aker osephine by Constance L. Campbell

Inventing
•
osephine
by
•
•
aker
Constance L. Campbell
All photos are courtesy of Hargrett Rare Book and
Manuscript Library/University of Georgia Libraries.
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Tableau of Fatou with
Josephine in the banana
skirt; from the program
of La Folie du Jour.
he year was 1925, the place was Paris. This was the Paris of Ernest
Hemingway and Pablo Picasso, of Mam1ce Chevalier and Jean Coeteau,
of Gertrude Stein and Erte, a city of people who were assured of their
own sophistication and who were determined to enjoy the peace and
prosperity of the postwar years to the fullest.
At the height of fashion in this Paris was anything
considered "exotic" or "primitive"-or both. Artists
were copying African masks, couturiers were dressing
women like Art-Deco Tefertitis. And, just beginning to invade the French consciousness was a style of music created and performed by Americans of African descent, a
music these Parisians caLled "Le Jazz Hot." It was to tllis
Paris that Caroline Dudley Reagan, an Anlerican socialite
turned producer, brought a troupe of pelformers from
Harlem. BiUed as La Revue Negre, the show opened at
Andre Daven's Theatre du Champs-Elysees on October 2,
1925. The first tableau of this revue included a dark,
leggy young woman dressed in a ragged pair of cut-off
overaLls, who entered on aLI fours, her rear end above
her head, singing,
Boodle am, Boodle am Boodle am now
Skoodle am, Skoodle am Skoodle am now.
This was Josephine Baker's Paris debut.
1\velve years later, she would appear on stage at the
Folies Bergere costumed in satin, and lame, and ermine.
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How did tllis transformation come about?
In America's black musical theatre josephjne Baker
was considered a comedienne, the gawky, awkward girl
who could steal the show by grimacing and crossing her
eyes. Tills was a role she was originally meant to play in
La Revue Negre as well, but in rehearsals it becanle apparent that the show as originally planned simply would
not appeal to Parisian audiences. There was too much
tap dance and blues; producer Andre Daven was afraid
the audiences would find it boring. Accounts differ as to
whose idea it was to give more of a featured role to
joseplline-it may have been Andre Daven,' or perhaps
Moulin Rouge producer/choreographer jacques Charles
whom Daven had brought in to "fix" the show,! or it may
have been the young artist Paul Colin who had been illred
to create the show's poster, and whose artistic eye
joseplline had caught on the first day of rehearsal. All of
them were struck by her vivacity, her dancing ability, and
the modernistic angularity of her body. Soon, she was
posing nude for Colin and rehearsing for a nude appearance on stage. She later wrote about her reaction to tills
situation: "For the first time in my life, I felt beautifuL" 3
jacques Charles, whom Daven had illred to try to
solve the problems of the Revue, knew that he had to add
somethjng to the show's American pieces to make the
program more appealing to French audiences. In llis
own words, "I wanted a note a little bit more voluptuous,
an erotic, sensual duet. .. ," and added to Daven, "We
2
Contemporary
watercolor of
Josephine in the
banana skirt. (Artist's
signature is illegible.)
3
Josephine in the gilded
banana skirt in the
number; La Roue vers
d'Or; from the program
of La Folie du Jour.
I. Lynn Hanel', Naked allbe Feasl: A Biogmp/~)' oJ}osepbille Baker
(New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1981) 56.
2. PhyUis Rose,jazz Cleopalm:}osepbille Baker ill ber Tillie (New
York: Doubleday, 1989) 5.
3. Josephine Baker and Jo BouiUon,josepbille, lrans. Mariana
Fitzpalrick (New York: Harper & Row, 1977) 50.
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need tits. These French people, with their fantasies of
black girls, we must give them des nichons."· The result
was the Danse Sauvage, a comic-erotic, "authentically
African" ballet. Josephine and her partner, Joe Alex,
appeared in nothing more than beads and feathers.
The French got their fantasy black girl, nichons and
all, the show was a smash hit, and Josephine was the
toast of Paris.
