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Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Good People. What's Up? This is Queslo.

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Speaker 1: In our recent final episode of Team Supreme, I mentioned

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Speaker 1: that one of my most underrated episodes of QLs was

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Speaker 1: this particular one right here. It's our conversation with Ben Breen.

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Speaker 1: We take this less than a year ago, and I

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Speaker 1: think it's worth pushing into your feed for a Monday.

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Speaker 1: QLs classic been shared a lot of things.

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Speaker 2: About his life that really hit.

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Speaker 1: Hard, in particular that that episode of The Fresh Prince

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Speaker 1: of bel Air was a lot bigger than just a role.

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Speaker 1: As you'll hear, Ben and his daughter also talk about

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Speaker 1: roots and why the role of Chicken George and that

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Speaker 1: mini series was so significant and truthfully, I've been thinking

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Speaker 1: about this episode since we taped it back in twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty four. And let's listen back together, Classic encore this

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Speaker 1: no bemboe Quest Love Supreme. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Court Love Supreme, Quest Love your host. We

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Speaker 1: are here with the fam. Wha, yeah, hello, where are

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Speaker 1: you right now?

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Speaker 2: You're in La.

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Speaker 3: I'm in the Sunny La.

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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, your your wall situation is so unique.

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Speaker 1: Every episode I see in you part of your house

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Speaker 1: I never knew existed before.

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Speaker 3: That's hilarious.

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Speaker 2: Unpaid bills, Yes, sir, it was good to see you.

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Speaker 2: Everything's well. You know, I complain drinking.

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Speaker 1: Coffee for QLs, which is a new I vibe, but

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Speaker 1: I'm super into.

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Speaker 2: It right exactly new vibes.

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Speaker 1: I'm drinking applesire lemonade or the opposite.

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Speaker 3: Of brag is that's that thing? That's good? Did you

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Speaker 3: drink first in the morning? That's good a mirror.

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Speaker 2: Exactly exactly, sugar Steve, what's that brother? Good morning everybody?

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Speaker 2: How's it going? Very well? Thank you? That's good to hear,

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Speaker 2: good to hear. What can I say?

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Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, We you know, we're about checking off

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Speaker 1: our bucket list, dream interviews and our guest today is

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Speaker 1: a legend of the big screen, the big stage, and

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Speaker 1: of the recording studio, depending on your generation or your taste.

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Speaker 1: Certain if my mom were here, she'd go nuts over

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Speaker 1: the fact that, you know, let's start Pippin or Sweet

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Speaker 1: Charity or hair or all that jazz is with us.

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Speaker 1: Our guest today is one of the first actors that

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Speaker 1: my parents approved of me watching. If you're you know,

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Speaker 1: I've mentioned many times that television really wasn't looked upon

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Speaker 1: unless it was like Chesame Street or music, but Roots

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Speaker 1: was required watching.

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Speaker 2: And I watched all that show even at the age

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Speaker 2: of five.

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Speaker 1: So the fact that the character Chicken Joy is here

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Speaker 1: and in front of me like is mind blowing. Of course,

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Speaker 1: if you're eighties baby, I'm sure, Layah. Are you an

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Speaker 1: eighties baby or a nineties baby today?

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Speaker 3: I'll be eighties. I'll be eighties all right.

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Speaker 1: Of course remember him in Webster Yeah, even for gen

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Speaker 1: Z society that lives for memes, of course we know

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Speaker 1: him as Will's dad or the fresh Prince of Bill.

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Speaker 1: There we are in the company of greatness right now,

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Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the Tony Award winning Ben

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Speaker 1: Veren and also not to mention his daughter at Kabara,

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Speaker 1: who also helped organize this for us.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to Quest of Supreme. Hello, how y'all doing?

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Speaker 4: Oh? Thank you so to be here waiting for this

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Speaker 4: quite a long time. So you had my friend and

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Speaker 4: help me on.

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Speaker 1: We're gonna have you on right now. Where are you

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Speaker 1: talking to us from? What part of the world are

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Speaker 1: you in.

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Speaker 4: I'm in New York City at the Dance Theater of Halem,

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Speaker 4: Arthur Mitchell's then Theater of Harlem, and I'm honored to

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Speaker 4: be I'm working my daughter on her new piece that

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Speaker 4: she's doing called The Resurrection of ot Cyrus. It's going

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Speaker 4: to be at the Met on January seventeenth. I'm directing it.

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Speaker 4: And so we're in rehearsal right now, and I'm honored

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Speaker 4: to be here in Arthur Mitchell's because I remember, I

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Speaker 4: remember you, Tad. I had a conversation with Glenn Turman,

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Speaker 4: my good friends, and we went to the High School

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Speaker 4: of Performing Arts together, and there's one photo that encouraged

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Speaker 4: me on the wall there and it was Arthur Mitchell.

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Speaker 4: He was in his beautiful dance post on the wall

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Speaker 4: and I said wow. And I later became good friends

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Speaker 4: for them, and now I'm in his studio. So thank

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Speaker 4: you author.

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Speaker 1: So you went to school with Glynn Turman at a

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Speaker 1: performing arts school?

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Speaker 4: Was performing our school? Yeah?

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Speaker 2: What time period was this? If you don't mind me.

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Speaker 4: Asking nineteen oh four memory.

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Speaker 1: I'm only asking that because you know, when I was

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Speaker 1: in first grade in the mid seventies, my parents made

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Speaker 1: a big deal of you know, you're going to a

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Speaker 1: new type of school where you're going to do like acting, art, music, dancing,

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Speaker 1: like all those things. And I was led to believe

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Speaker 1: that schools of that caliber were unique to the seventies.

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Speaker 1: Like I was part of the first generation of performing

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Speaker 1: art schools. So you're telling me that they were performing art.

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Speaker 4: Schools before that. It's the fifties. I started in the fifties,

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Speaker 4: I believe late fifties. I got there in the sixties,

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Speaker 4: and I believe it just began to take on form.

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Speaker 4: It was called the High School for the Performing Arts.

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Speaker 4: Later it's now called Laguadia. They moved up on Tenth Avenue.

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Speaker 4: But we were the first there was music and art

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Speaker 4: and performing arts, and we had a rival, you know,

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Speaker 4: we said, o't nothing, you got to go to performing arts,

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Speaker 4: you know.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, So in the fifties you went to a performing

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Speaker 1: arts high school in New York that we still know

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Speaker 1: as the Fame School. Right, You're blowing my mind that

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Speaker 1: there was even the idea of black and white students

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Speaker 1: going to school together studying the arts.

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Speaker 2: So what was that experience like for you?

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Speaker 4: You understand something, The arts is the one thread that

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Speaker 4: keeps civilization going. We are all creative aspects of the

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Speaker 4: creator that created us. So the arts is the one

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Speaker 4: thing that's going to propel us into whatever experiences we're

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Speaker 4: going to have in this lifetime. So they can't hold

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Speaker 4: back the arts. Well, so wonderful about that time, because

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Speaker 4: you know in the sixties, that's when Neil Martin, Luther

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Speaker 4: King and it's from Malcolm X. That's streets, you know,

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Speaker 4: the hippies and the whole movement. So that was all

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Speaker 4: happening then. So performing arts I got lucky because they

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Speaker 4: needed boys for the dance apartment. Now Glenn Book's coming

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Speaker 4: up from acting. I knew nothing about the arts. I'm

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Speaker 4: from the church. I sang with Sensational Twilights of Brooklyn.

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Speaker 4: You know, Brooklyn was my home. And when I went

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Speaker 4: to the High School of Performing Arts, it was a

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Speaker 4: whole new world. Man. The arts became a new word

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Speaker 4: in my vocabulary. I saw a dancing sort of first

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Speaker 4: time I saw a serious musician sort of person. I

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Speaker 4: saw serious actors. You talk about Beneth Carroll, you know, yes,

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Speaker 4: Beeth Carroll was there. It was integrated, as we call

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Speaker 4: in those days.

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Speaker 1: So there was a lot of stigma on me as

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Speaker 1: an elementary school student concerning the arts it was already like, oh,

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Speaker 1: you're one of those weirdo kids at least, like, you know,

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Speaker 1: coming to my neighborhood to go to a performing arts

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Speaker 1: school automatically made me kind of like a social outcast.

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Speaker 2: Now here's the thing. Music was always my thing.

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Speaker 1: But for the first year and a half of me

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Speaker 1: going to that school, the school was like, before you

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Speaker 1: get on that drum set, you got to coordinate your rhythm.

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Speaker 1: And so they brought a pair of tat dance shs

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Speaker 1: and they're like, you're going to have to learn how

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Speaker 1: to dance first before we let you on that drum set.

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Speaker 2: Of course, be in the seventies, what the seventies were,

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Speaker 2: there was a.

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Speaker 1: Lot of sigma says you dance, You're dancing was the

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Speaker 1: idea of dance expression a stigma for you in the fifties,

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Speaker 1: as it was for me in the seventies.

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Speaker 4: The sixties, sixties. Okay, okay, I'm proud of I'm if

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Speaker 4: people ask me old that, I said, you remember Moses.

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Speaker 4: But here's the thing about I also went through that

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Speaker 4: stigma because I ran with gangs. You know, I ran

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Speaker 4: with the Crossair Lords and you know, the bishops and

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Speaker 4: the Chaplains and all those guys in Brooklyn. So there

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Speaker 4: I was going all of a sudden. I remember my

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Speaker 4: mother getting a list of was required for me to

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Speaker 4: go into the dance department. I knew nothing about the

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Speaker 4: drama department. I probably would have h the acting apartment.

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Speaker 4: I probably would have loved to have tried out for that.

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Speaker 4: But the wonderful thing I had a guy named David

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Speaker 4: Wood to talk about the importance of telling his story

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Speaker 4: through dancing through movement. But the point is that in

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Speaker 4: my neighborhood, if I came home, now, I gotta get

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Speaker 4: a dance bag, I gotta get tights, I gotta get

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Speaker 4: a dance spell.

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Speaker 2: ID to wear jumpsuit?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, ballet slippers? Yeah, you kidding me. I was walking

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Speaker 4: about Brogans and you know Garretson. I was, you know,

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Speaker 4: a tough kid, and I gotta wear ballet slippers. I

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Speaker 4: wouldn't tell anybody where I was going up for school,

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Speaker 4: And so they said, man, wasn't that bad. Man wasn't

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Speaker 4: a bag man and nothing? It is my school stuff.

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Speaker 4: Let's see, no, not run. Yeah, it was tough. There

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Speaker 4: was something which you came across that bridge and you

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Speaker 4: got in that dance studio, a whole new world opened up. Magic.

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Speaker 4: It's beautiful?

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Speaker 2: Was it cathartic for you?

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Speaker 5: That relationship with the neighborhood is so fascinating because we

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Speaker 5: were talking before you got on, of course, the kind

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Speaker 5: of beautiful. There's a lot of alignment between some quest

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Speaker 5: Love Supreme guests and yourself. We talked about Glenn Turman,

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Speaker 5: but when you told that story about being the ballet

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Speaker 5: Slippers and being in the neighborhood, it made me think

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Speaker 5: about Prodigy in that way. In the picture of him,

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Speaker 5: who you know is little Albert. I'm sorry, I know

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Speaker 5: his rap name is is Prodigy, but you knew him

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Speaker 5: as little Albert at Kabar.

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Speaker 3: What was the dance studio.

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Speaker 6: Bernie Johnson, who is a very famous dance.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, I imagine he had the same issues as a

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Speaker 5: little boy coming up with being in a dance school

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Speaker 5: that his grandmother had built. So I was just wondering

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Speaker 5: if you guys, if you remember that as he was

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Speaker 5: a little boy, and that that common thread with you

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Speaker 5: guys in that way.

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Speaker 3: That's interesting.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, we you know what we were together. The world

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Speaker 4: didn't matter. It's about us and doing what we did.

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Speaker 4: We had fun we loved to dance. We love, you know,

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Speaker 4: the expression of telling our story through dance. And I'd

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Speaker 4: go into a studio and just make a record player

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Speaker 4: and just for hours, just dance. You know, do all

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Speaker 4: sorts of makeup stories, make up stories for myself through dance.

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Speaker 5: Did you look at someone on TV? Was there a

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Speaker 5: dancer like that you used to watch that you admired.

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Speaker 5: I'm curious who you look to in that way?

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Speaker 4: Well, there wasn't many dancers to look to it, and

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Speaker 4: I didn't. I wasn't into the concert world, into going

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Speaker 4: to see Bartha Graham or going to see George Valant.

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Speaker 4: Matter of fact, when I came to the studio to

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Speaker 4: the school that day, and I'll never forget this, I ok,

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Speaker 4: I wore you know, if they say not to make

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Speaker 4: up a dance, said real dance to Quincy Jones' Killer Joe.

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Speaker 4: I woke here the muter shorts, us kids, sneakers, a

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Speaker 4: T shirt, my father's skinny brim hat. I'm sitting outside

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Speaker 4: waiting to go on and watching all these other kids

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Speaker 4: dancing the balance sheet. She's to Chopain and you know,

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Speaker 4: all these deep cats about wow, And I got to

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Speaker 4: my dance there was white people sitting at the table.

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Speaker 4: I know where they were, So I got up and

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Speaker 4: did my little cool d the d I thought I

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Speaker 4: was pretty cool. I sat down and the cityusing story.

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Speaker 4: There was a lady named doctor Rachel Yoker, and she

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Speaker 4: came over me. She said, did you how did you do?

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Speaker 4: She said you liked the school? I said yes, I

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Speaker 4: She said it is I. I said yes. I said

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Speaker 4: you mean all right? I said yes I. She says,

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Speaker 4: what's your name? Was said? Vision said what I said, Benjamin?

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Speaker 4: She said you mean ben Juman. I said, yeah, Benjamin.

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Speaker 4: What's wrong with you? She said, well, do you like

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Speaker 4: the school? Yes? I right? She said okay, and then

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Speaker 4: she said, you know these people at the table? I said, no,

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Speaker 4: this white people? To me said you don't know George

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Speaker 4: Balance she no, Martha Graham, no, Toerne Robbins. No. Why.

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Speaker 4: I had no idea of these people who had would

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Speaker 4: carved the importance of dance into our culture. I later

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Speaker 4: found out about Catherine Dunham, later found out about Juth Jamison.

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Speaker 2: Jameson, Yeah, oh man.

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Speaker 4: And to be able to say that and have the

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Speaker 4: experience of meeting them and walking the same path with

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Speaker 4: them and having them call me friend.

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Speaker 1: Because you know, you dip your hand or your tail

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Speaker 1: into so many creative waters. Normally I asked what was

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Speaker 1: your first musical memory? But I would like to know

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Speaker 1: from you, what's the first thing that you created? What

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Speaker 1: was your first moment that you realize I'm a creative

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Speaker 1: I know that you were born in North Carolina. I

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Speaker 1: don't know when you moved to Brooklyn, But at what

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Speaker 1: point do you realize that your artistic Like, what was

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Speaker 1: your first creative project in life?

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Speaker 4: I wasn't born in North Carolina. My my biological mother

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Speaker 4: was Launburg, North Carolina. I was born in Florida, Dade County, Florida.

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Speaker 4: You see the arts. It's tricky and it's wonderful. I'm

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Speaker 4: writing my book now, my memoirs, and I remember playing

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Speaker 4: in the streets and remember having little dance parties, you know,

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Speaker 4: you know, after school, we do these little dances. And

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Speaker 4: as white children, was coming down the street one day

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Speaker 4: on Fulton Street, and it was right in the fifties,

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Speaker 4: and they were soliciting for the young boys, young kids

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Speaker 4: to put into the art school, dance school. Because it's

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Speaker 4: right around the time when the you know, the civil

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Speaker 4: rights are starting out, and so they wanted to show

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Speaker 4: their windows weren't broken. Say, have some a few black

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Speaker 4: kids in school. And that's how I got into the

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Speaker 4: Start Time Dance studio. But I never thought about the

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Speaker 4: fact that my creative aspect that was just part of me.

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Speaker 4: There was natural love to sing. I love the dance

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Speaker 4: at parties. I didn't have a form to it. I

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Speaker 4: didn't call a modern dance. I didn't call a ballet.

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Speaker 4: I didn't call it tap and An interesting thing I

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Speaker 4: lived right across the street from a shoe shine Parlow

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Speaker 4: called tip tap and toe. These are brothers who were

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Speaker 4: in vaudeville. And I wondered why these guys on Sundays

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Speaker 4: because in those days they had the blue law in

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Speaker 4: Brooklyn that means bondy liquor. So every Sunday you see

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Speaker 4: a lion wrapped around the block getting the deacons getting

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Speaker 4: their shoes shine. Because brothers are being there. You get

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Speaker 4: online and standing and get this shoe shine. You know.

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Speaker 4: So these guys are going to tip tap and toe.

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Speaker 4: We get the rag snapping. You have jazz music playing

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Speaker 4: and these brothers sit back there and he'd be singing

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Speaker 4: then through a you know, a shuffle back, then snap

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Speaker 4: the rag fat and then they have a hand on

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Speaker 4: little Dixie cups a whiskey. So the lives are around

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Speaker 4: the corner the brothers where they go to church. They

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Speaker 4: had to have their little shot.

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Speaker 1: All right, That makes sense because even today, you know,

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Speaker 1: like you're always seeing these terror cart businesses, these random

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Speaker 1: terror cart businesses, and you know you'll see them in

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Speaker 1: a lank city or New York or like any cosmopolitan city.

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Speaker 1: And I always wonder, for the life of me, how

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Speaker 1: are these businesses thriving like a woman or anyone reading

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Speaker 1: your future. I just found out that those are basically

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Speaker 1: people that have sort of in place owner or renter's law.

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Speaker 1: In other words, that place used to be a residency,

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Speaker 1: but then once a business district is established, you're not

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Speaker 1: supposed to live in a business district. So basically it's

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Speaker 1: sort of an underhanded way of the city saying you

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Speaker 1: can still live here, but you have to be a business.

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Speaker 1: So thus, anytime you see a terror card reading or

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Speaker 1: let me read your future, it's just a residence. But

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Speaker 1: they have to have a storefront that's like a business

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Speaker 1: and a wink. So that now that makes sense. That

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Speaker 1: shoe shine people really had a side business of moonshine

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Speaker 1: speakeasies while you get your shoes shine.

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Speaker 2: That makes sense, now, that makes total sense.

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Speaker 4: You know they didn't sell liquor on Sundays Pennsylvania.

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Speaker 2: So wait, New York was a blue law state as well.

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Speaker 4: You had a blue law in New York City.

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Speaker 2: I never knew that.

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Speaker 1: But the thing is is that, like I have, my

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Speaker 1: toes also dipped in various waters. But like for me,

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Speaker 1: drumming is always my passion. If you just had one

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Speaker 1: thing to say, that's what I'm known for for you,

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Speaker 1: because again you're known for your singing, your acting, everything,

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Speaker 1: you're direct. What is the one medium in the arts

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Speaker 1: that you say is your north star employment preach.

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Speaker 3: That's you come on now, mayor at this point, that's

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Speaker 3: you do.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, But if it's all taken away from me.

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Speaker 4: Drum set, yeah, yeah, for me, it's leave me my voice.

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Speaker 4: Let me tell my story, my story through song, through dance,

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Speaker 4: you know, tell my story. Let me give it to

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Speaker 4: the young people, let me pass it on. I've lived

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Speaker 4: such a life then it's nice to be able to

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Speaker 4: say here it's yours. Now, go.

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Speaker 1: Take me through your life as a creative. What was

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Speaker 1: your first step into a profession.

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Speaker 4: I just graduated from the High School for the Performing Arts.

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Speaker 4: There's a woman there named Janette Carol and she was

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Speaker 4: doing Michelle called The Prodigal Son off Broadway at the

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Speaker 4: Greenwich News Theater. I'm talking about. You don't bout a

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Speaker 4: professional show, right. I never knew anything about Broadway or

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Speaker 4: the theater. I had never been on a Broadway stage

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Speaker 4: until Bob Fosse. But I go to the show. It

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Speaker 4: was in a graduate greennich News Theater. It was downstairs,

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Speaker 4: a little theater, and uh, that was my first production.

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Speaker 4: And one night I'm coming out of the theater. I

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Speaker 4: was in my first Son of been born, and I

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Speaker 4: was nay getting to the theater. I had to spend

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Speaker 4: time with my first wife and got back to the

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Speaker 4: theater and the dance captain had taken my role and

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Speaker 4: gave it to his love, and I wasn't going to

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Speaker 4: have that because it was my role. So I went

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Speaker 4: on stage anyway. So those stage where I said they

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Speaker 4: can't do that, I said, no, they can'ts. I went

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Speaker 4: on stage, guy got dressed, went on stage, and we're

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Speaker 4: fighting doing the show on stage. I'm he's in my place.

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Speaker 4: I'm hitting him. He's hitting me this or and people

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Speaker 4: must say, they're going, wow, this show is so real.

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Speaker 4: I got I come off stage. I'm angry. I'm leaving

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Speaker 4: the theater. I'm going to Glenn's house, you know, to

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Speaker 4: get myself cooled off. And it's a little guy sitting

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Speaker 4: outside of the door, and he says, he says, excuse me, Yeah,

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Speaker 4: what do you want? He says, I'm looking for Benjamin Verena.

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Speaker 4: I'm bench. What do you want? He said, you look

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Speaker 4: like you could use the dinner. My name is Langston,

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Speaker 4: used I wrote this.

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Speaker 3: Whoa, Well, you can't just you just drop that.

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Speaker 4: You did that? Yeah, took me to dinner. He said,

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Speaker 4: you looked like good boy your dinner. So he took

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Speaker 4: me a little a little Italian joy in the village

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Speaker 4: and we sat and talked, and he told me about

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Speaker 4: himself and told me a guy he's written the play

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Speaker 4: and inviting me up the Harlem for the first time.

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Speaker 4: So that was my first professional job. Uh, and the

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Speaker 4: time would buy And the next time I got a

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Speaker 4: job was uh, you'll read about in the book. He

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Speaker 4: was on the subway, I jump turned style, I went

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Speaker 4: to New York City. I was standing on the corner.

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Speaker 4: I went by my school and I was really depressed.

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Speaker 4: I went by Performing Arts. I looked at the school

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Speaker 4: and going, where am I going? What's going to happen?

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Speaker 4: And I walked down to the news stand and I

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Speaker 4: opened up a newspaper. Backstage in his audition for that

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Speaker 4: day for a show called Sweet Charity going to a

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Speaker 4: place called Las Vegas, starring Woman and Juliet Prowse, directed

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Speaker 4: by Bob Fosse. And that was the first time I

383
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Speaker 4: was scept on Broadway Sturge at the Palace Theater. I

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Speaker 4: went to the audition. It was like the opening of

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Speaker 4: all that jazz. Yes, and I went that was one

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Speaker 4: of those kids on the stage standing there Washington. Cool

387
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Speaker 4: guy walked down the middle of the aisle smoking a cigarette.

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Speaker 4: He gets up on stage. He does the demonstration for

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Speaker 4: us to do, and the ashes never fall. I said,

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Speaker 4: this guy.

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Speaker 3: He just smoked to the end and the ashes just

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Speaker 3: grew and grew.

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Speaker 4: Hung there, but he did the combination turns and boom,

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Speaker 4: steps to step boom, and they stopped. Okay, do the steps.

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Speaker 4: We couldn't do the steps because you're too busy watching

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Speaker 4: the ashes see if they're in Fall.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So my mother is, you know, probably the show's

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Speaker 1: biggest fan, and.

399
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Speaker 2: She will scream on me.

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Speaker 1: You drop so many names that she'll scream on me

401
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Speaker 1: if I don't go in the further detail. And my

402
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Speaker 1: mom's from Pittsburgh. Okay, I'm gonna ask about Bob Fosse.

403
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Speaker 1: But you mentioned the legendary Martha Graham. You studying under it?

404
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Speaker 1: What was what was it like studying under Martha Graham?

405
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Speaker 4: Well, I didn't actually have a class about the Graham.

406
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Speaker 4: I studied with one of her dancers named David Woods. Okay,

407
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Speaker 4: it's one of the teachers there. It was amazing, you

408
00:22:48,440 --> 00:22:52,360
Speaker 4: know for me getting into the middle. The first day

409
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Speaker 4: of school, they have you line up and then they

410
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Speaker 4: have you change and you get dressed for your class.

411
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Speaker 4: You go to your glasses and my first day in school,

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Speaker 4: I wore my suit that I wore with the Sensational

413
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Speaker 4: Trials to Brooklyn. My mother bought me in the tashed sharecase.

414
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Speaker 4: I still like my tash shad case. And then they

415
00:23:11,840 --> 00:23:14,280
Speaker 4: said go get dressed. All the guys went and put

416
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Speaker 4: on their dance clothes. I put on my dance clothes,

417
00:23:16,560 --> 00:23:19,320
Speaker 4: put my suit back on. That's what it was raised,

418
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Speaker 4: you know, don't just walk around your underwear. So I

419
00:23:23,800 --> 00:23:25,760
Speaker 4: get back out there in my suit on. She said,

420
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Speaker 4: excuse me, doctor was saying, you're taking class of that.

421
00:23:28,400 --> 00:23:30,840
Speaker 4: I said yes. He said, well, where's your dance clothes?

422
00:23:30,880 --> 00:23:36,680
Speaker 4: I said, my suit You can't dance that way. Get

423
00:23:36,680 --> 00:23:38,960
Speaker 4: in there, put on your dance clothes. And that was

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Speaker 4: the beginning of wonderment. Yeah. But David Woods, who was

425
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Speaker 4: really the foundation of my actings as well, because he

426
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Speaker 4: would tell us, he say, you can't just dance. It's

427
00:23:50,880 --> 00:23:54,280
Speaker 4: got to tell a story. So find the story that

428
00:23:54,359 --> 00:23:57,200
Speaker 4: you want to tell through your movement. And that's why

429
00:23:57,280 --> 00:24:01,119
Speaker 4: dance is so personal to me. You know, in modern dance,

430
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Speaker 4: you must tell a story. It isn't about just steps.

431
00:24:04,760 --> 00:24:08,960
Speaker 4: It's about emotion. It's about the story that you're telling.

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Speaker 4: Although it may not be the choreographer may not is

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00:24:13,480 --> 00:24:15,679
Speaker 4: telling you his story. But you got to find your

434
00:24:15,760 --> 00:24:19,800
Speaker 4: story within the movement. What makes you move this way,

435
00:24:20,440 --> 00:24:23,000
Speaker 4: what makes you sing this way? What makes you tell

436
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:26,359
Speaker 4: your story through drama, through the word this way? You

437
00:24:26,400 --> 00:24:28,520
Speaker 4: have to create it, at least for me. You have

438
00:24:28,560 --> 00:24:31,879
Speaker 4: to relate to something within you that connects to that

439
00:24:32,520 --> 00:24:36,800
Speaker 4: emotion and that's how we dance be That's how I danced.

440
00:24:37,280 --> 00:24:39,320
Speaker 1: For a lot of us, at least for my generation.

441
00:24:40,000 --> 00:24:43,320
Speaker 1: This conversation is really transformational as far as like my

442
00:24:43,440 --> 00:24:46,360
Speaker 1: mind state, because I think every person thinks that their

443
00:24:46,480 --> 00:24:50,439
Speaker 1: era in the world is the kind of you know,

444
00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:53,080
Speaker 1: black and white, the color Wizard of Oz thing, like

445
00:24:53,160 --> 00:24:55,560
Speaker 1: everyone thinks like, oh, when I was born, then suddenly

446
00:24:55,600 --> 00:25:00,480
Speaker 1: modern times began. But you know, I would zoom that

447
00:25:00,680 --> 00:25:05,840
Speaker 1: until Roots came along, that a lot of African Americans

448
00:25:05,960 --> 00:25:09,720
Speaker 1: weren't even thinking in terms of their history going back

449
00:25:09,760 --> 00:25:13,200
Speaker 1: to Africa, unless you know, they were of the generation

450
00:25:13,240 --> 00:25:16,920
Speaker 1: that watched Tarzan as a kid in the fifties and sixties.

451
00:25:16,640 --> 00:25:19,080
Speaker 3: The Marcus Garvey movement, and he was down with.

452
00:25:19,080 --> 00:25:20,560
Speaker 2: That, right.

453
00:25:20,840 --> 00:25:23,760
Speaker 1: So what I'm asking you is when you're told to

454
00:25:23,840 --> 00:25:29,280
Speaker 1: tell your story and the vocabulary of our African history

455
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:34,360
Speaker 1: really wasn't super enforced unless you were part of specialized movements.

456
00:25:34,920 --> 00:25:39,439
Speaker 1: In your mind, when you are expressing yourself and reaching

457
00:25:39,480 --> 00:25:43,240
Speaker 1: inside for your emotions and through dance, what is it

458
00:25:43,280 --> 00:25:45,919
Speaker 1: that drove you creatively? Like what are you thinking of

459
00:25:46,040 --> 00:25:49,080
Speaker 1: when they're telling you tell your story?

