Billie Holiday Movies

Performance footage of Billie Holiday may admittedly be scant, but this issue compiles into a single release song cuts from some of Holiday's live filmed performances that are still extant. Concerts from which the compilation draws include: an August 19, 1950 gig with Count Basie and his orchestra, an August 13, 1956 set with pianist Corky Hale and his trio; a July 10, 1958 set, filmed in Newark, in which Holiday is backed up by tenor saxophonist Georgie Auld, bassist Vinnie Burke, pianist Mal Waldron and others; and a November 1958 Parisian set where Holiday is accompanied by Waldron and bassist Michel Gaudry. The program wraps with two selections from a February 1959 set featuring Mal Waldron and Peter Knight's orchestra, and then jumps back to Manhattan in December 1957 for one track performed with such artists as Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young and others. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

Made famous by singer Billie Holiday in an unforgettable 1939 recording, the haunting anti-lynching anthem "Strange Fruit" was not, as many believe, written by an African-American. Rather, it grew out of poem penned by a Jewish schoolteacher from the Bronx, Abel Meeropol. Outraged by the shabby and often brutal treatment of black citizens in the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave, Meeropol gravitated to the burgeoning civil rights movement of the 1930s, where he also found a nurturing home for his left-of-center sentiments (the same sentiments which, years later, moved him to adopt the children of executed atomic spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg). To avoid persecution from the radical right and from the anti-Semites of the era, Meeropol published the song under the pseudonym Lewis Allen, the same name he later used for his less impassioned but equally powerful anti-bigotry ballad "The House I Live In." Naturally, this 60-minute documentary includes film clips of Billie Holiday performing the title song (in her only TV appearance, in 1958), as well as renditions by such activist-artists as Pete Seeger, Josh White, and Cassandra Wilson. Strange Fruit was first telecast as a presentation of the PBS anthology Independent Lens. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Two vocalists are captured performing some of their famous songs. "Jumpin' the Blues" and "Symphony in Black" are featured in Young's show. ~ Rovi

Billie Holiday is recognized as one of the greatest blues and jazz vocalists of all time. This program tells her story. Holiday's song, "Strange Fruit," a reference to the lynching of black Americans in the South, was voted the most important piece of music of the 20th century. The singer experienced firsthand the indignities of racism in her native land. She found solace in the alcohol and drugs which eventually killed her. Her music continues to thrill audiences. Many of her signature tunes are included in this documentary, such as "St. Louis Blues," "My Man," and "God Bless the Child." Archival film clips show Billie Holiday in performances in film, television, and concert appearances. Interviews with musical colleagues and friends give insight into the troubled life of this giant of American music. ~ Rose of Sharon Winter, Rovi

The Swing era conjures up images of sophisticated ladies, debonair gentlemen, and the big bands who entertained them with a certain élan. This program is the first volume in a series that captures that elegant era on film, with a look at the big bands. This episode features the renowned Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, as well as crooners Rosemary Clooney and Tony Pastor, doing 18 numbers, including "Opus One" and "Frankie and Johnny." Archival clips, photographs, and personal recollections of performers and fans recall the charm of this great time in American music. ~ Rose of Sharon Winter, Rovi

Diana Ross plays the magnificent, tragic song stylist Billie Holiday, who while writhing in a strait jacket in a prison cell, awaiting sentencing on drug charges, reflects on her turbulent life. Raped in her youth by a drunk (Adolph Caesar), then compelled to work as a domestic in a Harlem whorehouse, Holliday is encouraged to try for a singing career by the bordello's pianist (Richard Pryor). She rises as high as it is possible to go in the white-dominated show business world of the 1930s, but can't handle the pressure and turns to narcotics. The film takes several liberties with the 44-year existence of "Lady Day." Among the Billie Holiday standards performed by Ross are "My Man," "I Cried for You," "Lover Man," "Them There Eyes," and the title song. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This television special, originally aired on December 8, 1957, offers performances from some of the greatest names in jazz history. Included are appearances by Billie Holiday, Count Basey, Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, and Red Allen. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

New Orleans is Republic Pictures' spin on such "musical origin" films as Birth of the Blues and Dixie. Covering nearly four decades, the story is a fanciful recreation of the "birth" of American jazz music. Arturo de Cordova plays Nick Duquesne, owner of a posh gambling house in turn-of-the-century New Orleans (yes, that's an uncredited Shelley Winters as Duquesne's secretary!) When the "good" people of the town forced Duquesne to pack up and leave, he relocates in Chicago, where he discovers that his customers are turned on by hot jazz. Hiring bandleader Louis Armstrong to entertain his patrons, Duquesne no longer has to rely on gambling to make a living. Romance enters the picture in the form of Miralee Smith (Dorothy Patrick), a straightlaced student of classical music who learns to kick up her heels and shed her inhibitions at the sound of jazz. New Orleans is the only mainstream Hollywood feature good enough to cast Billie Holliday in a major role: true, she's playing a maid, but a maid with the most exquisitve singing voice this side of Heaven. The film's highlight is the Holliday/Armstrong duet "Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans", surely one of the great moments of movie-musical history. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi