Legends of the Apollo
For more than 75 years, some of the world’s greatest entertainers have performed at the famous Harlem theater
- By Lucinda Moore
- Smithsonian.com, May 10, 2010
(Courtesy Smtihsonian Books)
Flip Wilson, one of the most beloved comedians to play the Apollo Theater, appeared there regularly during the 1960s. From 1970 to 1974, he starred in the Emmy Award-winning “Flip Wilson Show;” in 1971, he also won a Golden Globe for best actor in a television series. Although Apollo audiences famously employed boos and derision to dismiss any act that failed their acid talent test, they served for many entertainers, including Wilson, as a source of inspiration and a gauge of success. “It sounded as if the whole world was going to explode with laughter and any second the balconies would fall,” Wilson recalled. “It’s a sound I’ve never heard anywhere else, and it made such an impression that I compare the sound of every audience to that sound.”
Additional Sources
“Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing: How the Apollo Theater Shaped American Entertainment,” co-sponsored by the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) and the Apollo Theater Foundation, is on view through August 29 at the NMAAHC exhibition space in the National Museum of American History. It begins a national tour in October.
A book of the same name is available through Smithsonian Books.
Comments (3)
FIRST TIME ON THIS SITE....BUT I THINK IT IS SO INFORMATIVE AND EDUCARIONAL...
THANK YOU, I WILL RETURN
Posted by Victoria Lang on November 2,2010 | 08:49 AM
in 1949 i saw ella fitsgerald and billy eckstine at "jazz at the philharmonic at Lake merrit, Oakland Calif.
B
in 1949 I saw Ella Fitzgerald and Billy Eckstein at "jazz at the philharmonic" in oakland, calif. I fell in love at 17. for years I sang like Ella and danced to Eckstein..."you sigh, a song begins, you speak, and I hear violins...it's magic" wow! what a swooner. 20 years later again I saw Ella at Rbt. Mondavi winery in Napa Valley. She still had the voice of a 17 year old. Later, Ray Charles, Dizzy Gillespe, Oscar Peterson, Lena Horn...if there is a heaven, I want to go where they are...I don't want to listen to any old harps...just give me a horn, a piano, and a black voice
Posted by barbara ciapponi on October 28,2010 | 09:34 PM
It has bee a very long time ago when I, as a young woman from a small town in Rhode Island, was one of the many fans of Ella who sat in the great Appollo Theater and listend to her magnificent voice. A thrill I'll never forget--even now, at age 84.
Posted by Lucille Davis on May 14,2010 | 01:19 PM