Emmett "Babe" Wallace

Happy Birthday Emmett "Babe" Wallace 1909-2006...A true Renaissance man but largely forgotten today, the handsome Emmett Wallace appeared on stage and screen as a singer, actor and dancer, wrote thousands of songs (many of them covered by Ella Fitzgerald, Benny Goodman and Cab Calloway) a novel, essays and books of poetry and performed on three continents.

At the age of 19 Wallace got a job as a bouncer at the Savoy Ballroom. His skills as a singer and dancer were soon discovered and he began working in some of the famous Harlem nightspots; Small's Paradise, The Cotton Club and the Apollo. When Ella Fitzgerald inherited Chick Webb's orchestra after his death, Wallace helped front the band for a short time. It was only natural that his talent and good looks would lead him to the silver screen.

As an actor, Wallace was one of the early pioneers of black cinema. He appeared in Smash Your Baggage in 1932 and The Black Network in 1936. His career gained momentum in 1943 when he starred with Lena Horne and Bill Robinson in Stormy Weather but like many black American performers, the industry didn't know what to do with him besides place him in "colored" films or cast him as a driver or lowly worker in films made for white audiences.

During WW2 he spent time in France and afterwards, like many African American performers of that era, he made his way to Europe to escape segregation policies in the U.S. He performed on stage in London in "Anna Lucasta" in 1947-1948 and became the first black male star of the Folies Bergere in Paris during 1952-1955 where he sang many of his own compositions in English and in French. In 1956 he moved to Israel where he sang in Hebrew, Yiddish and English and enjoyed a successful recording career. In 1962 he went on tour in Europe again sharing the stage with Louis Armstrong, Lionel Hampton, Della Reese, Johnny Otis and Cab Calloway to name a few. At the end of that tour he returned to the States in 1964.

Like many ex-patriot black Americans returning home after long years away, Wallace had been forgotten by the general public. Finding work as an actor or singer was a constant struggle and much of his experience was used as material in his many essays, poems and songs. He found work in a few off Broadway plays and appeared on a television series "Our Street" but from 1966-1970 he was forced by financial circumstances to work as a messenger, elevator operator and mail room clerk for Twentieth Century Fox.

In 1976 he appeared on Broadway in an all black production of Guys and Dolls with Robert Guillaume and James Randolph. After that he spent most of his creative energy on his writing with occasional appearances in community theater and singing in hotel and cabaret engagements. He retired to the Actors Fund Retirement Home in New Jersey where he continued to write up until his death at the age of 97.