460
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:54,879
Speaker 4: Well, I'm thinking of my emotional feelings and what I

461
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:59,560
Speaker 4: feel in that moment of death. Story makes sense, all

462
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:01,920
Speaker 4: right if I have safe For example, if I tell

463
00:26:01,920 --> 00:26:06,000
Speaker 4: a story of my listen, keep him we going to

464
00:26:06,160 --> 00:26:08,920
Speaker 4: performing us? What did that make you feel? Like? How

465
00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:11,400
Speaker 4: did you feel the first day you stepped on that stage,

466
00:26:11,760 --> 00:26:14,240
Speaker 4: when you stepped into that studio? What was it feeling

467
00:26:14,280 --> 00:26:16,480
Speaker 4: to you and feeling? What's that story that you want

468
00:26:16,480 --> 00:26:19,680
Speaker 4: to tell right there? And then that creates a whole movement,

469
00:26:20,280 --> 00:26:23,080
Speaker 4: yes for us coming up. And I was as far

470
00:26:23,080 --> 00:26:25,760
Speaker 4: as we're talking about ancestry now, when we talked about

471
00:26:25,800 --> 00:26:30,000
Speaker 4: black history in my school coming up in my era,

472
00:26:30,480 --> 00:26:34,919
Speaker 4: it was one paragraph your slave and Lincoln freed you,

473
00:26:34,920 --> 00:26:37,880
Speaker 4: you know, and we know that's not true. And long

474
00:26:38,000 --> 00:26:41,120
Speaker 4: comes a wonderful man named Alex Haley who says, I'm

475
00:26:41,119 --> 00:26:43,879
Speaker 4: going to devouch that because it's not true. And he

476
00:26:43,920 --> 00:26:47,320
Speaker 4: goes back to Gambia and he finds his roots, and

477
00:26:47,359 --> 00:26:50,560
Speaker 4: he writes a wonderful book called Roots. And we all

478
00:26:50,640 --> 00:26:54,280
Speaker 4: now say, and now the world is going whoa wait

479
00:26:54,280 --> 00:26:56,880
Speaker 4: a minute, waking up. There was more to it than

480
00:26:56,880 --> 00:26:59,920
Speaker 4: this what's in our history books. There's more to my story,

481
00:27:00,240 --> 00:27:03,359
Speaker 4: you see. It's so interesting. When Roots came out, it

482
00:27:03,440 --> 00:27:05,920
Speaker 4: was just the book, and I had heard about it,

483
00:27:06,440 --> 00:27:08,760
Speaker 4: and like a lot of us did, and I just

484
00:27:08,840 --> 00:27:11,639
Speaker 4: knew I wanted to be a part of that movie,

485
00:27:12,280 --> 00:27:14,720
Speaker 4: that TV series that was And I went to my

486
00:27:14,840 --> 00:27:19,359
Speaker 4: agent and I said to him, listen, there's this book.

487
00:27:19,440 --> 00:27:21,399
Speaker 4: I think ABC is gonna make a movie out of

488
00:27:21,400 --> 00:27:24,720
Speaker 4: it called Roots. Cinda, I really i'd like to be

489
00:27:24,920 --> 00:27:27,800
Speaker 4: to try out. What he says to me, Ben, you're

490
00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:31,840
Speaker 4: a song and dance man. They're looking for actors, he said,

491
00:27:31,880 --> 00:27:35,520
Speaker 4: So listen, there's a there's this group that starting out.

492
00:27:35,720 --> 00:27:39,560
Speaker 4: You got a big hit called your Family's Sister Sledge.

493
00:27:39,920 --> 00:27:41,960
Speaker 4: He says, they're going to open for you in Chicago,

494
00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:44,399
Speaker 4: So why don't you go do that? And you have

495
00:27:44,440 --> 00:27:46,960
Speaker 4: another to get for you guys down in Savannah. So

496
00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:50,160
Speaker 4: I said yeah, But Kenny said, Ben, they're looking for actors.

497
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:52,119
Speaker 4: So I get on I get on the plane. I

498
00:27:52,200 --> 00:27:54,280
Speaker 4: go to Chicago. This it's a Sledge. They opened to

499
00:27:54,320 --> 00:27:56,960
Speaker 4: be a wonderful these little girls, the little Girls, and

500
00:27:57,040 --> 00:27:59,080
Speaker 4: we get to Sabana, Georgia. He used to do a

501
00:27:59,160 --> 00:28:04,800
Speaker 4: character called Burt Williams about my ancestry, about the performer.

502
00:28:05,240 --> 00:28:08,480
Speaker 4: There was a time in American history where black people

503
00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:11,520
Speaker 4: in the theater were not allowed on stage unless we

504
00:28:11,560 --> 00:28:14,159
Speaker 4: wore a black face. And he went through that. So

505
00:28:14,240 --> 00:28:17,560
Speaker 4: I told that story and coming at the show that

506
00:28:17,600 --> 00:28:21,800
Speaker 4: afternoon in Savannah, Georgia, there was a guy came backstage

507
00:28:21,840 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 4: and they would staying Margolis and he said, I want

508
00:28:25,040 --> 00:28:28,880
Speaker 4: you to read my Chicken George And I said, I said, said,

509
00:28:28,920 --> 00:28:30,919
Speaker 4: what's the chicken George? He said, We'll shoe me down

510
00:28:30,920 --> 00:28:34,719
Speaker 4: here shooting a show called Roots. He said, Michael, And

511
00:28:34,760 --> 00:28:37,880
Speaker 4: I said, I don't care, man, if Chicken George's guy

512
00:28:37,920 --> 00:28:40,040
Speaker 4: in the boat going, let me out of here. Let

513
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:43,360
Speaker 4: me out of here, please please, I'll be there. And

514
00:28:43,400 --> 00:28:45,880
Speaker 4: that's how I got the bar. I had no idea

515
00:28:46,080 --> 00:28:49,120
Speaker 4: how deep it was going to go and what I mean.

516
00:28:49,480 --> 00:28:52,880
Speaker 4: It opened up a whole avenue for me and for

517
00:28:52,960 --> 00:28:56,960
Speaker 4: all of us to look back and honor our ancestry,

518
00:28:57,120 --> 00:29:00,760
Speaker 4: which we must continue to do. This stay four because

519
00:29:00,800 --> 00:29:04,800
Speaker 4: our ancestry of the reason why we're here today, their struggle,

520
00:29:05,280 --> 00:29:12,360
Speaker 4: their fight, their determination to go through slavery. Imagine coming

521
00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:17,840
Speaker 4: across the water, having being stolen from your family, you're

522
00:29:17,840 --> 00:29:21,960
Speaker 4: on and you're put on chains. Change what was a chain,

523
00:29:22,560 --> 00:29:24,960
Speaker 4: and you're being put on a boat on and you

524
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:27,520
Speaker 4: put to an island, and you're gone away with a

525
00:29:27,520 --> 00:29:30,440
Speaker 4: bunch of people you've never seen. The white and you

526
00:29:30,520 --> 00:29:33,880
Speaker 4: see a bunch of other people your color were not

527
00:29:34,000 --> 00:29:38,080
Speaker 4: the same languages, and we're all chained inside this boat

528
00:29:38,480 --> 00:29:41,680
Speaker 4: and someone jumping off the side. They refuse to go

529
00:29:41,800 --> 00:29:44,080
Speaker 4: to they're gonna know what's gonna happen. They don't want

530
00:29:44,080 --> 00:29:46,560
Speaker 4: to be a part of it. But the bravery of

531
00:29:46,640 --> 00:29:50,520
Speaker 4: those people went through that passage and stood on that

532
00:29:50,920 --> 00:29:55,240
Speaker 4: on that slave block and watch their families being torn apart,

533
00:29:55,560 --> 00:29:59,680
Speaker 4: which which I think in my mind, destroyed our culture together.

534
00:29:59,800 --> 00:30:07,360
Speaker 4: The that strength and to tell their stories to be forgotten. No, no,

535
00:30:07,400 --> 00:30:08,160
Speaker 4: not on my watch.

536
00:30:09,080 --> 00:30:12,680
Speaker 2: How long did they give you to prepare that role?

537
00:30:13,400 --> 00:30:18,000
Speaker 1: Take us through the process of preparing, executing, and then

538
00:30:18,120 --> 00:30:19,080
Speaker 1: leaving that character.

539
00:30:19,680 --> 00:30:20,960
Speaker 4: I never looked their character.

540
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:25,880
Speaker 2: Boy all right, chicken joys.

541
00:30:27,640 --> 00:30:33,360
Speaker 4: Well, for me, it was all because understand, my family

542
00:30:33,600 --> 00:30:37,200
Speaker 4: we never sat around and talked about then, because we

543
00:30:37,200 --> 00:30:41,760
Speaker 4: were surviving in the now. My family was the educators

544
00:30:41,880 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 4: or the the you know, they were not of that elk,

545
00:30:45,760 --> 00:30:49,640
Speaker 4: you know, if they were field workers, you know, survivors,

546
00:30:50,040 --> 00:30:53,760
Speaker 4: and so We never sat around and talked about education,

547
00:30:54,360 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 4: about government, about what's going on day to day survival.

548
00:30:59,640 --> 00:31:02,400
Speaker 4: So I got this. I knew there was a deeper story.

549
00:31:02,880 --> 00:31:05,720
Speaker 4: When I got the opportunity to tell my story, it

550
00:31:05,760 --> 00:31:08,160
Speaker 4: was like, how do I find my research? So I

551
00:31:08,240 --> 00:31:11,480
Speaker 4: called my elders. You know, can you tell me about

552
00:31:11,680 --> 00:31:14,560
Speaker 4: what it was like during this time that time? And

553
00:31:14,680 --> 00:31:17,920
Speaker 4: you know, and a lot of it came from imagination

554
00:31:18,080 --> 00:31:21,920
Speaker 4: once again, what it must have felt like. And Chicken

555
00:31:22,000 --> 00:31:24,600
Speaker 4: George was so he's so beautiful. You know, the one

556
00:31:24,640 --> 00:31:26,959
Speaker 4: thing I do is that when I get to a character,

557
00:31:27,200 --> 00:31:30,760
Speaker 4: especially someone like Chicken George, I asked permission to enter

558
00:31:30,840 --> 00:31:35,200
Speaker 4: into that realm of consciousness and what's been like for you?

559
00:31:36,280 --> 00:31:39,920
Speaker 4: Educate me, teach me. And he took me on his journey.

560
00:31:40,640 --> 00:31:44,720
Speaker 4: And I tell you the respect and the admiration that

561
00:31:44,800 --> 00:31:48,040
Speaker 4: the cast and the crew had doing that, it was amazing.

562
00:31:48,720 --> 00:31:49,560
Speaker 4: It was amazing.

563
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:50,920
Speaker 3: Did it feel safe?

564
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:53,400
Speaker 5: Did they provide like a cause you know in twenty

565
00:31:53,520 --> 00:31:55,760
Speaker 5: twenty if you guys made this in twenty twenty four

566
00:31:55,840 --> 00:31:57,720
Speaker 5: or twenty five, there would be all kind.

567
00:31:57,560 --> 00:31:59,040
Speaker 3: Of counseling on set.

568
00:31:59,520 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 5: And you know, when you when you broke out a

569
00:32:01,440 --> 00:32:03,760
Speaker 5: character there'd be somebody to make sure are you okay?

570
00:32:04,360 --> 00:32:05,680
Speaker 3: Like, how did y'all handle that?

571
00:32:06,080 --> 00:32:06,120
Speaker 4: No?

572
00:32:07,360 --> 00:32:09,480
Speaker 6: Not in twenty twenty four, sorry to jump in now,

573
00:32:10,120 --> 00:32:10,640
Speaker 6: please go.

574
00:32:10,800 --> 00:32:14,040
Speaker 3: Please cabar that will come later. Oh not in twenty

575
00:32:14,080 --> 00:32:15,800
Speaker 3: twenty four, My bad. Okay, yeah.

576
00:32:16,680 --> 00:32:20,200
Speaker 4: Four. During that time, it was self nurturing. And that's

577
00:32:20,200 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 4: why I say the cat the crew, even the crew

578
00:32:23,120 --> 00:32:26,200
Speaker 4: was aware that we were touching upon something that was

579
00:32:27,160 --> 00:32:31,080
Speaker 4: in other words, I hate to use this word but taboo.

580
00:32:32,080 --> 00:32:36,920
Speaker 4: But the respect and reverence that the crew had and

581
00:32:36,960 --> 00:32:39,280
Speaker 4: would like to see that one scene I never forget

582
00:32:39,360 --> 00:32:43,240
Speaker 4: the scene where Richard Rowntree was dating my mother time

583
00:32:43,600 --> 00:32:46,520
Speaker 4: Leslie other one was playing kissing and there's a scene

584
00:32:46,560 --> 00:32:50,000
Speaker 4: where she had talked him into taking her to find

585
00:32:50,080 --> 00:32:53,520
Speaker 4: her father and they go back and they're late coming

586
00:32:53,560 --> 00:32:59,000
Speaker 4: back to the plantation and his masa at the time

587
00:32:59,800 --> 00:33:04,240
Speaker 4: were supposed to chastise him and Richard round. She was

588
00:33:04,280 --> 00:33:07,720
Speaker 4: supposed to beg for him, not to beat him. And

589
00:33:07,720 --> 00:33:11,400
Speaker 4: I'll never get this. Richard said, you want me to

590
00:33:11,400 --> 00:33:14,440
Speaker 4: grobble to a white man? Do you know why? I

591
00:33:14,480 --> 00:33:19,200
Speaker 4: am mm hmmm. I don't groobble for no white man.

