Eartha Kitt: My Encounter with a Legend

Of course I adored and wanted to be Catwoman. That goes without saying. Eartha Kitt was another matter. I had interviewed her once for the Chicago Tribune. It was a couple of years after she told Lady Bird Johnson what she thought of LBJ's Vietnam war. Unfortunately, she chose to tell her at a girly luncheon all about Lady Bird's beautification program. Eartha took the entire luncheon off-message and maintained that she didn't work for eleven years after that, but here it was l971 and she was headlining a nightclub in Chicago. She'd already been a legend for twenty years, and legends have very vague calendars. I had a great time interviewing Eartha. who spent a lot of time telling me how she had created Eartha and was now spending the seventh day resting.

The next great time I had with her was about a decade and a half later, and this time I got to participate in the creation. Things were slow-ish for both of us. I had just been fired after refusing to do free rewrites on my script of Can't Stop the Music, widely considered to be the best first-draft screenplay since Citizen Kane. One of the benefits of working on the Village People movie was I got to see them all naked which, at the time, helped me see lots of other people naked, from villages far and wide. The other benefit was I met Jacques Morali, the insane gay French Jew who created the group and wrote their songs. In another pocket of his existence, Jacques annually created a score for the Crazy Horse show in Paris. Spectacular showgirls lip-synched the English lyrics as well as spectacular showgirls could to an audience of non-English speakers who had about as much interest in the lyrics as Lorenz Hart might have had in the showgirls. Armed with this knowledge, Jacques asked me to write a lyric to one of his disco tunes. And he had another reason. "The girrrrl will be lap-sinking to Eartha Kitt. And zo the lyrics need to be special." Will she be doing an Eartha Kitt impression? "Don't be bizarre. It is not a drag show. Eartha is sitting on a hill in Connecticut, not working. She will record this one thing." The song was called "Where is My Man?" It's about Eartha and her endless search for a soul-mate who never met Bernard Madoff.

I sent the lyrics to Eartha. A day later, she called. "Brrrrruce, my love. Where have you been since 1952? This is so, so Eartha. But listen, I've never done this disco music before, so you must make a recording of this just the way you want me to phrase it so we get the maximum Eartha out of it." If I didn't know that Ashton Kutcher had not yet been born, I would assume I was punked. Moi, teach Eartha Kitt how to phrase? Naturally, I fired off the cassette, which prompted another call from Eartha, threatening to sue me into the next world if I ever dressed up like Jim Bailey and did her act. She then went to New York and recorded the song with Jacques. During the session, they called. There was a long dance break on the record and Jacques felt she should cover it with something, something Eartha-esque. I dragged out my best trans-continental Eartha and purred, "I want a man...with a big...big...big...big.....big....yacht." Notice I resisted dinghy. And please enter it into the record. They loved the song at the Crazy Horse, Jacques and his business partner Henri Belolo released the song as a single, it became a gigantic dance record all over the world, I got to tip several people lavishly, and suddenly Eartha was Back. She never had charts for a full orchestra, and disco music always sounds silly when attacked by a trio, so she never performed the song in public outside of singing it to track at huge discos. But we did record an entire album of equally Eartha-esque disco songs, in which she continued her poignant search for a relationship with a man of color, clarity, cut and carat. I feel her pain. To this day, I will walk into disco and hear her asking, "where is my man?" You ain't the only one, sister.

Comments

[lionel64]

Thanks for a great article on the unforgettable Eartha Kitt...one slight correction: she did include 'Where is my man' in many concerts when she had a larger orchestra-there is even a live version of it in a double live CD from London recorded in late 8o's at the Shaefstbury theatre-

[JayJonson]

Yes, thank you very much for this reminiscence. Eartha Kitt was an extraordinary figure. The world is a poorer place for her absence.

[rubinoff]

Good entertainer and to think she was black-balled from working in our country a long time, for asking a question or was it making a statement about the 'nam war? Anyway, dear Eartha, rest in peace.

[isis]

The name Eartha is beautiful and i wonder why it has not been used more to name babies.

[jesmer e]

Dear Bruce:

Please do more writing for HuffPost. Like every day, maybe?

[dianahy]

I had the honor of having Eartha Kitt star in an off-Broadway musical, Mimi LeDuck, for which I wrote the book and lyrics. It ran 58 performances in the fall of 2006. Bad reviews, except for Eartha's extraordinary performance: "Fine wine." (NYT). One of the songs, "Everything Changes," was written after I looked in the mirror one morning and realizing that my time was, indeed, marching on. She took my words, inhabited them, gave them life, and made them her own. Onstage, that song became the bewildered cry from all of us who are aging. She took my words and gave me back a song, a gift for which I am eternally grateful. Aloha, Eartha.

[sector1463]

Is this avaiklable anywhere?

[Chicago48]

Surely there is a link to the music on you tube? Can somebody find it?

[MrEguy]

Eartha Kitt - Where Is My Man (Original 80's Mix)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYjF6IUB0PE

[MrEguy]

Here's the music video:
Eartha Kitt Where is my man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5m88CoGLno

[avraamjack]

NICE

[BostonB]

Eartha Baby...you will be missed.

[vote-obama]

never knew the lady but she seems to lived a full life. so here is to you ma'am(raises cup) RIP

[sxa]

Wow! What a great story about such a fun disco song. that purrrrrrrrr

[alwaysthere]

I was 14 15 maybe, and she just sat in a room purrrinnnn­nnnggggggg­g

it'll change who you are

Love ya Eartha

[SCG]

"Eartha Kitt's former neighbors remember her kindness" - by Nanci Hutson 12/26/2008 The News Times

NEW MILFORD (CT)-- To Patricia and Ted Hammer, Eartha Kitt was far more than the sex-kitten actress and singer the world knew.

Instead she was Eartha Mae, a Southern plantation-born employer and friend who loved to garden and searched their refrigerator for homemade snacks.

On Christmas Day, the 81-year-old performer who rose to fame in the 1960s as the purring Catwoman in the "Batman" television series, died of colorectal cancer.

The Eartha Kitt "dearest to our hearts," Patricia Hammer recalled, was down-to-earth and generous beyond anything one might suspect from her lusty performances.

Continues: http://www.newstimes.com/ci_11315202?source=most_emailed

[randall207]

Oh the memories! I saw her perform "Where is My Man" live at the Trocadero Transfer in San Francisco - she came onstage being carried by two muscle men. She lost her place - late by 32 beats - but a great time was had by all.

Thanks for the tribute and background on her.

Randy from Maine.

[Libertine58]

I met Eartha Kitt as a kid in the spring of 1967 when my family stayed that the same Howard Johnson Motor Lodge in South Jersey. My celebrity-struck mother, spotted her leaving her room as we were leaving our room and wasted no time running over to meet her.

As I remember, she was quite gracious to my mother and they chatted for a few moments. She had her daughter with her, who was somewhat younger than me.

[Shzron1946]

Thank you for writing with such feeling about Miss Kitt. I was a longtime fan, but only saw her live on stage once in my life, in the 1970s production of Timbuktu. I have been very disappointed in how she has been portrayed by the American press, but I wondered if you had seen the London Times obit. It may read a little bit dramatic, but it is so much more like the real Eartha Kitt...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article5399897.ece

[kewps]

I preferred Julie Newmar as Catwoman-but Eartha Kitt rocked at everything she did!