02/28/2021
BLACK HISTORY MONTH
THE UNASSUMING CIVIL RIGHTS ICON
BILLIE HOLIDAY
This post is inspired by “The United States vs. Billie Holiday,” a film directed by Lee Daniels and written by Suzan-Lori Parks, debuted last Thursday, February 26th on HULU.
Billie Holiday experienced a tortured childhood but had a gift for music. Most of the media present Holiday as an artist struggling with addiction. We rarely get a glimpse of the cause of her troubles and pain. Her popular protest song “Strange Fruit” set Harry Anslinger (Commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics) on the warpath to silence her voice in the 1940's using her as a poster child for the American War on Drugs while privately was consumed with preventing her from singing "Strange Fruit," determined to hide the truth that it accurately depicts the lynching of black Americans and helped galvanize an anti-lynching movement across the country. To her credit, Holiday refused to stop singing the song despite the federal government's attempts to silence her. Harry Anslinger was aware there were white women as famous as Billie who had drug problems—but he responded to them rather differently. He called Judy Garland, who suffered addiction in for a friendly chat, in which he advised her to take longer vacations between films, and wrote to her studio, assuring them she didn’t have a drug problem at all!
So, what was it like to be black for Billie Holiday? Racism censoring a magnetic voice, a lifelong battle with addiction, toxic men, and unfortunately, being targeted by the federal government. Yet, through it all, she kept an unshakable strength. Billie Holiday's defiance was an essential part of the civil rights movement, fighting white supremacy, and an inspiring stepping stone for women. Side Note: Living in the time of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and others the anti-lynching bill, now called the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, has still not passed in Congress. "Strange Fruit" is as resonant now as ever...there is still a lot of work to be done in the ongoing march towards racial justice! Hear Andra Day's interpretation of Billie Holiday's top hit tunes: https://soundcloud.com/andraday/sets/the-united-states-vs-billie