592
00:33:19,880 --> 00:33:23,200
Speaker 4: And the director said said Richard, we need this just

593
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:25,760
Speaker 4: for the next scene. He said, nord to he said,

594
00:33:26,040 --> 00:33:28,440
Speaker 4: he said, you can do this. He says, I ain't

595
00:33:28,480 --> 00:33:33,560
Speaker 4: grabbling and no white man, it's like that. And he said, well,

596
00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:38,760
Speaker 4: he said, just one time, he said. He looked around,

597
00:33:38,800 --> 00:33:41,720
Speaker 4: He looked at at Kissey and my mother Leslie, looked

598
00:33:41,760 --> 00:33:44,520
Speaker 4: at the castle and the crew. You went, you got

599
00:33:44,560 --> 00:33:48,120
Speaker 4: one shot. And he gets down. He does that scene

600
00:33:48,160 --> 00:33:50,360
Speaker 4: where he says, please bost some morsel, don't beat me,

601
00:33:50,760 --> 00:33:53,200
Speaker 4: and we just finished. The director said, goud, okay, that

602
00:33:53,280 --> 00:33:58,440
Speaker 4: was a good friend. Anybody go home sake, Okay, thank you,

603
00:33:58,520 --> 00:34:01,240
Speaker 4: thank you very much. Because it was like, I mean,

604
00:34:01,320 --> 00:34:03,440
Speaker 4: all of a sudden, we had to reflect on the

605
00:34:03,480 --> 00:34:07,640
Speaker 4: fact that what it must have been like to have

606
00:34:07,880 --> 00:34:13,719
Speaker 4: the wobble to white people for our survival. That the

607
00:34:13,840 --> 00:34:18,799
Speaker 4: big you know, I think about my oof, don't get

608
00:34:18,840 --> 00:34:29,279
Speaker 4: me started. I think about what people went through as slaves, kings, inventors, doctors,

609
00:34:30,320 --> 00:34:37,759
Speaker 4: leaders being stripped. We built empires and civilizations and now

610
00:34:37,800 --> 00:34:41,080
Speaker 4: we are at the bottom of the chain. They gave

611
00:34:41,200 --> 00:34:45,080
Speaker 4: us slop and we made it a cuisine. We made

612
00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:45,800
Speaker 4: it a cuisine.

613
00:34:46,040 --> 00:34:48,440
Speaker 5: I can't even get to that extent of thought it

614
00:34:48,480 --> 00:34:51,040
Speaker 5: makes me think of also the artists who have had

615
00:34:51,040 --> 00:34:53,879
Speaker 5: to play these roles. And it's funny because as you said,

616
00:34:53,920 --> 00:34:55,960
Speaker 5: as you said, this was a taboo thing and now

617
00:34:56,000 --> 00:34:58,760
Speaker 5: it's not. Now we've had several movies that have followed,

618
00:34:58,760 --> 00:35:01,240
Speaker 5: and it makes me think about all the black actors

619
00:35:01,239 --> 00:35:04,520
Speaker 5: who have had to tackle these rolls, like from Chiwaitali,

620
00:35:04,640 --> 00:35:08,640
Speaker 5: Joe for to Jamie Fox, to Lapita and Jongo. And

621
00:35:08,680 --> 00:35:11,279
Speaker 5: I'm curious if anybody ever reached back to you and went,

622
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:12,919
Speaker 5: how did you do this?

623
00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:16,000
Speaker 3: How did you do this thing?

624
00:35:16,080 --> 00:35:20,640
Speaker 4: Because we who were there at the first beginning a

625
00:35:20,800 --> 00:35:24,439
Speaker 4: waiting to say this is how we did it? Because

626
00:35:24,600 --> 00:35:29,000
Speaker 4: what annoysment? I loved my brother LaVar Burdon loved him,

627
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 4: yet he felt that maybe I let me take it

628
00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:34,640
Speaker 4: this way, but he never allowed us to talk to

629
00:35:34,840 --> 00:35:38,879
Speaker 4: the cast, They say, what did you go through? How

630
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:40,759
Speaker 4: did you get there this point? Oh?

631
00:35:40,800 --> 00:35:42,720
Speaker 3: With the newer roots? Are you talking about the new roots?

632
00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:44,000
Speaker 3: The newer roots?

633
00:35:44,760 --> 00:35:48,279
Speaker 4: I said, Okay, they did a good job, but as

634
00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:50,520
Speaker 4: far as they could do. But we could have given

635
00:35:50,560 --> 00:35:54,280
Speaker 4: them another layer that's much deeper, because we were there.

636
00:35:54,800 --> 00:35:56,920
Speaker 3: We were I was curious about thank you for answering

637
00:35:56,920 --> 00:35:57,440
Speaker 3: that question.

638
00:35:58,400 --> 00:36:02,800
Speaker 4: We cried and wept and what to do, but we

639
00:36:02,880 --> 00:36:04,799
Speaker 4: knew we had to do it for the art and

640
00:36:04,880 --> 00:36:09,120
Speaker 4: to tell the truth story as far as Hollywood would

641
00:36:09,160 --> 00:36:12,200
Speaker 4: allow us to tell the truth stories. You understand, Ruth

642
00:36:12,360 --> 00:36:16,960
Speaker 4: just scrounged upon the surface really went down, But what

643
00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:19,920
Speaker 4: really went down you can do those wounds, you go deeper.

644
00:36:20,760 --> 00:36:24,720
Speaker 4: They were knights. I come home and my wife Nancy,

645
00:36:25,560 --> 00:36:28,239
Speaker 4: she go you okay, I say yeah, And nights I

646
00:36:28,320 --> 00:36:32,040
Speaker 4: was just being tears, like okay, okay, and let me

647
00:36:32,080 --> 00:36:35,360
Speaker 4: get myself ready, Okay, let's go do the scene. And

648
00:36:35,400 --> 00:36:37,920
Speaker 4: although I was friend chicken George, who was like a dandy,

649
00:36:38,160 --> 00:36:40,040
Speaker 4: but there was that moment when he finds out his

650
00:36:40,080 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 4: father is white. It's what he's gone through. And watching

651
00:36:44,680 --> 00:36:50,239
Speaker 4: your fellow neighbor, brothers, sister, they whipped because they didn't

652
00:36:50,280 --> 00:36:52,480
Speaker 4: want to pick up something they didn't want to do,

653
00:36:52,560 --> 00:36:54,960
Speaker 4: so they said the same wrong thing because they were

654
00:36:55,080 --> 00:36:58,040
Speaker 4: field niggas, then the house niggas. Because it's to you

655
00:36:58,040 --> 00:37:03,839
Speaker 4: a little better with the field telling those stories. And

656
00:37:03,880 --> 00:37:07,839
Speaker 4: I think those stories have not been told enough. As

657
00:37:07,840 --> 00:37:10,680
Speaker 4: long as my Jewish brothers and sisters can tell us

658
00:37:10,719 --> 00:37:15,359
Speaker 4: about the Holocaust. We must talk about our Holocaust. Excuse me.

659
00:37:15,760 --> 00:37:16,240
Speaker 3: I agreed.

660
00:37:16,520 --> 00:37:21,080
Speaker 4: Let's read so we know where we are going, otherwise

661
00:37:21,120 --> 00:37:22,600
Speaker 4: they will do it to us again.

662
00:37:28,160 --> 00:37:30,480
Speaker 5: Did this journey at all make you want to go

663
00:37:30,560 --> 00:37:33,799
Speaker 5: back to your own roots and find out about who

664
00:37:33,920 --> 00:37:36,439
Speaker 5: you are? And can you talk about that a little bit?

665
00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:42,040
Speaker 4: When I was with Sammy Davis Junior, I got I

666
00:37:42,080 --> 00:37:45,719
Speaker 4: was finishing a movie called Sweet Charity with Shortian McClair, Yep,

667
00:37:46,480 --> 00:37:50,120
Speaker 4: Davis Junior and Sammy and I was, I was, I

668
00:37:50,200 --> 00:37:55,280
Speaker 4: was feeling pissed to Sammy. Why well, sam went on

669
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:58,320
Speaker 4: on TV television, those dames. He had three channels. The

670
00:37:58,400 --> 00:38:01,520
Speaker 4: fourth channel came out and he said, well, you know,

671
00:38:01,600 --> 00:38:04,120
Speaker 4: I know how how hard it is for us in

672
00:38:04,200 --> 00:38:07,960
Speaker 4: this business. So there's any young black entertainer out there?

673
00:38:07,960 --> 00:38:13,960
Speaker 4: I think no? In those days were negroes in colored right.

674
00:38:14,800 --> 00:38:17,640
Speaker 4: I want to talk to me. I'm open to talking

675
00:38:17,719 --> 00:38:20,120
Speaker 4: to him. I mean, you know how much courage it

676
00:38:20,160 --> 00:38:22,120
Speaker 4: took me to get up the skids from Brooklyn and

677
00:38:22,160 --> 00:38:26,520
Speaker 4: we opened Caesar's Palace. I'm there Caesar's Palace and I'm

678
00:38:26,560 --> 00:38:30,880
Speaker 4: going into Casino, which I'm hearing stories. Lean on hornhurlbelly

679
00:38:31,080 --> 00:38:33,279
Speaker 4: had to be in trailers outside and walk through the

680
00:38:33,280 --> 00:38:35,680
Speaker 4: slop before they got on stage. Now I'm staying in

681
00:38:35,760 --> 00:38:38,600
Speaker 4: a hole in an apartment right across the street from

682
00:38:38,760 --> 00:38:41,680
Speaker 4: from the Caesar's Palace, and I'm coming in there and

683
00:38:41,719 --> 00:38:44,680
Speaker 4: I'm standing there. I see Joe esuis walking down and

684
00:38:44,760 --> 00:38:47,759
Speaker 4: how Tomorrow giv him money. And I'm sending wipe that

685
00:38:47,880 --> 00:38:50,799
Speaker 4: still gave me money to gamble, And I mean, I'm like, wow,

686
00:38:50,920 --> 00:38:53,600
Speaker 4: I'm skips from Brooklyn look at me. And then Sammy

687
00:38:53,600 --> 00:38:57,640
Speaker 4: says he'll talk to me. Yes. So I'm waiting one

688
00:38:57,719 --> 00:38:59,960
Speaker 4: day for sam to come to me Rose Nook, which

689
00:39:00,120 --> 00:39:02,640
Speaker 4: the lounge the head there with people like Jack Machel

690
00:39:02,760 --> 00:39:05,880
Speaker 4: hangout and the platters and and so he was coming

691
00:39:05,920 --> 00:39:08,560
Speaker 4: and walking with fifty of his closest friends. So I

692
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:13,320
Speaker 4: walk over and I go, miss mister Davis, I heard

693
00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:16,920
Speaker 4: that he said, talk to my secretary. I went, what

694
00:39:18,120 --> 00:39:23,080
Speaker 4: mm hmm, really okay. So then I get to show

695
00:39:23,080 --> 00:39:27,319
Speaker 4: Sweet Charity. I'm on tour with with Cheter rivera end

696
00:39:27,400 --> 00:39:30,360
Speaker 4: up in catalog. I get a telegram we want it.

697
00:39:30,480 --> 00:39:33,360
Speaker 4: I'm doing Daddy Blue Bank a role in the show.

698
00:39:33,560 --> 00:39:35,440
Speaker 4: You know, I got to sing my own solo I

699
00:39:35,520 --> 00:39:39,239
Speaker 4: was excited all let Bob Fosk and trusted business role.

700
00:39:39,600 --> 00:39:41,799
Speaker 4: Now I get this telegram we want you to come

701
00:39:41,840 --> 00:39:46,520
Speaker 4: to Hollywood to star in the movie Sweet Charity, and

702
00:39:46,520 --> 00:39:49,200
Speaker 4: I went, wow, I'm gonna do doing the role. Oh

703
00:39:49,280 --> 00:39:51,480
Speaker 4: Daddy brew Bank. Then I get to the movie and

704
00:39:51,520 --> 00:39:53,879
Speaker 4: they said, no, Sammy Davis is gonna do this role.

705
00:39:54,360 --> 00:39:59,319
Speaker 4: Saturday attitude. Chake my role too, man, I have done

706
00:39:59,800 --> 00:40:03,080
Speaker 4: do with you. He walks in and say says, Samy's

707
00:40:03,120 --> 00:40:05,239
Speaker 4: too sick to do the row. I went, whoa, I'm

708
00:40:05,280 --> 00:40:08,279
Speaker 4: gonna put apart. Yeah, so I'm standing on line and

709
00:40:08,320 --> 00:40:10,840
Speaker 4: who should walk through the door in the wheelchair? Sammy

710
00:40:10,960 --> 00:40:15,080
Speaker 4: David Juni and everybody goes, oh, sam oh Sam, I say,

711
00:40:15,160 --> 00:40:20,200
Speaker 4: I do I sit back? So saf notices I have

712
00:40:20,280 --> 00:40:24,160
Speaker 4: this attitude man. He goes, yeah, don't come on the

713
00:40:24,160 --> 00:40:27,279
Speaker 4: stories say fight everybody, fight everybody over. We're gonna have

714
00:40:27,320 --> 00:40:31,319
Speaker 4: this much with everybody. Everybody goes, I stand outside. So

715
00:40:31,360 --> 00:40:34,359
Speaker 4: Sammy sends over on his henchmen. He says, uh, mister

716
00:40:34,480 --> 00:40:37,000
Speaker 4: Davis likes to have dinner with you in Little Santa Monica.

717
00:40:37,880 --> 00:40:42,160
Speaker 4: I said, yeah, right, cool. I got so excited, I'm

718
00:40:42,200 --> 00:40:47,239
Speaker 4: gonna put brand New Soon I got the little got

719
00:40:47,239 --> 00:40:49,319
Speaker 4: to the hotel like an hour before. Right, I went

720
00:40:49,800 --> 00:40:52,720
Speaker 4: in the restaurant. I said, mister, my name is benjam Veren,

721
00:40:53,120 --> 00:40:55,520
Speaker 4: and miss Davids Many said, wait who wo wo wo

722
00:40:55,600 --> 00:40:58,719
Speaker 4: wo wo. Well not here, you know, let's see if

723
00:40:58,719 --> 00:41:03,080
Speaker 4: you're in the list. Listen Benjamin, Yeah, okay, come in.

724
00:41:03,160 --> 00:41:05,280
Speaker 4: So I go to this long table and I'm sitting

725
00:41:05,320 --> 00:41:08,240
Speaker 4: his long table. As I got there, like at six thirty.

726
00:41:08,600 --> 00:41:10,640
Speaker 4: We want to be there at seven seven things dinner.

727
00:41:11,280 --> 00:41:14,640
Speaker 4: And I'm looking around the room. There's Joey Bishop, There's

728
00:41:14,880 --> 00:41:19,239
Speaker 4: you know, Dean Martin, there's Lucio Ball, all these celebrities

729
00:41:19,239 --> 00:41:22,520
Speaker 4: sitting around, and I'm sitting this long table smoking, waiting

730
00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:27,839
Speaker 4: for Sammy. Nine thirty. No, Sammy, I'm sitting there at nine.

