Oscar Devereaux Micheaux was an author, film director and independent producer of more than 44 films. Although the short-lived Lincoln Motion Picture Company was the first movie company owned and controlled by black filmmakers, Micheaux is regarded as the first major African-American feature filmmaker, a prominent producer of race films, and has been described as "the most successful African-American filmmaker of the first half of the 20th century". He produced both silent films and sound films.
Evelyn Preer, was a pioneering American stage and screen actress and jazz and blues singer of the 1910s through the early 1930s. Preer was known within the black community as "The First Lady of the Screen."
Ivy Sawyer was a British-born American cabaret and ballroom dancer, singer, and stage actress.
The Exile is a 1931 American film directed by Oscar Micheaux with choreography by Leonard Harper. A drama-romance of the race film genre, The Exile was Micheaux's first feature-length sound film, and the first African-American sound film. Adapted from Micheaux's first novel The Conquest (1913), it the film shares some autobiographical elements; for example, Micheaux spent several years as a cattle rancher in an otherwise all-white area of South Dakota as does the film's central character Jean Baptiste.
The Girl from Chicago is a 1932 American Pre-Code drama film produced and directed by Oscar Micheaux, with an all-African-American cast including lead actors Grace Smith and Carl Mahon. The story concerns a federal agent who falls in love while on assignment in Mississippi. He helps his lover escape a local thug, and the film follows them to Harlem where they become involved in the assassination of a Cuban racketeer, played by Juano Hernández.
Alice Burton Russell was an African-American actress, producer, and the wife of director Oscar Micheaux. She appeared in several films directed by her husband.
Swing! is a 1938 American race film directed, produced and written by Oscar Micheaux.
Murder in Harlem is a 1935 American race film written, produced and directed by Oscar Micheaux, who also appears in the film. He remade his 1921 silent film The Gunsaulus Mystery.
A Daughter of the Congo is a 1930 race film directed, written and produced by Oscar Micheaux. The film is loosely based on the novel The American Cavalryman (1917), by African-American novelist and playwright Henry Francis Downing. It is considered a lost film.
A Son of Satan is a 1924 silent race film directed, written, produced and distributed by Oscar Micheaux. The film follows the misadventures of a man who accepted a bet to spend a night in a haunted house. Micheaux shot the film in The Bronx, New York, and Roanoke, Virginia.
The Czar of Black Hollywood is a 2014 documentary film by Bayer Mack that chronicles the early life and career of African-American filmmaker Oscar Micheaux (1884–1951). Mack conceived of and produced the film about Micheaux using Library of Congress archived footage, photos, illustrations and vintage music. The documentary, which is the first devoted exclusively to Oscar Micheaux's life, is narrated by William Bell, features an original score by Nicholas Jones and art direction by Julie Anderson.
Hot Chocolates is a musical revue with music by Fats Waller and Harry Brooks and book by Andy Razaf. It was originally titled Tan Town Topics in hopes it would be picked up by Broadway. Performed at the Hudson Theater in New York City, it was directed by Leonard Harper and ran for 219 performances from June 20, 1929, to December 14, 1929. It is also referred to as Connie's Hot Chocolates. It was staged, directed and produced by Leonard Harper. While the revue featured music and singing, including the subsequent hit "Aint Misbehavin'," it was praised for the cast's dancing, including its male and female chorus lines.
Leonard Harper was a producer, stager, and choreographer in New York City during the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s and 1930s.
Born in Orange, NJ, Eddie Rector was a famed tap dance artist and master of ceremonies. His career spanned the 1920s-40s as he danced in Harlem, across the US, and in Europe. He is known as a “soft shoe expert,” and he invented the Slap Step. Rector was the protégé of John Leubrie Hill and later danced as a team with Ralph Cooper. He danced in notable revues including Darktown Follies (1914), Tan Town Topics (1926), Blackbirds of 1928, Hot Rhythm (1930), Rhapsody in Black (1931), Blackberries of 1932, and Yeah Man (1932). Eddie Rector died in 1963 at the age of 66.
Rhythm For Sale is a 2013 biography of performer, choreographer, and director Leonard Harper written by Grant Harper Reid, Leonard Harper's grandson. It was self-published by Reid on CreateSpace. Rhythm For Sale has a total of 300 pages and the revised edition was published on August 11, 2014. ISBN 9780615678283
Birthright is a 1939 American film directed, co-produced and co-written by Oscar Micheaux. Carman Newsome stars in the 1939 film as a black Harvard graduate facing racism and discrimination after he returns to his small hometown in Tennessee, where he hoped to develop a school similar to Tuskegee Institute or Hampton Institute, both historically black colleges.
Easy Street is a 1930 American film by Oscar Micheaux, an African American filmmaker. It features an African American cast. Known as the last silent achievement in his filmography, the film is considered lost. The plot reportedly revolved around a group of con artists trying to seize the savings of an old man.
Lester Lang was an American cinematographer known for lensing several of Oscar Micheaux's films in the 1930s.
Carl Mahon was an actor in the United States. An African American, he had several film roles including a starring role in the 1932 film The Girl from Chicago
African American cinema is loosely classified as films made by, for, or about Black Americans. Historically, African American films have been made with African-American casts and marketed to African-American audiences. The production team and director were sometimes also African American. More recently, Black films featuring multicultural casts aimed at multicultural audiences have also included American Blackness as an essential aspect of the storyline.