Near the end of the Revue's run, Paul Derval, impresario of the Folies Bergere, saw the show and immediately offered Josephine the starring position in the next
Folies revue. So, in 1926, Josephine made her debut at
the Folies Bergere in the revue La Folie du]ow; wearing
her most fanlOus costume ever. "Fatou," the first tableau
of the show, opened on a jungle scene with an explorer
asleep beneath the trees (fig. 1). Josephine came climbing down one of the palms to dance for him-the fantasy
native girl par excellence. She was clad in a skirt of bananas (fig. 2), a costume that would haunt her for the
rest of her life. No one knows who was responsible for
the banana skirt, a design that was at once exotic, phallic,
and humorous. Associates of the great couturier Paul
Poiret claimed that it was his design.; Others credit Paul
Colin, the creator of the famous poster of the year be-
LA EO LE DEFLEURS
THE
FLO\NER
BALL
4
Josephine in La Boule
des Fleurs; from the
program of La Folie du
Jour,
1'·'"\"ll.It
4. Jean-Claude Baker and Chris Chase,josepbille: Tbe HUllgry' Hearl
(~ew York: Random House, 1993) 111.
5. Baker and Chase 135.
6. Bryan Hammond and Patrick O'Connor,josepbille Baker (London:
Jonathan Cape, 1988) 57.
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fore. 6 josephine herself once said that the idea was given
to her by jean Cocteau.- It seems much more likely, however, that credit should go to one of the designers of the
revue: Erte, Brunelleschi, de ZanlOra, Montedoro,
Betout, Pavis, Ranson, or Barbier. Tllis supposition is
strengthened by the fact that the banana skirt made a second appearance later in the show in a number titled "La
Roue vers d'Or" (The Gold Rush). The bananas, however, now were transformed (fig. 3). Instead of fairly realistic-appearing fruit, they were metallic gold, and
sntdded with rhinestones.
Although the banana skirt is by far the most famous
of her costumes, we find josephine appearing in two
other numbers in La Folie du jour in which her costumes also point toward directions in which her stage
persona would develop. In "La Boule des Fleurs" (The
Ball of Flowers), an enormous floral globe was lowered
from the flies onto the stage. It opened, and out stepped
josephine to dance the Charleston on a nlirrored floor,
before stepping back into the globe to be lifted away. For
this number, she was dressed in a Music Hall version of a
grass skirt with floral leis around her neck-a South Sea
Island touch (fig. 4). She was again a figure of fantasy,
dark and exotic, this time tapping into a Frenchman's desire to emulate Gauguin-and, perhaps, to dance the
Charleston as well.
Another number of the revue depicted the various
fans of the world-ivory, lace, diamonds, fire-as personified by various of the Music Hall's artistes. joseplline
was the feather fan, a showgirl just like the French
women, and she was portrayed in this guise on the cover
of the souvenir program (fig. 5).
The following year, 1927, the Folies Bergere produced Un Vellt de Folie, again featuring josephine. The
designers listed in the program are Brunellesclli, de
ZanlOra, Montedoro, Betout, Ranson, Czenel, and
Thirriot. However, George Barbier designed josephine's
costume for the number "La Meme en 1927" (She's the
Sanle in 1927). It's quite interesting to note the differences between the rendering and the finished cosnlme,
including how much barer the actual cosnlme is (figs. 6
and 7). The plumes, too, are noticeably different-perhaps the long boas were too difficult to control with
josephine's wild dancing. In both incarnations, however,
tllis costume is in the same spirit as the feather fan from
La Folie du jour-tllis is josephine, the Parisian
showgirl.
Other tableaux from Un Vellt de Folie bear out the
title of this first number-josephine really was "The
Same in 1927." In a tableau titled "Plantation," she was
dressed in almost the identical cosnlflle she wore in her
debut (fig. 9). For the finale, "Paris en Folie," she was
dressed in a very odd but charnling outfit (figs. 8 and 10)
possibly designed by Ranson, who did the poster. It consisted of nille leggings trimmed with spangles and jewelled balls, and a pair of red gloves with glittering balls at
the fingertips. The tufts of plumes from her waist and
from her silly little conical hat add to the whimsy of the
costume. It is absurd and it is unique, but it is unmistakably the costume of a Paris showgirl.
