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At a party with Sidney Poitier: Cherno Jobatey's memory of the US actor

2022-01-11T17:46:03.618Z


The US actor and Oscar winner Sidney Portier was a role model - and meeting him was a privilege. Remembering a magical evening in Los Angeles.


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Sidney Portier with Cherno Jobatey: Leading Magic

Photo: private

Party night in Beverly Hills.

The legendary Morton's restaurant closes up and celebrates itself again. Hollywood's Camelot was called it.

Sylvester "Sly" Stallone, Angelina Jolie and the powerful agents such as the CAA power brokers held court here.

It is buzzing!

Full of jams, flawless beauty everywhere.

Lots of Hollywood, lots of It girls, plus a huge in-crowd.

Surfing through the crowd, you immediately notice that there is more, another energy center.

Surrounded by many, you recognize him immediately: Not the smile, not the distinctive facial features, it is the charisma that hits you like an ICE.

The legendary Sidney Poitier, the Oscar winner, or as they say in LA: Hollywood Royalty!

He sees me, points at me with a huge index finger, smiles and waves me over.

“You look like you've come from a long way off.

What's your story? «From Berlin!

“Wow,” he interrupts, “what's bringing you here?” I tell you about my DAAD scholarship year in LA and that I've been here two to six weeks a year since then.

"Lovin 'it," I add, "got californicated!"

Sidney Poitier's smile is getting warmer, almost fatherly.

"What are you doing, my son, what is your education like, what do you work in Germany?" Journalist, I'll give back, studied politics, journalism and business administration in Berlin and Los Angeles.

“Oh wow, it was different in my time.

There was no such thing as you.

I have an elementary school degree. ”-“ But you've already existed in my life, ”I reply.

“I'm sure you didn't just shape me!” Smile.

"How so?"

"I bet your mommy tormented you with the 'Banana Boat Song'"

I tell about my mother, who packed up my siblings and me several times a year and dragged them to our aunt Gerti, who had a television. My mother strictly refused to watch TV, wanted us children to play. But my mother had experienced racism during her exchange student days in London after my father's marriage and wanted her children to see black role models. Films were just right for her for that. And so it happened that every few months, mostly on Sunday afternoons, we would sit on Aunt Gerti's sofa. It was always a film with Sidney Poitier. We felt "lilies in the field" 100 times. We children sang along with the songs and acted out the scenes.

"What? You've seen 'Lilies' 100 times because your mommy loved it so much? ”Sidney Poitier arches with laughter. “It's unbelievable! How is your mother Definitely give her my regards. Then she probably liked my old buddy Harry Belafonte too. ”There must have been a brief moment of suffering on my face. Poitier notices it, of course, and laughs even more. "I bet your mommy tormented you with the 'Banana Boat Song' a lot." Everyone around us is laughing more and more. The classic generation conflict with the music of the parents seems to be universal.

Poitier tells of his time with Harry Belafonte, first as a competitor at the New York ›American Negro Theater‹.

They later became best friends and fought for civil rights together.

“You can't imagine it, but you couldn't actually go into certain parts of the city.

Police officers fined black people for being in the wrong area.

'Arrested for driving while black', as we always said.

Law and statute were very relative, we had to fight. "

Cloud of inviolability

As he speaks, the aura around him becomes bigger, stronger.

It basically sucks you in.

Suddenly I have the feeling that I have met a very good old friend again whom I haven't seen for a long time.

And it was probably precisely this gift of triggering precisely this in his counterpart and also in an audience of millions that made a 15-year-old farmer's son, who moved to New York from his native Barbados, go in times of tough racial segregation that were previously unthinkable and unthinkable were impossible.

He was sailing - or rather - it seemed as if he was gliding through the hardships of his time on an imaginary cloud of inviolability.

Blacks sit in the back of the bus, blacks are not allowed to go to good schools, get no jobs, live in quasi-apartheid!

And Sidney Poitier plays leading roles!

It couldn't have been easy to assert oneself in Hollywood.

In addition, he plays these main roles with an intensity, nonchalance and elegance that is second to none.

How do you do that?

“You just have to find a conduit for your anger or it will destroy you.

It's best to turn it into something positive.

And the highest form of it is forgiveness ”.

And in my astonished look Poitier adds: "I'm the me I chose to be!"

Caribbean youth

No matter how great his fame, Poitier never forgot where he came from. Even as a Hollywood star, he was right on the front line of the civil rights struggle of the 1960s, looking police dogs in the eyes. It is this combination of courage, nonchalance, dignity, friendliness and respect and an incredible amount of charisma that made Sidney Poitier.

"Why did you wave me over?" I ask. “I knew right away you weren't an American. The way you look, your clothes, you are different, you are not shaped by this society. ”Sidney Poitier was born more or less by chance in Miami and grew up in the Bahamas. One would probably not do him wrong to say that these were probably fortunate circumstances. So he experienced a loving environment in a Caribbean society. He was shaped - was able to learn and grow up - without the daily US racism of that dark time, which tells everyone who is "not blonde and blue-eyed": You can do nothing, you are nothing, please take a back seat. This bombardment of you-can-nothing messages triggers many to believe it and not even try it. Sociologists speak here of internalized racism,which Poitier evidently did not miss as a child.

When he first auditioned at the (black) theater, they kicked him out. He, who had no stage training, should wash the plates, please. He had just done that, so he was back the next day and the next and the next. Until something worked.

"Black, but somehow different"

And this "I can do what and want what charisma" is contagious. As absurd as it may sound, despite all the racism of the time, it fits into the American dream: Anyone can do it. It's black, but somehow different. Many could live with him and also find him good. Although he always stood up, always carried the torch for the cause of the blacks.

In our conversation, Poitier comes back to Belafonte.

A 'best buddy', a very good friend, is a great support.

"Do you have something like that too, someone who goes through thick and thin with you?" I've been nodding since school days.

"Good," says Poitier, "hold on to it, it's really important!"

I'm trying to rationalize why he's so captivated by me.

Why can't I withdraw from it?

He wears a gray suit made of a striped heavy wool fabric, a printed banker's tie, an immaculately starched white shirt with a light checked pattern made of heavy cotton, and of course an undershirt.

Actually too formal and probably too warm for the climatically Mediterranean Los Angeles.

So de facto pretty

old school

, an ongoing anachronism, a greeting from a bygone era.

And this is exactly where his magic comes in: this slim, upright stature, the posture of the head, the expansive speaking with his arms and hands.

And this look too!

Sparkling, casual and at the same time sharp, but with a dash of goodness.

Despite its old age, it appears timeless.

He speaks like a 40-year-old, looks like he is in his early 50s, but is over 80!

Break through a glass ceiling with elegance

In Hollywood there has always been a term for this: »Leading Man Looks«!

That means as much as this rare lead magic that carries an entire project, an entire film.

And it doesn't seem boring when you see the film for the third or tenth time.

Sidney Poitier was one of those who broke through a very thick glass ceiling, and he did it with such elegance that many after him could poke through that gap.

And that worldwide!

Even in his proud age, Poitier still fills every room, including Morton's with many celebrities.

And he has questions: “You know Cherno, I was born with insatiable curiosity, I wanted to understand everything.

Tell me how is Merkel doing in the German world of men?

Are you still friends with the French after the war? ”He listens, his eyes sparkle, he nods, he is blazing.

He has something that you cannot learn, that you cannot train.

He is just there.

And I can spend the evening with him.

Sidney Poitier has now passed away, but he will stay with me forever.

Rest in peace, they say.

I would like to call after him: Rest in power!

And thank you!

Source: spiegel

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