the likes of Chuck Berry, Little Richard, James Brown, BB King and Ray Charles at the time he was seen by teen record buying teens as decidedly old hat. The audience for R&R in the fifties was almost exclusively made up of teenagers and by that point he had been around since before the war and the more associated with the Swing Era of Count Basie and Duke Ellington than Elvis and Chuck Berry. Especially since the main instrument for R&R was the guitar, not the sax and suddenly Jordan's jive talking saxman seemed as old fashioned as Louis Armstrong. Jordan himself was reluctant to cater to the new teen audience playing package tours instead relying on his older established fans and the night clubs and Chitlin Circuit. At the same time Jazz audiences had changed as well with the Swing Era he was somewhat related to being replaced by the more cerebral Be-Bop and Cool Jazz scenes who looked askance at Louis jukebox mugging. His contract with Decca Records ended in the early fifties and he moved through a series of other labels through the decade including Aladdin, Vik, and Mercury and he was also plagued by health issues which also slowed him down.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "SWING OUT LOUD";
The Blues revival of the sixties was focused on the guitar and harmonica playing urban bluesmen like Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker or the Folk Bluesmen of Son House and Mississippi John Hurt rather than a fast talking, sax slinging hustler who was once called the Jukebox King. Throughout the sixties he would record for various small Jazz labels but his days as the Jukebox King were over. Most modern Jazz critics have been even more dismissive, usually not even considering him at all. In a typical example in the 2001 Ken Burns documentary series and accompanying book Jordan is mentioned long enough to acknowledge his Jazz roots but then dismiss him as a corny showman who cheapened his talents with crowd pleasing antics for crass commercial motives. Cab Calloway and Slim Gaillard, two other proto R&R contemporaries get similar treatment. Louis Jordan died in 1975 aged 66 but he would eventually get his due.
By the 80's and 90's a new generation of artists like Joe Jackson, Kid Creole, Brian Setzer, Dexy's Midnight Runners and any number of Ska bands were wearing suits and adding horns to their repertoire and Jordan was being hailed as a godfather of R&R. The 1980 film "The Blues Brothers" included one of his songs and the US postal service issued a stamp with his image. Louis Jordan was inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame in 1987 and in the Blues Hall Of Fame. In 1990 a musical based on his music called "Five Guys Named Moe" would run for four years in Londona and Broadway in 1992 winning an Olivier Award and two Tony nominations. In 2018 he was awarded a posthumous Grammy Award.
LOUIS JORDAN ~ "HOW LONG MUST I WAIT FOR YOU";
