Marie Bryant

Marie Bryant (November 6, 1917 – May 23, 1978) was an American dancer, singer, and choreographer born in Meridian, Mississippi, who relocated with her family to New Orleans, Louisiana, during her childhood. Her Broadway career spanned from 1946 to 1971, encompassing credits in Beggar's Holiday and Hello, Dolly!. From an early age she demonstrated a gift for performance, offering impersonations of Josephine Baker at her church by the time she was ten. As a teenager, her dance teacher Mary Bruce featured her in annual productions at the Regal Theater in Chicago.

Bryant launched her professional career in 1934 alongside Louis Armstrong at the Grand Terrace Cafe in Chicago, where she became a regular presence in the venue's floor shows as both a singer and dancer. She subsequently performed with Lionel Hampton in Los Angeles and appeared at the Cotton Club in New York City with Duke Ellington. By 1939, Bryant had become a featured attraction at the Apollo Theater in Harlem and was touring nationally with Ellington. She participated in his 1941 Los Angeles musical revue Jump for Joy, which included the number "Bli Blip," and appeared as the leader of a dance troupe in the 1944 film Carolina Blues. That same year she sang in the short film Jammin' the Blues, accompanied by Lester Young and Barney Kessel, among others.

Her Broadway debut came in 1946 with Beggar's Holiday, a musical featuring music by Ellington and lyrics by John LaTouche. During this period Bryant also taught at dance schools operated by Katherine Dunham and Eugene Loring, counting Marlon Brando among her students. In 1948 she appeared in the RKO film They Live by Night and headlined at the Florentine Gardens in Los Angeles, where she taught burlesque and other routines to chorus dancers. She went on to appear in the 20th Century Fox production Wabash Avenue (1950) with Betty Grable and toured the United States in The Big Show of 1951 alongside Ethel Waters, Sarah Vaughan, and Nat King Cole.

Bryant served as a dance coach and choreographer for Paramount, 20th Century Fox, MGM, and Columbia, developing a personal teaching method she called "controlled release." Among the film actors she worked with were Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds, Cyd Charisse, Betty Grable, and Ava Gardner. In 1952 she toured with the Harlem Blackbirds and married the company manager John A. Rajakumar. The following year she appeared in London in the musical High Spirits and performed across Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. While in London in 1953, she performed a satirical anti-apartheid calypso song titled "The Plea," with the refrain "Don't malign Malan because he dislikes our tan," drawing controversy during South African Prime Minister D. F. Malan's visit to Britain for the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Bryant returned to the United States after Rajakumar fell ill; he died in 1965.

In the 1970s, Bryant operated the Marie Bryant Dance Studios and served as an understudy to Pearl Bailey in the Broadway production of Hello, Dolly!, completing her documented Broadway career that had begun more than two decades earlier. She continued working as a choreographer in Los Angeles and Las Vegas until her death from cancer in Los Angeles on May 23, 1978, at the age of 60.