#755) Cab Calloway Home Movies (1948-1951)

#755) Cab Calloway Home Movies (1948-1951)

OR “Hi-De-Ho-Hum”

Filmed by Cab and Zulme “Nuffie” Calloway

Class of 2022

The “Cab Calloway Home Movies” can be viewed online at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture. Of the six documented reels of film, reels 1, 2, and 4 are available for online viewing (roughly 35 minutes).

The Plot: Cab Calloway is best remembered as the epitome of scat and jazz singing in the 1930s, but did you know he also filmed home movies? “Cab Calloway Home Movies” offer us brief glimpses of Calloway’s family life in Long Beach, Long Island with his wife and children, plus footage from family vacations, as well as from Calloway’s South American performance tour. And…yeah, that’s about it.

Why It Matters: The NFR gives a brief overview of the collection, with the only superlative going to the “handsome” footage. Huh.

But Does It Really?: Maybe I’m experiencing some NFR home movies fatigue, but why is this on the list? No disrespect to Cab Calloway and his family, but as wonderful as it is to see this footage, I’ve tried to justify its inclusion on the NFR, and I keep running into other titles that cover the same ground. Home movies from a prominent 20th century entertainer? “Nicholas Brothers Family Home Movies”. Amateur footage of a Black community? “The Solomon Sir Jones Films”. Documentation of Cab Calloway? “Stormy Weather” and “The Blues Brothers”. All these films made the NFR before “Cab Calloway Home Movies”, which makes its inclusion seemingly redundant. I’m glad the “Cab Calloway Home Movies” have been preserved and made available, but I’m still on the fence about their NFR standing.

Everybody Gets One: Cabel Calloway III started taking singing lessons and performing in night clubs when he was a teenager. After honing his craft in Chicago, Calloway moved to New York and found himself performing at the Cotton Club with the Missourians, who quickly changed their name to Cab Calloway and His Orchestra. In 1931, Calloway recorded “Minnie the Moocher”, which became his signature song and the first record by an African American artist to sell one million copies. By decade’s end Calloway would also become a star on radio and in the movies, including NFR titles “Stormy Weather” and “Snow-White”. At the time of these home movies, Cab was married to his second wife Zulme “Nuffie” Calloway, and the two were living in Long Beach raising their three daughters: Chris, Cecilia, and Cabella.

Other notes

Reel 1 is the Calloways’ trip to Trinidad and Tobago (presumably on vacation). It’s mostly drive-by shots of different buildings: post offices, police stations, even an outdoor school. We also get to see raw sugar cane being processed into sugar. I was not expecting this film to be so educational.
Reel 2 brings us back to Long Island, where Cab and Nuffie are enjoying some family time with their newborn (I’m not sure on the timeline, but I think that’s Cecilia). In contrast with Calloway’s boisterous energy on-stage, it’s nice seeing him relaxed and cuddling up with his kids. And those babies are so cute! I just want to invent time travel, go back in time, and pinch those cheeks!
Each individual reel of “Cab Calloway” has its own listing on the Smithsonian website which describes the footage in as much detail as possible, which I greatly appreciated. One interesting note about Reel 2 is that the “[o]riginal footage has exposure irregularities”. That’s putting it mildly. This reel is so overexposed it looks like God keeps trying to break into the shot. The overexposure is so distracting I didn’t even notice that one of the people visiting the Calloway’s in this reel is Lena Horne!
Reel 4 has the most going for it because it’s in color! This one features Cab and his Orchestra traveling and performing in such countries as Uruguay and Argentina. It’s all pleasant to look at, but we don’t stay on anything long enough to get a clear snapshot of time and place. Ah well.
Based on the Smithsonian descriptions, the three reels currently unavailable for online viewing include footage from Calloway’s travels to Jamaica, Haiti, Brazil, and Puerto Rico.

Legacy

Shortly after these home movies were filmed, Cab Calloway and his band split up following financial difficulties exacerbated by Cab’s gambling. Calloway continued performing on stage and TV, and even managed one more NFR movie with his appearance in “The Blues Brothers”. Cab Calloway died in 1994 at age 86.
At some point the “Cab Calloway Home Movies” were gifted to the Smithsonian by Cab’s youngest daughter, Cabella Calloway Langsam, along with several of Cab’s personal belongings. New prints of “Cab Calloway Home Movies” were made in 2016 from the original 16 mm prints, and the footage made the NFR six years later.

Listen to This: Among Cab Calloway’s posthumous achievements are two honorary Grammys, induction into the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame, and the 2018 inclusion of “Minnie the Moocher” on the National Recording Registry. An essay by author and journalist Herb Boyd is a rundown of the song and Calloway’s contribution to pop culture.