731
00:41:28,920 --> 00:41:31,320
Speaker 4: I said, okay, say you guys, you're not coming. So

732
00:41:31,480 --> 00:41:33,560
Speaker 4: I got up. I started to leave. Who walks in

733
00:41:33,640 --> 00:41:36,920
Speaker 4: Sammy with the same fifty closest friends, He says, So

734
00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:41,000
Speaker 4: sit down, sit sener. He says, you know, I did

735
00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:44,520
Speaker 4: a show called Golden Boys some years ago on Broadway

736
00:41:44,600 --> 00:41:46,760
Speaker 4: and think about doing it again taking it to London.

737
00:41:47,400 --> 00:41:49,200
Speaker 4: So well, now it's a different time because we have

738
00:41:49,280 --> 00:41:52,080
Speaker 4: the black panthers. There's a black movement going on, and

739
00:41:53,160 --> 00:41:58,600
Speaker 4: we need somebody who's angry, who's the fire And his

740
00:41:58,760 --> 00:42:02,520
Speaker 4: agent says, nudget, we go asking for the role, and

741
00:42:02,640 --> 00:42:05,880
Speaker 4: what is asking for the role? I said, missus David,

742
00:42:05,960 --> 00:42:08,239
Speaker 4: we got the role. So he hires me to do

743
00:42:08,280 --> 00:42:11,799
Speaker 4: poll the Boy. Right. So we says, now we're going

744
00:42:11,840 --> 00:42:15,200
Speaker 4: to do the show, uh in Chicago. Then we're going

745
00:42:15,239 --> 00:42:18,319
Speaker 4: to London, and he says, we have a passport. I said, no,

746
00:42:18,400 --> 00:42:22,640
Speaker 4: I don't I have a passport. He said oh. He said, okay,

747
00:42:23,960 --> 00:42:26,359
Speaker 4: just right down to where you were you were born

748
00:42:26,400 --> 00:42:28,239
Speaker 4: and you'll send you your birth certification. We got the

749
00:42:28,280 --> 00:42:31,759
Speaker 4: crassport and you're gone. I said, okay, so right down

750
00:42:31,840 --> 00:42:35,520
Speaker 4: to Florida. Mimi flund I get this letter back saying

751
00:42:35,800 --> 00:42:38,960
Speaker 4: we do not have a Benjamin Augustus Verene born to

752
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:42,840
Speaker 4: an SSI Varene. However we do have are born to

753
00:42:42,840 --> 00:42:46,759
Speaker 4: a Pauline Verene. However, we do have a Benjamin Augustus

754
00:42:46,960 --> 00:42:51,920
Speaker 4: Middleton born to an SSI middle East Middleton on that date.

755
00:42:54,360 --> 00:42:58,160
Speaker 2: What wait, that's how you found your roots?

756
00:42:58,960 --> 00:43:03,879
Speaker 4: So I called my mother. I said, Mom, you got

757
00:43:03,920 --> 00:43:05,759
Speaker 4: to call these people. I'm saying any days, you don't

758
00:43:05,760 --> 00:43:08,520
Speaker 4: take him to London. And I ain't need my passport,

759
00:43:08,680 --> 00:43:11,759
Speaker 4: I need you. And they say, said I read a

760
00:43:11,840 --> 00:43:17,000
Speaker 4: letter and she went it was quiet. I said, mom,

761
00:43:17,800 --> 00:43:21,200
Speaker 4: whoa and she said, I was hoping you'd never know.

762
00:43:25,040 --> 00:43:25,160
Speaker 5: Hm.

763
00:43:26,560 --> 00:43:29,720
Speaker 4: And that's how I had my journey, then my my daughter.

764
00:43:29,840 --> 00:43:32,800
Speaker 4: When I had my daughters, you know, they came to me.

765
00:43:33,400 --> 00:43:36,120
Speaker 4: Babies came to me and said, Dad, all we have

766
00:43:36,360 --> 00:43:40,520
Speaker 4: is mom, and but we don't have any We're gonna

767
00:43:40,520 --> 00:43:43,239
Speaker 4: have children one day, and we didn't know who's in

768
00:43:43,320 --> 00:43:47,839
Speaker 4: our So I said, okay, So I started searching. I

769
00:43:47,920 --> 00:43:51,400
Speaker 4: was down in Mexico and ran to a friend named

770
00:43:51,480 --> 00:43:54,600
Speaker 4: uh La Fever Rocks and the Fever and this lady

771
00:43:54,640 --> 00:43:56,120
Speaker 4: and I got to talk and went to Mexico to

772
00:43:56,120 --> 00:44:00,400
Speaker 4: get vitamin drip because in those days invited the States been.

773
00:44:01,880 --> 00:44:04,560
Speaker 4: So I go down to meet her and we go

774
00:44:04,640 --> 00:44:07,200
Speaker 4: to dinner, and I stought. She starts telling me she's

775
00:44:07,200 --> 00:44:10,120
Speaker 4: a genealogist. So I said, oh yeah, I said, well,

776
00:44:10,320 --> 00:44:13,120
Speaker 4: and I saw telling my story. She said, well, why

777
00:44:13,160 --> 00:44:16,280
Speaker 4: don't we go searching? So I go to an office

778
00:44:16,320 --> 00:44:18,879
Speaker 4: in Washington and see she worked for the Pearson And

779
00:44:18,920 --> 00:44:21,840
Speaker 4: that's when the journey began and I found my family

780
00:44:21,840 --> 00:44:24,399
Speaker 4: about what is it Toborrow sixteen years ago?

781
00:44:24,680 --> 00:44:26,759
Speaker 6: Yeah, fifteen years ago around.

782
00:44:27,200 --> 00:44:30,040
Speaker 4: My family And here's the ironic thing, he said, We

783
00:44:30,120 --> 00:44:32,279
Speaker 4: all read this in the book. The book is much

784
00:44:32,320 --> 00:44:33,760
Speaker 4: better than this interview.

785
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:37,759
Speaker 1: This interview is much better than your career retrospective. Like

786
00:44:38,480 --> 00:44:41,000
Speaker 1: this might be my favorite episode of the Quest of Supreme.

787
00:44:41,920 --> 00:44:43,120
Speaker 1: I did not know this was coming.

788
00:44:43,840 --> 00:44:46,760
Speaker 4: So we start searching, and here we is a wonderful story.

789
00:44:47,760 --> 00:44:52,239
Speaker 4: When I got married at a very young age, it

790
00:44:52,320 --> 00:44:56,480
Speaker 4: was to the bishop's daughter of the Holiness Church. When

791
00:44:56,520 --> 00:44:59,839
Speaker 4: I find my family, come to find out my grandfather

792
00:45:00,480 --> 00:45:03,600
Speaker 4: was the originator of the Holiness churches in the South

793
00:45:04,440 --> 00:45:10,839
Speaker 4: pier Since, now here's the thing. My first father in law,

794
00:45:11,239 --> 00:45:15,120
Speaker 4: we go to a place in Connecticut. We haveing Connecticut.

795
00:45:15,360 --> 00:45:18,279
Speaker 4: We had a thing called Complication. That's where you know,

796
00:45:18,280 --> 00:45:20,600
Speaker 4: all the black churches get together and we celebrate the other.

797
00:45:21,840 --> 00:45:25,440
Speaker 4: And so when I found my family, I called my

798
00:45:25,520 --> 00:45:28,759
Speaker 4: sister Gloria, and it was so weird. You know how

799
00:45:28,800 --> 00:45:33,200
Speaker 4: it is you find you just like it was what

800
00:45:33,360 --> 00:45:38,840
Speaker 4: a conversation. I said, hello, she said hi, I said Gloria.

801
00:45:39,160 --> 00:45:43,239
Speaker 4: She said yeah, I said, my name is Benjamin, I'm

802
00:45:43,280 --> 00:45:46,360
Speaker 4: your brother. She said, yeah, they're telling me. You told

803
00:45:46,360 --> 00:45:48,960
Speaker 4: me that. So how she found out? She said that

804
00:45:49,120 --> 00:45:52,560
Speaker 4: someone called and said you better sit down. He said,

805
00:45:52,800 --> 00:45:55,480
Speaker 4: well she got another brother. Said I don't know, I

806
00:45:55,480 --> 00:45:59,200
Speaker 4: got a brother. Said no, you better sit down. Yeah.

807
00:45:59,239 --> 00:46:00,959
Speaker 3: I said, it's your oldest sister.

808
00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:08,360
Speaker 4: Huh, oldest sister. You have a Yeah, his name is Benjamin,

809
00:46:09,160 --> 00:46:13,960
Speaker 4: said Benjamin. She said yeah, She said, I got my Eugene.

810
00:46:14,040 --> 00:46:17,160
Speaker 4: I got She said, no, you have another brother. His

811
00:46:17,320 --> 00:46:21,440
Speaker 4: name is ben Vereen. You better sit down. So I

812
00:46:21,640 --> 00:46:25,000
Speaker 4: call her and I say who I am, introduced myself

813
00:46:25,360 --> 00:46:29,560
Speaker 4: and they said that year they were having the my family.

814
00:46:29,600 --> 00:46:33,520
Speaker 4: Part of the family was about the Pearsons, and so

815
00:46:33,760 --> 00:46:37,759
Speaker 4: in Connecticut. Now I lived an hour away from my

816
00:46:37,920 --> 00:46:44,680
Speaker 4: mother my entire life and never never. And here's the thing.

817
00:46:44,719 --> 00:46:48,640
Speaker 4: We're sitting at the table at the reunion and my

818
00:46:48,760 --> 00:46:53,440
Speaker 4: wife there, my children, my grandchildren, and we're sitting there celebrating.

819
00:46:53,719 --> 00:46:55,760
Speaker 4: There was only supposed to be fifty p or sixty

820
00:46:55,760 --> 00:46:58,319
Speaker 4: people showing up. It was one hundred or two hundred

821
00:46:58,320 --> 00:46:59,799
Speaker 4: people showed up. When they found out I was part

822
00:46:59,800 --> 00:47:02,920
Speaker 4: of the family, they all come to Connecticut. Who was

823
00:47:02,960 --> 00:47:05,760
Speaker 4: sitting at the table and in walks my first wife's

824
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:09,720
Speaker 4: aunt and she looks at me. She said, you're Essie's son.

825
00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:14,880
Speaker 4: Oh god, yes, she said, ESSI was my best friend.

826
00:47:16,480 --> 00:47:20,520
Speaker 4: I could have been in church with my first family

827
00:47:21,239 --> 00:47:24,680
Speaker 4: sitting next to my mother and never knew it.

828
00:47:25,440 --> 00:47:30,800
Speaker 6: And it's heartbreaking because she also really admired him an artist,

829
00:47:30,920 --> 00:47:33,400
Speaker 6: and she was a fan of his, and she would

830
00:47:33,719 --> 00:47:36,880
Speaker 6: when he was on television, she would shut off. She

831
00:47:36,880 --> 00:47:39,520
Speaker 6: would tell everybody to be quiet because she had to

832
00:47:39,560 --> 00:47:44,120
Speaker 6: have full attention on my father's performances. But she didn't

833
00:47:44,120 --> 00:47:44,959
Speaker 6: know that was her son.

834
00:47:45,040 --> 00:47:49,600
Speaker 4: It's so heartbreaking, he said, did not didn't know, And I.

835
00:47:53,400 --> 00:47:55,719
Speaker 2: No, I'm messed up.

836
00:47:56,320 --> 00:47:58,600
Speaker 4: She was gone when I found she got to stand something.

837
00:47:58,760 --> 00:48:01,640
Speaker 4: In the black Communitian those days, they do things like that.

838
00:48:01,800 --> 00:48:04,479
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like you just send somebody off

839
00:48:04,600 --> 00:48:05,879
Speaker 5: or you you know.

840
00:48:05,880 --> 00:48:09,000
Speaker 4: You just like you know me. Look, the woman lived

841
00:48:09,080 --> 00:48:12,000
Speaker 4: upstairs with us on Herkim the street. She had fourteen

842
00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:15,120
Speaker 4: kids because the government said you don't have to work,

843
00:48:15,200 --> 00:48:19,040
Speaker 4: just have babies, so she'd have babies, you know. And

844
00:48:19,200 --> 00:48:20,840
Speaker 4: there was a lot of that going on in what

845
00:48:20,880 --> 00:48:23,920
Speaker 4: they called the ghetto. Yeah, and so my mother is

846
00:48:24,239 --> 00:48:26,960
Speaker 4: my mother. The story I got was, my mother just

847
00:48:27,000 --> 00:48:29,840
Speaker 4: came from New Orleans where she got into an altercation

848
00:48:29,920 --> 00:48:33,719
Speaker 4: and beautiful and she's working as an orderly at the

849
00:48:33,719 --> 00:48:36,400
Speaker 4: hospital in Miami. She was coming home one night. She

850
00:48:36,440 --> 00:48:39,279
Speaker 4: told me it was raining and she was standing in

851
00:48:39,360 --> 00:48:41,759
Speaker 4: the hall in the storeway, and there was this woman

852
00:48:41,880 --> 00:48:44,680
Speaker 4: standing beside us, pregnant, and they got a conversation. Name

853
00:48:44,760 --> 00:48:47,400
Speaker 4: was Essay. They had a conversation going on, and she

854
00:48:47,640 --> 00:48:50,560
Speaker 4: invited a woman home to her home, and she said

855
00:48:50,560 --> 00:48:58,200
Speaker 4: a few days later she had practice. I can't and

856
00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:00,600
Speaker 4: she said, she went to work, came home and there

857
00:49:00,680 --> 00:49:04,040
Speaker 4: was a nope beside me, saying I don't want to

858
00:49:04,080 --> 00:49:08,840
Speaker 4: take it. And she said, okay, no man, let's go

859
00:49:08,840 --> 00:49:12,720
Speaker 4: to New York City. And it's an interesting thing about

860
00:49:12,719 --> 00:49:17,879
Speaker 4: that scenario because I told my sister, I said, I'm

861
00:49:17,960 --> 00:49:23,120
Speaker 4: sorry I wasn't here for you as a brother. She

862
00:49:23,160 --> 00:49:26,359
Speaker 4: looked at me, she said, don't be sorry, she said,

863
00:49:26,360 --> 00:49:33,960
Speaker 4: and you came with us, you probably wouldn't. Benbury, I was.

