Most presentations of Billie Holiday, whether in picture or in word, feature Billie as the sad victim of hard times and hard drugs; the black woman wailing the autobiographical blues as she's driven down to pathetic ruin. With such a stark outline of her career, small wonder that she is remembered more for her sensational exploits (several of the best-known of which are outright fictions) than for the single fact of her life that matters above all others: That she was a great artist who, along with Louis Armstrong, invented modern jazz singing.
Mining a treasure-trove of utterly new information, the producers of this marvelous 60-minute documentary set the Billie Holiday record straight—and beautifully. Third in the series of film/programs produced by Toby Byron/Multiprises (the first two were the award-winning and highly acclaimed Celebrating Bird: The Triumph of Charlie Parker and Satchmo), Lady Day-The Many Faces of Billie Holiday does precisely what a jazz film is supposed to do: it gives you abundant footage of the artist herself, doing her thing.
The clips include Fine and Mellow, l957 (featuring Billie with Lester Young, Ben Webster, and Roy Eldridge), often called the greatest short film in jazz; New Orleans, l946 (and a superb number showing Billie and Louis Armstrong together); as well as rare footage of Holiday on TV in England and in the United States; and—rarest of all—the Basie Band of l937 (featuring Count with Lester Young, Jo Jones, Buck Clayton, Harry “Sweets” Edison and Jimmy Rushing) on Randall's Island, New York.
Research for Lady Day also unearthed literally hundreds of photos of Billie—as a two year-old (even then with a large flower in her hair), as a youngster in Baltimore (that secretly jazz-rich town where she started singing in bordellos and good-time houses), as an artist in rehearsal, in concert, at record dates, or just at home. Along with these fabulous materials, many of them never publicly seen before, Lady Day displays such a rich sampling of new data—programs, news clippings, records—that even Holiday specialists will be surprised and delighted.
In a voice that is Billie-like in its rasping wise-ness and its ring, Ruby Dee (the stage and screen star best known for her roles in “A Raisin in the Sun,” “Roots,” and Spike Lee's “Do the Right Thing”) reads selected words from Holiday's autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues, which—along with expert narrative commentary—helps structure this show.
Lady Day presents outstanding new interviews with Carmen McRae (who, before she became a singer, admired Billie Holiday and became a close friend); Annie Ross (of Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross—another younger singer who became a friend); Buck Clayton (the Basie trumpet giant who made dozens of records with Billie, including his first in l937); Harry “Sweets” Edison (another key Basie alumnus who knew Billie from the thirties, when he first recorded with her, until her last record date in l959); Mal Waldron (Billie's piano player in the last two years of her life); and others.
Aimed at the aficionado and novice alike, this documentary swings, both visually and aurally. “What a Little Moonlight Can Do,” “You Can't Take That Away From Me,” “Lover Man,” “On the Sunny Side of the Street,” “God Bless the Child,” “Strange Fruit,” “Fine and Mellow,” and “Swing, Brother, Swing” (among others) all come brilliantly to life on the screen. Never has it been more clear that Holiday shaped her musical statement precisely as if her voice were one of the horns.
Lady Day helps the viewer to put into perspective Billie Holiday's often anguished life. We get the picture that this woman was not just a victim but a back-talker and fighter who did not suffer fools gladly. And who, above all, was a genius of a jazz musician. Lady Day—The Many Faces of Billie Holiday invites a new generation to see the many faces of this beautiful woman—this “dark lady of the sonnets,” as one poet called her—and to appreciate more deeply her undying art.
Writer: Robert O'Meally
Program: © Multiprises, LLC
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