5
7. Baker and Chase 135. Slephen Papid!, in his book Remembering
Josepbine (Indianapolis and New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1976) 55,
credils Henri Varna for its invenlion, btll Ihis seems hardly credible
in Ihat he seems to think Ihal Varna, Ihe impressario of the Casino
de Paris, was the director of Ihe Folies Bergere al this lime, ralher
than Ihe aClual director, Paul Den'aI.
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Josephine as the
feather fan; from the
cover of the program
of La Folie du Jour.
When Un Vent de Folie closed in 1928, josephine
went on tour throughout Europe and South America. She
did not renlrn to Paris until 1930, when she starred in a
revue at the Casino de Paris titled Paris Qui ReI/me
(variously translated as "Paris Bustles" or "Paris Swings"
or "Paris jumps"). It was partly as a publicity stunt and
par·tly to please his new star that casino manager Henri
Varna presented josephine with Chiquita, the pet leopard
which soon becanle her inseparable companion.
Oosephine was a great animal lover. She also knew a
good publicity stunt when she saw one.) Chiquita was immortalized in the poster for the show by Zig.
The sets for Paris Qui Remue were designed by
George Barbier-this show was probably the last thing
he designed. He was also responsible for josephine's
costume for her first number, "L'Oiseau des Forets" (The
Bird of tlle Forests), in which josephine is described as
wearing an immense pair of white featllered wings, descending a staircase into a landscape of pale green and
pink trees and jungle foliage. Once in tlus landscape, she
was pursued in a stylized dance by a group of hunters
who, once they caught her, stripped her of her wings,
leaving her a broken, flightless creature. As this poignant
tableau began, she was once more the exotic object of
sex'Uai fantasy; but, as she was pursued and violated, she
becanle a symbol of all creantres who have been ravaged
by cruelty.
"The Bird of the Forests," however, did not put an
end to the depiction of josephine as the romantic representative of an exotic race. Another tableau in Paris Qui
Remue was a depiction of the various French colonies.
For this, josephine appeared as a girl from Martinique to
sing "Voufez-volls de fa call1le if sucre?" ("Would you
6
Josephine wearing the
costume for La Meme
en 1927; from the
program of Un Vent
de Folie.
7
Barbier rendering of
Josephine's costume for
La Meme en 1927.
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like some sugar cane?"-just a slight double-entendre),
and then in a golden, Asian-style costume to sing a song
that was to become almost as much a part of her as the
banana skirt, "La Petite Tonkinoise."
In the closing number, "Electricity," we again see
Josephine as chorus girl, in the costume of the "Electric
Fairy" which-although she wore it for only this one
show-would become one of her most famous, with
photographs of it reproduced everywhere. An anlUsing
sidelight: during dress rehearsal, one of the electrified
cosnlmes of a chorus member short-circuited. lot even
the Max Weldy people were perfect.
1\vo years after Paris Qui Remue, Josephine starred
again at the Casino de Paris in a little-known show titled
Lajoie de Paris. It is, however, notable for some of the
experimentation it contained in the costuming of
Josephine Baker. It was 1932; the Roaring 1\venties were
long over; the world was at the height of the Great Depression. Josephine was twenty-sLx years old, no longer
the madcap teen of her first years in Paris, but a young
woman of talent and the power that such talent brings.
Josephine had always been interested in fine clothes, and
almost immediately upon her first arrival in Paris she became fascinated by haute couture. Soon, most of her
wardrobe was by Paul Poiret; later, she would patronize
other great designers as well. It was time, and past time,
for her stage costuming to begin to catch up to her offstage glanlOur and sophistication. Thus, one number in
La joie de Paris consisted of Josephine singing her hit
song USi j'etais blanche" (If 1Were White) dressed in a
satin gown and a blond wig. Less racist than it might
seem at first-the song ended with a statement of pride
8
Poster for Un Vent de
Folie by Ranson.