864
00:49:33,920 --> 00:49:39,239
Speaker 1: Going to ask you, how conflicted do you feel because

865
00:49:39,680 --> 00:49:44,239
Speaker 1: you had to go through your life in order to

866
00:49:44,320 --> 00:49:49,239
Speaker 1: get to this very place right now. But I know

867
00:49:49,320 --> 00:49:52,120
Speaker 1: there has to be a part of you that wonders

868
00:49:52,760 --> 00:49:58,320
Speaker 1: in an alternate reality where you're with your actual family,

869
00:49:59,520 --> 00:50:06,440
Speaker 1: that somehow you might serendipitously wind up in the same position, Like,

870
00:50:06,560 --> 00:50:08,359
Speaker 1: how did that make it? How long did it take

871
00:50:08,400 --> 00:50:11,239
Speaker 1: you to process? And really did it make you feel

872
00:50:11,239 --> 00:50:14,520
Speaker 1: complete as a human? Did it leave you more conflicted

873
00:50:14,560 --> 00:50:16,400
Speaker 1: about your history?

874
00:50:17,080 --> 00:50:22,200
Speaker 4: Was still a question because my father I have yet

875
00:50:22,280 --> 00:50:27,680
Speaker 4: to find that family, the Middletons. All I know is

876
00:50:27,719 --> 00:50:32,920
Speaker 4: he died in Philadelphia, and so we don't know.

877
00:50:33,360 --> 00:50:35,560
Speaker 6: We don't know if that's truly the father to that.

878
00:50:35,920 --> 00:50:38,800
Speaker 6: We're still trying to figure out the identity of the father,

879
00:50:39,040 --> 00:50:40,399
Speaker 6: the true How.

880
00:50:40,280 --> 00:50:42,359
Speaker 3: Would you do that, Kamar? How do y'all even get.

881
00:50:42,280 --> 00:50:43,800
Speaker 2: To Skip Gates?

882
00:50:44,080 --> 00:50:47,319
Speaker 6: Well, we've been in touch with Skip Gates. Hopefully we're

883
00:50:47,360 --> 00:50:51,839
Speaker 6: going to be on next season, and but we've been

884
00:50:51,880 --> 00:50:54,960
Speaker 6: in that process for a while. But we'd love now.

885
00:50:55,360 --> 00:50:57,040
Speaker 3: I would have assumed he would have been on Find

886
00:50:57,080 --> 00:50:58,680
Speaker 3: My Roots, because it's.

887
00:51:01,080 --> 00:51:03,560
Speaker 1: Well, not many people were privy to the story, And

888
00:51:03,840 --> 00:51:07,440
Speaker 1: you're right even right now, I mean, I'm not spoiler

889
00:51:07,440 --> 00:51:09,920
Speaker 1: a learning because he wrote about in this book Maurice

890
00:51:09,920 --> 00:51:13,720
Speaker 1: White of earthvend Fire, same thing he was five years old,

891
00:51:14,160 --> 00:51:18,040
Speaker 1: his mom gave him to the next door neighbor, and

892
00:51:18,400 --> 00:51:23,160
Speaker 1: she went off to Chicago, had a fit, you know,

893
00:51:23,440 --> 00:51:28,360
Speaker 1: got lucky, married a doctor, had seven children. Maurice joins

894
00:51:28,400 --> 00:51:32,799
Speaker 1: her at eighteen. But there's something inherently broken inside of

895
00:51:32,800 --> 00:51:36,719
Speaker 1: maurice white soul that, yes, he was given away, that

896
00:51:36,960 --> 00:51:41,799
Speaker 1: even though he miraculously kind of wound up in a

897
00:51:41,880 --> 00:51:46,319
Speaker 1: metaphysical self love space at least musically and creatively to

898
00:51:46,400 --> 00:51:50,200
Speaker 1: teach us to love ourselves, you know, afrocentricity and all that.

899
00:51:50,160 --> 00:51:51,480
Speaker 2: Stuff, But.

900
00:51:53,320 --> 00:51:58,799
Speaker 1: That I believe the emotional blockage that Maurice had with

901
00:51:59,040 --> 00:52:04,839
Speaker 1: really not coming to grips with I was so unlovable,

902
00:52:04,920 --> 00:52:10,680
Speaker 1: no one wanted me. I felt personally led to his

903
00:52:10,840 --> 00:52:12,239
Speaker 1: Parkinson's disease.

904
00:52:15,200 --> 00:52:21,120
Speaker 4: There, but the scars still I'm dealing with. Accordingly, It's

905
00:52:21,160 --> 00:52:23,400
Speaker 4: take me some very strange prices. You've regotten the book,

906
00:52:23,920 --> 00:52:25,200
Speaker 4: But what.

907
00:52:25,239 --> 00:52:27,480
Speaker 1: Can I ask, did you go through any sort of

908
00:52:27,600 --> 00:52:32,520
Speaker 1: therapeutic process to sort of deal with that feeling, that

909
00:52:32,560 --> 00:52:34,879
Speaker 1: emotion so it doesn't live inside you.

910
00:52:36,480 --> 00:52:40,720
Speaker 4: Well, you know it's going to always live inside of you.

911
00:52:40,360 --> 00:52:44,759
Speaker 4: Says how to process your life through that? I've been

912
00:52:44,760 --> 00:52:48,400
Speaker 4: through many counselors and people like that. And try to

913
00:52:48,640 --> 00:52:51,080
Speaker 4: try to help me. But it really comes down to

914
00:52:51,400 --> 00:52:55,680
Speaker 4: individual choice of what you choose to be today and

915
00:52:55,719 --> 00:52:59,880
Speaker 4: how you live each day in processing your life. Accepting.

916
00:53:00,800 --> 00:53:08,040
Speaker 4: It's a big word, acceptance, And I'm grateful that for

917
00:53:08,200 --> 00:53:11,359
Speaker 4: my journey. Would I have done it differently had I known,

918
00:53:11,480 --> 00:53:14,759
Speaker 4: baby so? But I can't say that because I am

919
00:53:14,800 --> 00:53:18,480
Speaker 4: not the one who's controlling the spiritual aspect of my life.

920
00:53:19,120 --> 00:53:21,920
Speaker 4: I have my human aspect which is going on the

921
00:53:22,000 --> 00:53:25,160
Speaker 4: journey that the spirit wants to experience through me. But

922
00:53:25,520 --> 00:53:30,000
Speaker 4: had I known, I don't know. I can't say I

923
00:53:30,040 --> 00:53:33,400
Speaker 4: know what I know today, And I'm grateful. When the

924
00:53:33,480 --> 00:53:34,080
Speaker 4: Quest Love.

925
00:53:33,960 --> 00:53:39,040
Speaker 1: Show, Okay, I wasn't going to make a big, rough

926
00:53:39,120 --> 00:53:42,759
Speaker 1: high of this only because you have such an expansive

927
00:53:42,840 --> 00:53:46,760
Speaker 1: career and I know where you're going that I didn't

928
00:53:46,800 --> 00:53:49,160
Speaker 1: want to reduce it to this question that I now

929
00:53:49,239 --> 00:53:50,560
Speaker 1: feel like I have to ask you.

930
00:53:51,280 --> 00:53:55,640
Speaker 2: Yes, yo, man, I'm yo. Oh God. You remember the

931
00:53:55,680 --> 00:54:03,760
Speaker 2: Matthew Knowles episode where hang on, oh shit, I'm sorry,

932
00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:05,640
Speaker 2: what's going on?

933
00:54:07,280 --> 00:54:10,560
Speaker 1: Look For the last year and a half, in hearing

934
00:54:10,600 --> 00:54:16,920
Speaker 1: these stories slid Stone, earth Wind and Fire, this this

935
00:54:17,080 --> 00:54:22,719
Speaker 1: really hits me in my heart only because And the

936
00:54:22,760 --> 00:54:26,040
Speaker 1: reason why I keep grappling with emotions is again, as

937
00:54:26,120 --> 00:54:29,040
Speaker 1: human beings were really not you know, we're taught to

938
00:54:29,080 --> 00:54:32,680
Speaker 1: suck it up, you know, man up, and really not

939
00:54:32,760 --> 00:54:36,279
Speaker 1: process our emotions. And I was wondering, like, how have

940
00:54:36,320 --> 00:54:38,560
Speaker 1: we dealt with this for five hundred years? And you

941
00:54:38,640 --> 00:54:43,640
Speaker 1: explained that through dance, through music, through me drumming. Perhaps

942
00:54:44,000 --> 00:54:46,440
Speaker 1: maybe that's how I get my rage out my you

943
00:54:46,440 --> 00:54:52,359
Speaker 1: know that sort of thing. But the reason why your

944
00:54:52,480 --> 00:54:58,799
Speaker 1: episode of The Fresh Prince of bell Air resonates so

945
00:54:59,160 --> 00:55:04,200
Speaker 1: much with my generation and millennials and gen z is

946
00:55:04,320 --> 00:55:08,359
Speaker 1: we all felt Will Smith's pain, and we you know,

947
00:55:08,480 --> 00:55:09,120
Speaker 1: the whole fight.

948
00:55:09,200 --> 00:55:10,920
Speaker 2: And I'm gonna be a man. I'm gonna be all

949
00:55:11,000 --> 00:55:12,120
Speaker 2: right like that whole Martin.

950
00:55:12,160 --> 00:55:14,240
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be all right like we're taught to sucking

951
00:55:15,120 --> 00:55:18,480
Speaker 1: the tears and not show like. I won't let you

952
00:55:18,520 --> 00:55:21,040
Speaker 1: see me sweat or see me cry or any sort

953
00:55:21,120 --> 00:55:25,120
Speaker 1: of as a sign of defeat. Knowing what you knew

954
00:55:25,160 --> 00:55:29,200
Speaker 1: about your own family history, were the creators of The

955
00:55:29,239 --> 00:55:33,439
Speaker 1: Fresh Prince of bel Air or Will Smith himself, were

956
00:55:33,520 --> 00:55:34,600
Speaker 1: any of them aware?

957
00:55:35,840 --> 00:55:35,880
Speaker 4: No?

958
00:55:37,440 --> 00:55:37,879
Speaker 3: Did you?

959
00:55:37,880 --> 00:55:38,960
Speaker 2: You didn't share with them?

960
00:55:40,920 --> 00:55:43,640
Speaker 6: This information hasn't been really shared publicly.

961
00:55:44,920 --> 00:55:46,879
Speaker 4: I'm just I.

962
00:55:46,880 --> 00:55:51,320
Speaker 1: Thank you for sharing that because it's it's it's it's

963
00:55:51,360 --> 00:55:51,799
Speaker 1: touched me.

964
00:55:52,520 --> 00:55:55,000
Speaker 4: They knew nothing about this, hadn't been talking about this,

965
00:55:55,080 --> 00:55:57,399
Speaker 4: has kept it to myself. I'm just beginning to open

966
00:55:57,480 --> 00:56:02,680
Speaker 4: up about this. But they should choose to tell this

967
00:56:02,920 --> 00:56:07,480
Speaker 4: story at the time in my life and here we

968
00:56:07,560 --> 00:56:10,160
Speaker 4: are talking about it. It was a very deep subject

969
00:56:10,160 --> 00:56:11,000
Speaker 4: for all of us.

970
00:56:11,640 --> 00:56:12,680
Speaker 3: How was that to shoot?

971
00:56:12,840 --> 00:56:13,080
Speaker 4: Was that?

972
00:56:13,200 --> 00:56:16,279
Speaker 5: What did it make it in your head? Or were

973
00:56:16,280 --> 00:56:19,080
Speaker 5: you just the constantly professional and just you know.

974
00:56:19,760 --> 00:56:23,239
Speaker 4: Tell that story, find the seed of that story and

975
00:56:23,360 --> 00:56:26,759
Speaker 4: sharing it and being that man who rejected his son

976
00:56:27,560 --> 00:56:30,880
Speaker 4: because of his background, his fear, his pain. You know

977
00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:34,640
Speaker 4: that moment when I'm silent, So I went through so

978
00:56:34,760 --> 00:56:37,839
Speaker 4: much in that silence as not being said when I'm

979
00:56:37,840 --> 00:56:42,719
Speaker 4: walking out the door. Was nobody saw that pain, what

980
00:56:42,880 --> 00:56:48,040
Speaker 4: I went through personally, So I had no words for him,

981
00:56:48,360 --> 00:56:51,080
Speaker 4: and the writers had no idea this was going down.

982
00:56:51,440 --> 00:56:54,239
Speaker 4: Why they were chose to write this particular show for

983
00:56:54,400 --> 00:56:56,719
Speaker 4: me or why will say I want him to do

984
00:56:56,840 --> 00:57:04,400
Speaker 4: this part? Oh pay it? No? But the university and

985
00:57:04,400 --> 00:57:06,600
Speaker 4: it was the beginning of this conversation we're having right then,

986
00:57:07,719 --> 00:57:08,640
Speaker 4: and as a daughter.

987
00:57:08,760 --> 00:57:11,880
Speaker 6: It was a hard thing to watch as well, because

988
00:57:13,040 --> 00:57:17,240
Speaker 6: my father growing up was always on the road, you know,

989
00:57:17,400 --> 00:57:20,560
Speaker 6: and when everyone thinks, you know, when you're this kid

990
00:57:20,600 --> 00:57:24,560
Speaker 6: of a hate to use the word celebrity, you have

991
00:57:24,680 --> 00:57:29,440
Speaker 6: this privileged life and everything's great and you're these fabulous

992
00:57:29,480 --> 00:57:33,320
Speaker 6: parties and your parents are ever present. But no, I

993
00:57:33,400 --> 00:57:36,280
Speaker 6: would tell people, when you see my father on television,

994
00:57:36,320 --> 00:57:38,680
Speaker 6: that's time that he's not with me. He's not with

995
00:57:38,720 --> 00:57:42,320
Speaker 6: my siblings. And especially when we were young, you know,

996
00:57:42,520 --> 00:57:44,880
Speaker 6: the only times you would see him is during breaks

997
00:57:44,920 --> 00:57:48,360
Speaker 6: for school and he was working because those were prime times.

998
00:57:48,400 --> 00:57:50,880
Speaker 6: And you know, people thought it was cool because at

999
00:57:50,880 --> 00:57:54,080
Speaker 6: one point he was hosting all the Disney specials, you know,

1000
00:57:54,120 --> 00:57:57,280
Speaker 6: in the holidays, and yeah, great, you get to cut

1001
00:57:57,320 --> 00:58:00,600
Speaker 6: the line at Disney. But I still don't have my father.

1002
00:58:01,120 --> 00:58:04,120
Speaker 6: You know. My mother was amazing. She did everything that

1003
00:58:04,160 --> 00:58:08,920
Speaker 6: she could within herself, but we also had to grapple.

