Dorothy Dandridge

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Dorothy Dandridge was an American singer and actress, born in 1922 in Cleveland, Ohio. Her mother Ruby devised a singing and dancing act for her two daughters, The Wonder Children, and the sisters toured the southern United States for years. In the 1930s the family moved to Hollywood. By 1934 the group was called The Dandridge Sisters and was appearing in nightclubs such as the Cotton Club and at the Apollo Theater in New York.

Music and breakthrough

Dorothy appeared in films as a child. In 1941 she sang and danced in Sun Valley Serenade, in a number with the Nicholas Brothers, and she took part in Duke Ellington's revue Jump for Joy. In the 1940s she sang in films with Count Basie and Louis Armstrong and made ten Soundies, short music films for jukeboxes with a screen. Her nightclub career took off remarkably from 1951, when she performed at the Mocambo in West Hollywood. In 1954 she played the lead in Carmen Jones, a film version of Oscar Hammerstein's musical that transfers Bizet's opera to an African American setting. Her singing voice in that film was dubbed by Marilyn Horne. She became the first African American actress to be nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress.

Influence

Porgy and Bess followed in 1959. Because of the limited roles that Hollywood offered Black actresses, her film career remained small. She died in 1965, aged 42. Her career shows how music, film and the nightclub world overlapped in the America of her day.

Listening

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

• The Dream Factory: Film Reel 4^NL Reader