Porgy and Bess: Cultural Landmark

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Lyric Opera of Chicago's 2008 production, with Morenike Fadayomi and Gordon Hawkins. Photo credit: Dan Rest/Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Duncan appeared in 124 performances during the premiere run at the Alvin Theater in New York City in 1935. The New York Times praised Duncan, whose stage credits later include the Lord’s General in Vernon Duke’s Cabin in the Sky and Stephen Kumalo in the first production of Kurt Weill’s Lost in the Stars, for his “elegant phrasing and burnished tone as well as his dramatic persuasiveness.”

“No one ever performed a livelier, better sung or better acted Porgy than Todd Duncan,” wrote Hollis Alpert in his book, The Life and Times of Porgy and Bess.

Porgy and Bess revivals in 1937 and 1942 also featured Duncan. He later recorded the role on an album, which is still available on CD. You can listen to Todd Duncan and his Bess, Anne Brown, at Amazon.com.

After the 1935 Broadway version, the show was taken on the road for three months. The last stop was Washington, D.C. Anne Brown would later recall another challenge that was on the horizon.

“As expected we were told that the National Theater would be a segregated house. Todd and I refused to perform and were threatened by the Theater Guild, which said we had to sing or there would be reprisals. We cared less. We were adamant.”

Facing threats of suspension and fines, Duncan and Brown had much to lose. But Duncan sought support for his position by sending letters to such important people as Eleanor Roosevelt and Ralph Bunche. The National’s manager called Duncan and offered to allow African Americans to attend Wednesday and Saturday matinees. Duncan refused. The National’s manager then said African Americans could sit in the second balcony at every performance. Duncan would have none of it. Duncan was informed that he would be fined $10,000 and suspended for a year if he did not perform, but Duncan did not waver. Finally, the theater’s management capitulated and the policy was changed. Hundreds of blacks attended the show. It was an important stand for equality in its day.

A 1938 tour visited California with the original cast. “Then, I came back home to Washington and taught again at Howard University,” Duncan said, although he performed in a 1942 revival.

The following year The Danish Royal Opera premiered Porgy and Bess in Copenhagen in Danish with an all-white cast. Duncan recalled: “I’d been doing concerts before that in Europe and heard about the production of Porgy and Bess during the war. The Gestapo closed a lot of theaters, but they wanted more music and allocated money for that. The Danish staged four new operas. They chose Porgy and Bess to show they hated the Nazis. After all, it was performed by Negroes and written by a Jew.  They thought the Nazis would veto it… At the premiere, 200 Nazis were in the audience. They enjoyed the first act, but during intermission they got up and walked out. They allowed the Danish to do the next two performances because they were sold out.

“But the Danes gave forty more performances underground during the war. The Germans would always find out that it was done the night before, but they never knew when it was going to be done. The Royal Opera was dark on the outside. And that was the Danish performers’ fight. They performed it at the cost of not knowing if they’d be blown up or killed by the Nazis. The Danes used ‘It Ain’t Necessarily So’ to jam Gestapo radio lines. That became a stymbol of resistance.”

After the war, Duncan returned. “I was proud to relearn the role and do it for them. I was learning it in Danish while they rehearsed it in Danish. For most of the rehearsals, though, I’d sing in English while they all sang in Danish. They gave me one more dress rehearsal with all these blondes in the cast. And that night, when I went out on stage and saw all their noses broader, they were lovely dark shades from light brown to black…all kinds of hair textures. Not only that but they had the Negro flavor. They were just so wonderful…I cried.

“I stopped the show with Plenty o’Nutin’. They wouldn’t let me go on. I had to encore the song. That opera house was 300 years old, and that was only the third time that this happened.”

After Porgy and Bess, Duncan earned renown as a teacher and performer, giving 2,000 recitals in 56 countries with his wife, Gladys, by his side. Although many cruel barriers were placed in his path, his talent and spirit endure. He died at age 95 in March 1998, in his Washington, D.C. home.

The reputation of Porgy and Bess would be challenged by some. Some critics thought it a one dimensional and stereotypical portrait of black life. Others predicted that over time, its power and passion would endure—which it did. In 1985, Porgy and Bess was finally staged by the Metropolitan Opera in New York City to sell-out crowds. James Levine, the Met’s music director and conductor of its orchestra, called it a great opera. “It has everything great opera has: great music, great drama and a psychological and social milieu that is as involving as the milieu of Don Giovanni or Boris Godunov.”

Part 1 of this article told the story of how Porgy and Bess achieved its place in American culture, while Part 2 [link] told how Todd Duncan became the first and most acclaimed Porgy.

Your local library will have many books about Porgy and Bess, as well as CDs and DVDs to help you explore the life and times of this historic opera. See the bibliography below.

Porgy and Bess Bibliography prepared by Robbie Green

Operatic Versions

Selections from George Gershwin's folk opera Porgy and Bess  (Decca 1940 & 1942), members of original cast and the 1942 Broadway revival cast including Anne Brown, Todd Duncan and Avon Long

Porgy and Bess (Decca/London 1976), Leona Mitchell and the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by Lorin Maazel

Porgy and Bess (RCA 1977), original cast from the Houston Opera Revival

Porgy and Bess (EMI 1989), studio recording of the Glyndebourne Festival Opera production under the direction of Simon Rattle

Porgy and Bess (Decca 2006), Alvy Powell, Marquita Lister, Nicole Cabell and Robert Mack, with the Nashville Symphony Orchestra conducted by John Mauceri

Porgy and Bess (1952), a live recording, released in 2008, of a 1952 Hamburg Germany performance by the famous Davis/Breen touring company, starring Leontyne Price, William Warfield, and Cab Calloway

Jazz Versions

The Complete Porgy and Bess (Bethlehem 1956), Mel Tormé and Frances Faye

Porgy and Bess (Verve 1957), a collaboration between Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald

Porgy and Bess (Columbia/Legacy 1958), Miles Davis and Gil Evans

Porgy and Bess (Decca 1959), Sammy Davis Jr. and Carmen McRae

Oscar Peterson Plays Porgy & Bess  (Verve 1959), Oscar Peterson

Porgy and Bess (RCA 1959), Harry Belafonte and Lena Horne

The Modern Jazz Quartet Plays George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess (Atlantic 1965), The Modern Jazz Quartet

Porgy and Bess (Pablo 1976), Oscar Peterson and Joe Pass

Porgy and Bess (RCA 1976), Ray Charles and Cleo Laine

Porgy and Bess (Verve 1997), Joe Henderson

Films and Television

Porgy and Bess (1959), directed by Otto Preminger, screenplay by N. Richard Nash

Porgy and Bess (1993), Glyndenbourne Festival stage production shown on television and later released on VHS and DVD, directed by Trevor Nunn

Books

The Life and Times of Porgy and Bess: The Story of an American Classic
by Hollis Alpert

The Muses Are Heard: An Account
by Truman Capote
The story of the 1955 Porgy and Bess production in Moscow

Porgy and Bess (Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series)
by Burton D. Fisher

Porgy
by DuBose Heyward