1004
00:58:08,960 --> 00:58:16,600
Speaker 6: And watching that episode for me was because, you know it, well,

1005
00:58:17,320 --> 00:58:19,480
Speaker 6: it was an interesting time in my life period. But

1006
00:58:19,760 --> 00:58:23,000
Speaker 6: I was probably in college around that time, and my

1007
00:58:23,160 --> 00:58:27,000
Speaker 6: father and I had gone through a lot, like just emotionally,

1008
00:58:27,040 --> 00:58:30,480
Speaker 6: We've always had this like kind of hard relationship because

1009
00:58:31,000 --> 00:58:33,200
Speaker 6: even as a little kid, it was this whole thing

1010
00:58:33,240 --> 00:58:35,880
Speaker 6: of Dad's coming home. Oh my god, Dad's home. And

1011
00:58:35,880 --> 00:58:38,400
Speaker 6: I would kind of stand back because I was resemful

1012
00:58:38,440 --> 00:58:40,960
Speaker 6: because I didn't have time with my dad. And then

1013
00:58:41,000 --> 00:58:44,440
Speaker 6: it was always the limos here. Okay, the assistants are

1014
00:58:44,440 --> 00:58:47,720
Speaker 6: here putting everything in the car, and he's off again,

1015
00:58:47,920 --> 00:58:50,880
Speaker 6: you know. And I always was kind of the defiant one.

1016
00:58:50,920 --> 00:58:53,920
Speaker 6: I remember this one instance. I don't know if you

1017
00:58:53,960 --> 00:58:54,480
Speaker 6: remember this.

1018
00:58:54,560 --> 00:58:54,760
Speaker 4: Dad.

1019
00:58:54,800 --> 00:58:57,600
Speaker 6: We're living in Saddle River because my parents decided to

1020
00:58:57,640 --> 00:58:59,800
Speaker 6: move us out of Hollywood. So it was about eight

1021
00:59:00,120 --> 00:59:03,680
Speaker 6: the time, and you know, spoiled had the Apple computer

1022
00:59:03,880 --> 00:59:07,280
Speaker 6: and the television in my room and everything like that.

1023
00:59:07,480 --> 00:59:09,920
Speaker 6: And I said something to you, Dad, and you were

1024
00:59:09,960 --> 00:59:12,520
Speaker 6: getting ready to go somewhere because the limo was outside.

1025
00:59:12,560 --> 00:59:16,360
Speaker 6: He was dressed up in his tucks and he said, you.

1026
00:59:16,280 --> 00:59:17,000
Speaker 3: Said what to me?

1027
00:59:17,240 --> 00:59:21,080
Speaker 6: And I said whatever I said, and he like was

1028
00:59:21,160 --> 00:59:23,800
Speaker 6: coming at me, and I was in my nightgown getting

1029
00:59:23,840 --> 00:59:26,000
Speaker 6: ready to go to bed. I got up and iran

1030
00:59:26,080 --> 00:59:30,320
Speaker 6: across the property. We had huge property, and I remember

1031
00:59:30,400 --> 00:59:33,160
Speaker 6: standing in this creek that we had because I knew

1032
00:59:33,200 --> 00:59:36,120
Speaker 6: he didn't have time to come into that creek after me,

1033
00:59:36,880 --> 00:59:39,160
Speaker 6: and we just looking at each other.

1034
00:59:44,400 --> 00:59:46,480
Speaker 7: You better get out of that creek, You better get out,

1035
00:59:46,520 --> 00:59:48,320
Speaker 7: You better come here and talk to me. As your

1036
00:59:48,360 --> 00:59:51,040
Speaker 7: father said, uh, He's like, I'm taking everything out of

1037
00:59:51,040 --> 00:59:53,120
Speaker 7: your room, and I was just like, okay, great, because

1038
00:59:53,120 --> 00:59:54,880
Speaker 7: you're not going to be there when I get back,

1039
00:59:55,080 --> 00:59:55,280
Speaker 7: you know.

1040
00:59:56,080 --> 00:59:59,480
Speaker 6: So that part when I you know, we had this

1041
00:59:59,560 --> 01:00:03,000
Speaker 6: release ship for a very long time, and when I

1042
01:00:03,040 --> 01:00:05,800
Speaker 6: did see the episode, I felt that pain on the

1043
01:00:05,840 --> 01:00:08,120
Speaker 6: other side of it where he felt the pain as

1044
01:00:08,160 --> 01:00:11,480
Speaker 6: the adult leaving the child, you know. So it is

1045
01:00:11,640 --> 01:00:13,960
Speaker 6: very emotional, I think for all.

1046
01:00:13,840 --> 01:00:14,640
Speaker 3: Of the kids.

1047
01:00:14,920 --> 01:00:18,320
Speaker 4: So, you know, in tap of that character and the

1048
01:00:18,480 --> 01:00:20,520
Speaker 4: character that I have had to be in my life

1049
01:00:21,160 --> 01:00:25,919
Speaker 4: and I missed those moments now of being there for them.

1050
01:00:26,400 --> 01:00:30,880
Speaker 4: It's an emptiness that I gobbled with every day you

1051
01:00:31,000 --> 01:00:35,000
Speaker 4: did what Why wasn't I there? But I was raised

1052
01:00:35,040 --> 01:00:41,200
Speaker 4: of a mindset of my mother was about providing, and

1053
01:00:41,440 --> 01:00:45,040
Speaker 4: so she would often say to me, you know, we'd

1054
01:00:45,040 --> 01:00:48,760
Speaker 4: be sitting around our tenement building and you know, we

1055
01:00:48,880 --> 01:00:51,120
Speaker 4: have one of his little pop belly stole and she

1056
01:00:51,320 --> 01:00:54,600
Speaker 4: say to me, Bunny because she couldn't pronounce Benjamin, and

1057
01:00:54,680 --> 01:00:57,440
Speaker 4: mounderstood this. She couldn't have pronounced Benjamin. I look at

1058
01:00:57,440 --> 01:00:59,880
Speaker 4: my father. They always called me Joe or she called

1059
01:00:59,880 --> 01:01:04,440
Speaker 4: me bunny. Bunny. If all we have was a donut,

1060
01:01:04,800 --> 01:01:07,400
Speaker 4: you need the donut the whole.

1061
01:01:08,920 --> 01:01:09,439
Speaker 2: Oh wow.

1062
01:01:10,200 --> 01:01:12,320
Speaker 4: So you know that was the way I was raised.

1063
01:01:12,320 --> 01:01:16,880
Speaker 4: And so when this opportunity of show business fell upon me,

1064
01:01:18,080 --> 01:01:21,000
Speaker 4: all I knew was to do is provide and got

1065
01:01:21,040 --> 01:01:23,479
Speaker 4: caught up in the madness. Listen, all you read about

1066
01:01:23,480 --> 01:01:27,440
Speaker 4: all this in the book, but it's about that missing

1067
01:01:27,560 --> 01:01:29,880
Speaker 4: part which I grobble.

1068
01:01:29,520 --> 01:01:32,120
Speaker 6: With as a daughter. I don't want him to feel

1069
01:01:32,120 --> 01:01:35,840
Speaker 6: guilty about it because I'm very privileged. You know, I

1070
01:01:35,880 --> 01:01:39,440
Speaker 6: don't have college loans. You know that was all paid

1071
01:01:39,480 --> 01:01:39,720
Speaker 6: for it.

1072
01:01:39,760 --> 01:01:41,720
Speaker 3: I was going to afford the work to the mental

1073
01:01:41,760 --> 01:01:42,840
Speaker 3: work in the council end too.

1074
01:01:43,240 --> 01:01:47,960
Speaker 6: Yes, yes, and my my father and I have had

1075
01:01:48,000 --> 01:01:51,520
Speaker 6: this tremendous journey and it's heavy on my heart that

1076
01:01:51,560 --> 01:01:52,640
Speaker 6: he has this guilt.

1077
01:01:53,120 --> 01:01:55,280
Speaker 5: But the bar the fact that j'all was sharing this,

1078
01:01:55,400 --> 01:01:56,800
Speaker 5: I just got to say it. I know Amre is

1079
01:01:56,840 --> 01:02:00,640
Speaker 5: feeling this too, like this is the result of having

1080
01:02:00,720 --> 01:02:04,680
Speaker 5: a black boomer daddy, Like this trauma is not You

1081
01:02:04,720 --> 01:02:10,160
Speaker 5: are not alone in this thing, understand father's trauma. And

1082
01:02:11,320 --> 01:02:13,400
Speaker 5: because the beautiful thing to me as I look at

1083
01:02:13,440 --> 01:02:16,760
Speaker 5: you guys and beautiful daughters, where we are now, where

1084
01:02:16,760 --> 01:02:18,760
Speaker 5: you are with him, wherever he goes, and how you

1085
01:02:18,800 --> 01:02:19,920
Speaker 5: take care of him.

1086
01:02:20,280 --> 01:02:22,760
Speaker 6: Is just along with my sister Karan Kan.

1087
01:02:22,760 --> 01:02:23,600
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, I guess.

1088
01:02:23,520 --> 01:02:29,120
Speaker 7: Yeah, likea she's out there somewhere the way the girls

1089
01:02:29,120 --> 01:02:29,720
Speaker 7: take care of you.

1090
01:02:29,880 --> 01:02:31,200
Speaker 2: How many children in total?

1091
01:02:31,520 --> 01:02:37,320
Speaker 4: I had four five children. I had an Najah whom

1092
01:02:37,360 --> 01:02:43,200
Speaker 4: I lost an automobile accident, and my son. Okay, so

1093
01:02:43,320 --> 01:02:46,480
Speaker 4: I have I have three daughter, beautiful daughters, and I'm

1094
01:02:46,480 --> 01:02:51,840
Speaker 4: so honored and privilege. Honest, I'm blessed. I'm truly blessed.

1095
01:02:52,080 --> 01:02:54,320
Speaker 3: Yeah, daughters, take care of you different right.

1096
01:02:55,680 --> 01:02:59,440
Speaker 4: Recommend the people who were handling me in my business.

1097
01:03:01,160 --> 01:03:04,720
Speaker 4: I mean, I've had some messed up people in my

1098
01:03:04,840 --> 01:03:08,160
Speaker 4: life who did not even think about my children. I

1099
01:03:08,440 --> 01:03:14,960
Speaker 4: was in rehab in Utah place called Circu and I

1100
01:03:15,000 --> 01:03:17,320
Speaker 4: had had my bow. I've had my bous and alcohol

1101
01:03:17,440 --> 01:03:20,600
Speaker 4: and drugs and things, and I'd find my last cleanup

1102
01:03:21,320 --> 01:03:25,560
Speaker 4: and I'll never forget. Ron and my wife came up

1103
01:03:26,080 --> 01:03:30,960
Speaker 4: for counseling and this has never happened, and I never

1104
01:03:31,000 --> 01:03:33,480
Speaker 4: forget her sitting there and saying, you do not like

1105
01:03:33,680 --> 01:03:38,840
Speaker 4: what it's like being the wife of ben Vereen. And

1106
01:03:39,880 --> 01:03:41,760
Speaker 4: she said there were times that I have to go

1107
01:03:41,840 --> 01:03:44,880
Speaker 4: through his pockets to find money to pay for my

1108
01:03:45,000 --> 01:03:51,800
Speaker 4: baby Steed. I hit the ceiling. I had no idea

1109
01:03:52,800 --> 01:03:57,240
Speaker 4: the robbery had been happening to my children. And I

1110
01:03:57,280 --> 01:04:01,280
Speaker 4: looked at it. I said, never mind me my babies.

1111
01:04:02,200 --> 01:04:06,160
Speaker 4: Why didn't you go up and say where excuse the expression,

1112
01:04:06,320 --> 01:04:10,520
Speaker 4: are the effing books? I want to see them books?

1113
01:04:11,720 --> 01:04:13,960
Speaker 4: Why are my babies? Why didn't I have the book

1114
01:04:14,000 --> 01:04:17,720
Speaker 4: to my husband's pockets to buy money? And I'm busting

1115
01:04:17,800 --> 01:04:22,080
Speaker 4: my ass not spending time with my babies. Keep them

1116
01:04:22,440 --> 01:04:26,200
Speaker 4: yachts and houses and things like that. That's another part

1117
01:04:26,240 --> 01:04:29,919
Speaker 4: of this interview, but one another day. That's the whole book.

1118
01:04:31,200 --> 01:04:33,160
Speaker 2: When when is this book coming out?

1119
01:04:33,560 --> 01:04:39,480
Speaker 4: Opening next ten months? In the title thank you for

1120
01:04:39,520 --> 01:04:44,840
Speaker 4: the Journey, I say that you know. Some people ask

1121
01:04:44,960 --> 01:04:49,720
Speaker 4: me you know? You say you know? So we Oh God,

1122
01:04:49,800 --> 01:04:55,160
Speaker 4: you're such a legend. I say thank you for receiving both.

1123
01:04:55,200 --> 01:04:58,000
Speaker 4: For you, I would not be here. I would not

1124
01:04:58,040 --> 01:05:00,640
Speaker 4: have this journey. I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't be

1125
01:05:00,640 --> 01:05:03,960
Speaker 4: here talking to the old question. Well, mm hmm, you see,

1126
01:05:04,360 --> 01:05:05,840
Speaker 4: so thank you for the journey.

1127
01:05:06,880 --> 01:05:11,600
Speaker 1: Usually when our listenership comes to this show, it's more

1128
01:05:11,720 --> 01:05:17,960
Speaker 1: factual things than like a person's story. I want to

1129
01:05:19,120 --> 01:05:20,600
Speaker 1: I want to no no, no, no, no no no no

1130
01:05:20,600 --> 01:05:23,560
Speaker 1: no no no no no. I apologize in advance. Look,

1131
01:05:24,440 --> 01:05:28,080
Speaker 1: I have a lot of tense, speed and brown shoe questions.

1132
01:05:28,680 --> 01:05:31,600
Speaker 1: I wanted to know what it was like winning for

1133
01:05:31,760 --> 01:05:35,000
Speaker 1: Pippin or Bob Foster. He was like all these things

1134
01:05:35,000 --> 01:05:38,400
Speaker 1: that you've been through. But for me, this is a

1135
01:05:38,640 --> 01:05:43,800
Speaker 1: way more important story, the totality of your career achievements.

1136
01:05:43,840 --> 01:05:47,600
Speaker 1: And yes, I do implore everyone to get this book.

1137
01:05:48,280 --> 01:05:52,080
Speaker 2: Man, I'm just damn yeah.

1138
01:05:52,080 --> 01:05:53,840
Speaker 3: I wanted to ask about Al Perryman and Dan You're

1139
01:05:53,880 --> 01:05:55,680
Speaker 3: right questions.

1140
01:05:55,920 --> 01:05:56,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, we can.

