[Dixielandjazz] Cab Calloway documentary reviewed - Boston Globe

[Robert Ringwald]

PBS Documentary Sells Cab a Little Short
by Mark Feeney
Boston Globe, February 25, 2012
The PBS series "American Masters" celebrates its 30th birthday in 2014. Maybe it's
time for a spinoff. That show, too, would consist of profiles of artists and creative
types. Call it "American Misfits" or "American Outsiders." Such a show would be a
way to celebrate, without having to oversell, individuals who fall between the cracks.
Under that heading, "Cab Calloway: Sketches" would be a much better fit. It airs
Monday night at 10 on Channel 2.
A singer and bandleader of the '30s and '40s, Calloway is best remembered today for
his unofficial title, "the Hi-De-Ho Man," and his trademark number, "Minnie the Moocher."
He later played Sportin' Life in several productions of "Porgy and Bess" (which gets
mentioned) and as Horace Vandergelder, opposite Pearl Bailey, in the all-black "Hello,
Dolly!" on Broadway in the '60s (which goes unmentioned). He also played John Belushi
and Dan Aykroyd's mentor in "The Blues Brothers" (which gets an undue amount of attention).
Calloway was a character: zoot suited, jive talking (one of his most irresistible
numbers was called "Jumpin' Jive"), baroquely hip, suavely clownish, an urbane burlesque
of minstrelsy's burlesque of blackness. Actually, in certain key respects, Calloway
was transracial. The fact he was able to fit so well into several Betty Boop cartoons
in the early '30s was as much a tribute to his blurred racial identity as to his
caricature-like persona. Those cartoons inspire a duet at the end of the documentary
between dancer Matthew Rushing and an animated Calloway.
As the jazz critic Stanley Crouch points out, Calloway not only had straight hair
but he was constantly flinging it about. More important, he spoke and sang with a
very white diction. In that regard, he prefigured Chuck Berry (now there's an American
master), who also sounded white on record and used wit and an exaggerated persona
to further dilute his racial identity -- and enlarge his popular appeal.
The key point about Calloway is that he was an entertainer first, a musician second.
Although some very fine players worked for him -- to name just two: the bassist Milt
Hinton and tenor saxophonist Chu Berry -- Calloway's band was more novelty act than
orchestra. Duke Ellington's name keeps coming up (both Ellington and Calloway were
associated with Harlem's Cotton Club), but he has more in common with, say, Fats
Waller or Louis Jordan, as a humorous, outsize musical personality.
There are two reasons why "Cab Calloway: Sketches" has that subtitle. A recurring
visual motif is artist Steve Brodner executing a large ink sketch of Calloway. The
other reason is that it's certainly not a biography. The documentary neglects to
say when Calloway was born (1907, in Rochester, N.Y.) or died (1994) or where he
grew up (Baltimore). It notes that his sister, bandleader Blanche Calloway, gave
him his start. But the fact he was a product of the black bourgeoisie -- his father
was a lawyer, his mother a teacher, and he briefly went to law school -- goes unmentioned.
What period footage there is is enticing. There's nowhere near enough of it, though.
That may be an even worse sin than ignoring those biographical basics. Sketching
an American Master's mastery is all well and good (or, in this case, maybe not so
well and good), but nothing actually demonstrates it like showing it in action. Instead
of "hi-de-ho," "Cab Calloway: Sketches" too often leaves a viewer thinking hi-de-who?



--Bob Ringwald
www.ringwald.com
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