① memo 20181205 ~ Blackface ~ One of Al Jolson’s blackface acts performed by the dutch variety show artist Heintje Davids as shown in dutch movie theaters in 1930 in the ‘Polygoon’ cinema news. The blackfaced Al Jolson starred in the very first feature length ‘talkie’ (sound film) The Jazz Singer in 1927 – with a synchronized recorded music, singing and speech. In France , right after the liberation, Robert Clary was known as L’Al Jolson français.
Footage thanks to the Open Images (openbeelden.nl). audiovisual archive of the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision.