The World's Greatest Minstrel

Clive's answer

to Blackface

November 12, 2009.

Dear Mr. Flint,

I was pleased to see that you answered letters from fans of mine in a most reasonable fashion. I’m thus encouraged to believe that a more scripted approach to exhibiting Jolson’s on-stage magic might be more acceptable to the uninitiated than the “review” style that has never failed to satisfy those of the senior generations in my 40 years of performing internationally. My fans know the story and songs by heart and the black face makeup has not been an issue until these “modern times.”

The present conflict between the senior versus the junior cultures began with the baby boomers who in the late 1960's said as one, “Don't trust anyone over 30”. Another of their edicts being, “if you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem.” Their unprecedented utterances have lost none of their vehemence in these days of the new millennium. Even the New Testament specifically indicts their behavior with the clear warning that great peril will attend their treason.

Dissolution as proposed by the Labor Government also proves part of my point. The Union Jack is now an embarrassment to all but the senior citizens of the Anglo Saxon culture.

With some respect for past glories that made the U. K. a haven for all cultures, the flag of St. George has replaced the Union Jack in most English locales. Therefore, it cannot be any other than the baby boomers who feel justified in depriving their seniors of their simple and well earned pleasures in order to accommodate the cultures of other nations.

Times do change but it is most uncivil of junior to deny seniors “their” music, performed their way and in a place paid for by their taxes in order to assuage those of other cultures who would not attend a Jolson show in the first place; it’s just not their “bag.”

As an adult I'm obliged to endure the idiosyncrasies of a younger generation; so I don't count their absence at my shows as a sign of their hatred of the Minstrel genre.

Theater fans are selective about what they want to see and they attend accordingly. Hopefully, without having to feel embarrassed that the current wisdom of the local “authorities” will ridicule their choice. Being of mid 1930's stock I was somewhat embarrassed by the Belgrade’s bold publicity announcing the “Vagina monologues,” but I am well aware that reality is in the mind of the generation that introduces its actuality. Prior to the late 1960's it wasn't respectful to discuss human genitalia in public.

I appreciate the predicament that the City Counselors might be in, in trying to overcome the demonstrably false “boomer” assumption that whites who “black up” are making fun of black people. Lenny Henry “whites up” with abandon and hopefully will never be banned for it, as do the Kabuki dancers of Japan who have used white makeup in their shows since the 1600's. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but as I have explained, the boomers have unsympathetically changed the time-tested rules of harmonious intercourse.

I am proud to have been christened in the same Church as William Wilberforce, MP for Hull who got his bill through Parliament under threats to his life in 1803; thusly I honor his name as a brother Christian and a truly great emancipator of black people. Al Jolson was the greatest of the Jewish emancipators and is lovingly remembered for the plaintive, joyful and stirring songs about caring for and about ones parents, sweethearts, children and country. To demean black people when one is acting onstage as a surrogate black man would be unthinkable to any professional performer who takes his art seriously.

You who inhabit and draw audiences from the vicinity of the illustrious Bard must know that, “music hath charm to soothe the savage breast.” Al Jolson did it for billions all around the world from 1911 onwards, by being the first actor to use black face on Broadway, from which direct location came the first of thousands of black performers that he endorsed and encouraged by lending his superior, magnetic and inimitable voice to their cause.

I am proud to be the “naturally-gifted” inheritor of his noble legacy.

Clive Baldwin.