'-'OS PHINE BAKER
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Tableau of Plantation;
from the program of
Un Vent de Folie.
10
Josephine in the
number Paris en Folie;
from the program of
Un Vent de Folie.
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11
Josephine in the
costume of Qu'est-ce
que c'est? in an ad
from the back of the
program of En Super
Folies.
in who she was-this number gives us a glimpse of the
more sophisticated josephine. The number, however,
was criticized at the time-for "toning down josephine's
spirit.·' 8
Also in Lajoie de Paris was a tableau entitled "The
Soul of jazz." Five years earlier, this \rould have signalled
an appearance by josephine in some elaborate COSlUme
of O)ing feathers and fringes, dancing the Charleston.
\ow, ho\\"erer, josephine played the orchestra leader,
cross-dressed in top-hat. \rrute tie, and tails-the
Marlene Dietrich look. Quite a change for the Little funnr
girl in oreraUs.
\'1' e see the transformation completed in josephine's
next Paris ~Iusic Hall rente. Ell Super Folies. staged by
the Folies Bergere in 19r. It had been five years since
josephine had last been on a Paris ~Iusic Hall stage. She
had just relllrned from \ell' York. lI'here she had been
giren a cold reception from both audience and critics for
her appearance in the 1936 edition of the Ziegfeld Follies, a revue that is now largelr remem bered as the show
in which Bob Hope introduced the song .. , Can't Get
8. Baker and Chase t --.
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Started With YOU." When Derval offered her a contract
with the Folies Bergere, she jumped at it. Ell Super Folies
was designed by Macha Prohaska, Revolg, Freddv Witlop,
and the young Hungarian designer, Michel Grarmathy,
who would soon become the sole costumer and then artistic director for the Folies Bergere. For josephine, this
was largell' a glamor sho\r. True. in one number she \ras
still cast as a natire i'Ve. but this time she \ras a fuLlv-c1ad
Arabian princess. Her sho\rgirl cosrume for the number
"Qu'est -ce que c'ese" (fig. II). \rhile to some extent recalling such piece a her "The Same in 19r." or the
silly finale costume from ell relit de Folie. is much more
elegant and malllre-not something to dance the
Charleston in. We also find her s\rathed in ermine as the
Queen of the Snows in the number ".lfagie Blallche"
(White ~Iagic-fig. 12). But. most eleg;lIlt and most
spectacular of all \ras the tableau "La jUligle
.lferl'eilleuse'· (The ~Iarrellous jungle). Ten rears earlier. josephine Baker in a jungle scene \rould hare meant
the banana skirt and an explorer's erotic fantasy. In
1937, she was the sIal' of the ~Iusic Halls. and she \ras
12
Josephine as Queen of
the Snows in Magie
Blanche; from the
program of En Super
Folies.
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Tableau of La Jungle
Merveilleuse; from the
program of En Super
Folies.
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treated as such. Josephine herself described
the number: "My favorite scene was the one in
which, gowned in clinging silver lame, I was
borne onto the stage in a feather-trimmed litter
which rested on the back of an enormous jade
elephant. .. My mount was surrounded by ten
rearing tigers, cla\\riflg the air" 9 (fig. 13). Yes,
it was still a fantasy-these are the Music Halls
we're dealing with here-but the former victim was now the conqueror.
Thus, we have seen Josephine Baker's
transformation from ragamuffin comedienne
to glanlOrous star. Along the way, various designers costumed her both as a Parisian
showgirl and as the European male's fantasy of
a native girl-be she African, Asian, or of
some other exotic and glamorous race. But,
whatever costumes she wore, no matter by
whom they were designed, all seemed to share
with their wearer both a sassy sense of fun and
a fundamental integrity that could transcend
the stereotypes and insults, inspiring the affection and respect of the \~ewer, and eventually
helping Josephine Baker to emerge triumphant as the Queen of the Music Hall.•:.
Constance L. Campbell is a Pb.D.
candidate (Drama and Tbeatre) at
University ofGeorgia, Atbens.
RegiOnal
Portfolio Interviews
9. Baker and Bouillon 107.
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