1141
01:05:56,600 --> 01:05:57,480
Speaker 3: Still ask them.

1142
01:05:59,080 --> 01:06:00,440
Speaker 2: Let's rapid fire, okay.

1143
01:06:00,440 --> 01:06:02,800
Speaker 5: So, so, Ben, can you talk about because we talked

1144
01:06:02,800 --> 01:06:05,240
Speaker 5: about black dance back in like the sixties and seventies,

1145
01:06:05,240 --> 01:06:07,120
Speaker 5: and you talked about how you know, it wasn't a

1146
01:06:07,160 --> 01:06:09,480
Speaker 5: thing where you would see us on those stages on TV,

1147
01:06:09,560 --> 01:06:12,400
Speaker 5: but there were so My father as well in New

1148
01:06:12,480 --> 01:06:14,280
Speaker 5: Yorker of Your Age, and he too is an artist,

1149
01:06:14,440 --> 01:06:16,320
Speaker 5: photographer and a drummer, and he took a lot of

1150
01:06:16,320 --> 01:06:19,560
Speaker 5: photos of the black dancers of that time, and I

1151
01:06:19,640 --> 01:06:22,160
Speaker 5: just wanted you to speak about like he spoke about

1152
01:06:22,160 --> 01:06:25,880
Speaker 5: Al Perryman, and he spoke about just this black dance scene.

1153
01:06:25,960 --> 01:06:27,160
Speaker 3: And I've seen.

1154
01:06:26,920 --> 01:06:30,080
Speaker 5: These beautiful photos of the black dancers going to the

1155
01:06:30,120 --> 01:06:33,680
Speaker 5: park where a Mere shot his documentary, And so can

1156
01:06:33,720 --> 01:06:34,040
Speaker 5: you just.

1157
01:06:34,000 --> 01:06:36,280
Speaker 3: Talk about how and then you kind of see it when.

1158
01:06:36,120 --> 01:06:37,880
Speaker 5: You watch the Wiz and you see all this black

1159
01:06:38,000 --> 01:06:39,720
Speaker 5: dance at the end, you know, brand new day and

1160
01:06:39,720 --> 01:06:41,280
Speaker 5: you see all these dancers of that time.

1161
01:06:41,600 --> 01:06:45,360
Speaker 3: Can you just George, come on, George face. We had

1162
01:06:45,400 --> 01:06:46,320
Speaker 3: you know, we had them on the show.

1163
01:06:46,440 --> 01:06:46,960
Speaker 4: George Face.

1164
01:06:47,160 --> 01:06:49,360
Speaker 3: Yes, Michael Peters, come on, let's go.

1165
01:06:50,120 --> 01:06:52,520
Speaker 4: We'll talk about Michael Peters. Mike. You know, I see

1166
01:06:52,480 --> 01:06:54,840
Speaker 4: he was saying, you know, this year, I was I've

1167
01:06:54,840 --> 01:06:57,360
Speaker 4: been watching what they call it, not Instagram, you know,

1168
01:06:57,840 --> 01:07:00,880
Speaker 4: young people in general, this stuff you work. But anyway,

1169
01:07:01,880 --> 01:07:05,520
Speaker 4: I'm watching all this and then now finally the recognizing

1170
01:07:05,880 --> 01:07:11,320
Speaker 4: that Michael Jackson is a product of Michael Peters beat

1171
01:07:11,360 --> 01:07:15,880
Speaker 4: it really. I mean, I mean before, I mean he

1172
01:07:16,000 --> 01:07:18,800
Speaker 4: was doing all that Motown stuff, but then he met

1173
01:07:18,840 --> 01:07:23,960
Speaker 4: Michael Peters and broke out the whole New Moonwalking and

1174
01:07:24,040 --> 01:07:27,000
Speaker 4: all these thriller beat it.

1175
01:07:27,960 --> 01:07:30,200
Speaker 2: Glass was Lester Wilson also part of that.

1176
01:07:31,320 --> 01:07:36,120
Speaker 4: Wilson was the foundation for all of us. At Bernie's

1177
01:07:36,200 --> 01:07:40,840
Speaker 4: Johnson's dance studio after school, we would go by Jerry Grimes,

1178
01:07:41,160 --> 01:07:45,800
Speaker 4: Mister Emsley, Michael Peters, Lorraine.

1179
01:07:45,400 --> 01:07:48,080
Speaker 3: Fields, Oh, Debbie Allen shout around too.

1180
01:07:48,200 --> 01:07:51,160
Speaker 4: Yeah, we all go to Bernie's Johnson and there was

1181
01:07:51,280 --> 01:07:55,720
Speaker 4: Lester Wilson with Chief Bad Flaying Kunga and we'd be

1182
01:07:55,960 --> 01:08:01,280
Speaker 4: dancing and he would he would give us. Oh he

1183
01:08:01,400 --> 01:08:06,600
Speaker 4: was such a smooth, beautiful dancer. Bout Fossey loved. That's

1184
01:08:06,640 --> 01:08:09,880
Speaker 4: the Wilson. He talked about Lester Wilson, all of his

1185
01:08:10,080 --> 01:08:13,680
Speaker 4: moves and how liquid and fluid he was. I looked

1186
01:08:13,720 --> 01:08:18,879
Speaker 4: at him, Mi, he was so fluid, so beautiful. Oh,

1187
01:08:19,080 --> 01:08:19,840
Speaker 4: I mission mess.

1188
01:08:20,600 --> 01:08:21,240
Speaker 6: I was slad.

1189
01:08:21,600 --> 01:08:28,240
Speaker 4: We die so angry. It's so foolish. But anyway, yeah,

1190
01:08:28,680 --> 01:08:32,320
Speaker 4: Lester Wilson and yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm glad he

1191
01:08:32,479 --> 01:08:34,639
Speaker 4: had documented all of us. Thank you.

1192
01:08:35,120 --> 01:08:36,960
Speaker 5: So you're telling a story about people, and I just

1193
01:08:37,000 --> 01:08:38,519
Speaker 5: I don't want them to ever forget the power of

1194
01:08:38,600 --> 01:08:41,439
Speaker 5: Judah Jamison. Since we recently lost her. What do you

1195
01:08:41,560 --> 01:08:44,320
Speaker 5: what comes to mind when we say Judith jameson.

1196
01:08:45,120 --> 01:08:53,439
Speaker 4: Stature of beauty and fluidity. She was the cream oh

1197
01:08:54,280 --> 01:08:58,680
Speaker 4: oo talking about cry. She cried for all of us.

1198
01:08:59,360 --> 01:09:04,479
Speaker 4: Oh I love Judith. I'm glad she came through my life.

1199
01:09:05,720 --> 01:09:08,799
Speaker 4: That's sit in the studio, just watch her. Oof.

1200
01:09:10,840 --> 01:09:13,080
Speaker 1: So this journey in your life you are right now

1201
01:09:13,160 --> 01:09:16,160
Speaker 1: and working on what is it that you want us

1202
01:09:16,240 --> 01:09:22,679
Speaker 1: to know, especially in terms of you being in your

1203
01:09:22,840 --> 01:09:26,840
Speaker 1: instructor phase, your your choreography phase, your your your director phase.

1204
01:09:28,360 --> 01:09:28,760
Speaker 4: What is it?

1205
01:09:29,160 --> 01:09:33,000
Speaker 1: What is it that you want This particular generation, those

1206
01:09:33,120 --> 01:09:37,720
Speaker 1: born in the nineties him in the two thousands.

1207
01:09:37,560 --> 01:09:40,760
Speaker 4: Attached to the rhetoric that you're human is listening to

1208
01:09:41,520 --> 01:09:46,120
Speaker 4: always know there's a power within you, greater than that

1209
01:09:46,320 --> 01:09:50,360
Speaker 4: outside of you, and stay in touch with who you've

1210
01:09:50,400 --> 01:09:53,840
Speaker 4: come to this planet to be. You'll get all the

1211
01:09:53,960 --> 01:09:59,240
Speaker 4: rhetoric from education, edumacation, and you'll get all the rhetoric

1212
01:09:59,320 --> 01:10:02,639
Speaker 4: from society what they're going through, but you understand that

1213
01:10:02,840 --> 01:10:07,960
Speaker 4: within you it's a core of creation and whatever you

1214
01:10:08,000 --> 01:10:12,280
Speaker 4: need to do to stay there, get there, get there

1215
01:10:12,920 --> 01:10:17,280
Speaker 4: and breathe that in and breathe that out. For all

1216
01:10:17,320 --> 01:10:22,280
Speaker 4: of us. That's what I want you to do. That's

1217
01:10:22,280 --> 01:10:23,000
Speaker 4: what I want you to know.

1218
01:10:23,040 --> 01:10:28,280
Speaker 2: Where you are, well, I'm good, I have a good day.

1219
01:10:30,280 --> 01:10:32,120
Speaker 5: It's such a it's such I just gotta say, it's

1220
01:10:32,120 --> 01:10:34,760
Speaker 5: a blessing to be a child of My dad calls

1221
01:10:34,800 --> 01:10:37,080
Speaker 5: you guys, the last of the new children, this generation.

1222
01:10:37,320 --> 01:10:41,559
Speaker 5: You know, I said to Kabara into Charlie Melvinmore's daughter,

1223
01:10:41,600 --> 01:10:44,160
Speaker 5: I was like, you guys are of a generation of

1224
01:10:44,240 --> 01:10:47,720
Speaker 5: creation that was just broke all of these barriers for

1225
01:10:47,840 --> 01:10:51,559
Speaker 5: people and also New Yorkers, and so the poet just

1226
01:10:51,640 --> 01:10:55,479
Speaker 5: the rhythm of when you just talk is like unmatched

1227
01:10:55,479 --> 01:10:56,680
Speaker 5: and we can never lose it.

1228
01:10:57,040 --> 01:11:00,160
Speaker 3: Just a treasure. I just we honor you.

1229
01:11:00,960 --> 01:11:04,760
Speaker 2: This is a great emotional episode of Quest Love Supreme Sorority.

1230
01:11:05,960 --> 01:11:07,000
Speaker 2: I thank you.

1231
01:11:06,840 --> 01:11:11,000
Speaker 1: Kabar and Ben for really really being open because oftentimes

1232
01:11:11,120 --> 01:11:15,360
Speaker 1: artists are taught to not overshare or that stuff. But

1233
01:11:15,520 --> 01:11:19,519
Speaker 1: I think now, especially where we are, yes, it's about

1234
01:11:19,640 --> 01:11:22,800
Speaker 1: honesty about who we are and what we're going through

1235
01:11:22,840 --> 01:11:25,040
Speaker 1: and things aren't perfect.

1236
01:11:25,080 --> 01:11:27,759
Speaker 2: And I think you know, I too thought I was alone.

1237
01:11:28,240 --> 01:11:32,280
Speaker 1: I am also a son of a traveling musician father

1238
01:11:32,320 --> 01:11:34,400
Speaker 1: and mother that had to go through the same thing.

1239
01:11:34,479 --> 01:11:36,880
Speaker 1: And you know you often think that you're isolated, but

1240
01:11:36,920 --> 01:11:43,080
Speaker 1: I really this is not just lip service. This moment

1241
01:11:43,200 --> 01:11:47,040
Speaker 1: right now, me speaking to you like I needed to

1242
01:11:47,080 --> 01:11:49,559
Speaker 1: have this conversation and I love you too for it,

1243
01:11:49,600 --> 01:11:50,240
Speaker 1: and thank.

1244
01:11:50,000 --> 01:11:54,320
Speaker 2: You very much for that. It's an awesome episode, so.

1245
01:11:54,800 --> 01:11:56,639
Speaker 5: Net of a kabar in that way, I'm here too,

1246
01:11:56,720 --> 01:12:00,000
Speaker 5: because Peers, you're right, you're not alone exactly.

1247
01:12:00,040 --> 01:12:02,439
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm surprised we didn't run into each other up

1248
01:12:02,439 --> 01:12:03,519
Speaker 6: on the borsch Felts.

1249
01:12:04,800 --> 01:12:07,880
Speaker 1: No, you know what, it's weird. I felt as though

1250
01:12:08,240 --> 01:12:10,639
Speaker 1: you and I have crosspaths. I know we had common

1251
01:12:10,960 --> 01:12:13,680
Speaker 1: like friends in common and whatnot. Yet this this is

1252
01:12:13,720 --> 01:12:15,880
Speaker 1: this is great to meet you this way, and you

1253
01:12:15,920 --> 01:12:19,880
Speaker 1: know I appreciate it. On behalf of a on Sugar

1254
01:12:19,920 --> 01:12:24,439
Speaker 1: Steve and and Unpaid Bill and Layah Kabara, Ben Veren.

1255
01:12:24,600 --> 01:12:26,720
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. This is Quest Love Supreme and

1256
01:12:26,760 --> 01:12:27,680
Speaker 2: we will see you on the next go.

1257
01:12:28,320 --> 01:12:33,759
Speaker 3: Thank you, hey, Thank y'all for listening to Quest Love Supreme.

1258
01:12:34,520 --> 01:12:37,280
Speaker 5: This podcast is hosted by an Afro a mouth, an

1259
01:12:37,280 --> 01:12:39,439
Speaker 5: engineer and a man with too many jobs aka a

1260
01:12:39,840 --> 01:12:40,920
Speaker 5: mere Quest Love Thompson.

1261
01:12:40,960 --> 01:12:44,839
Speaker 3: Why you, Saint Clair Douga, Steve Mandell and unpaid Bill Sherman.

1262
01:12:45,680 --> 01:12:49,000
Speaker 3: The executive producers, well get paid the big bucks.

1263
01:12:49,200 --> 01:12:52,680
Speaker 5: A mere quest Love Thompson, Sean g and Brian Calhoun

1264
01:12:52,840 --> 01:12:55,880
Speaker 5: asked them for money. Produced by the people who do

1265
01:12:55,920 --> 01:12:59,160
Speaker 5: all the real work Ritny Benjamin, Jake Payne and.

1266
01:12:59,200 --> 01:13:00,679
Speaker 3: Yes, why are You St? Claus?

1267
01:13:01,360 --> 01:13:04,640
Speaker 5: Edited by another person who does the real work, Alex Conroy.

1268
01:13:05,000 --> 01:13:07,839
Speaker 3: And those who approved the real work. Produced for iHeart

1269
01:13:07,920 --> 01:13:08,840
Speaker 3: by Noel Brown.

1270
01:13:11,000 --> 01:13:18,479
Speaker 1: What's Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. For more

1271
01:13:18,520 --> 01:13:23,040
Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or

1272
01:13:23,040 --> 01:13:25,000
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.