Carmen Jones
Quick Summary
Carmen Jones is a musical comedy by Billy Rose, which premiered in 1943. It is an adaptation of the opera Carmen by Georges Bizet, with an all-black cast. The musical was a significant success and later served as the basis for Otto Preminger's 1954 film of the same name, starring Dorothy Dandridge. The film adaptation earned Dandridge an Academy Award nomination for best actress, making her the first Black woman to receive this honor.12
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Cozy Cole…appeared in the Broadway musical Carmen Jones, performing “Beat Out Dat Rhythm on a Drum,” and he later played with the Benny Goodman Quintet in Seven Lively Arts (1945), another musical. From 1949 to 1953 he toured with Louis Armstrong’s All Stars, and in the late 1950s he was a…
Read More…appeared in the Broadway musical Carmen Jones, performing “Beat Out Dat Rhythm on a Drum,” and he later played with the Benny Goodman Quintet in Seven Lively Arts (1945), another musical. From 1949 to 1953 he toured with Louis Armstrong’s All Stars, and in the late 1950s he was a…
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Dorothy Dandridge…role in Otto Preminger’s all-black Carmen Jones (1954), earning an Oscar nomination. (She did not sing in Carmen Jones, however; the singing was dubbed by mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne.) Because she was a black woman in a racially tense era, film offers thereafter did not come readily, though she did appear…
Read More…role in Otto Preminger’s all-black Carmen Jones (1954), earning an Oscar nomination. (She did not sing in Carmen Jones, however; the singing was dubbed by mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne.) Because she was a black woman in a racially tense era, film offers thereafter did not come readily, though she did appear…
Read More