Lena Horne: A Trailblazing Star

[@THEDISH54]

My ex boss, Ms Horne and she was funny and stern at the same time and also generous! God Bless her Soul and thank you for the words of wisdom that you gave to us for the years that I was working for you. I brag and will always brag about the fabulous human being that you were and still are to be. ChinaDoll of the Platters

[@summermen]

What a crime...all that beauty, charisma and talent -- and how little she was ever given to show them. But I'll never forget "The lady and her music" from the 80s---saw it several times, she tore the place down.

[@coreycanada7104]

And she was supposed to be built up as a Black Lana Turner or Rita Hayworth and they gave her NOTHING

[@barbaraobach]

It was criminal,but at least she stood her ground for civil rights , eventually reaped the benefits at a later age ,when most Hollywood Mgm stars were gone or retired ,and at 92 outlasted most of her ignorant abusers and remains one of the greatest stars ever

[@waynej2608]

​@@barbaraobachYes and a good thing, too. If it hadn't turned out this way, it wouldn't have been worthy of Lena and her magnificent talent and beauty. 💙

[@Simplegalinny]

She is surely missed. Thanks for sharing this past interview before her death.

[@coreycanada7104]

I cried so hard when she passed

[@RyanHLee-nc7hg]

A magnificently regal star, both in the movies and in life--so grateful to have a beautiful autographed picture of her.

[@josephcalderon906]

+Ryan H.Lee You're so lucky!.

[@disastertransport3656]

That's cool bro

[@williamhorwich2072]

No one could could compare to Lena Horne when it came to style,class,grace and sophistication.She was also in Hollywood at a time when Hollywood was very racist and she always carried herself with dignity.

[@akrenwinkle]

@@disastertransport3656 I can imagine Miss Horne, with big glaring eyes and a tight little snarky smile, saying, "Who is this 'bro' I keep hearing about?"

[@barbaraobach]

Her 20's wig is perfection, she looks like Louise Brooks and so glamorous, she kept her glamor and to have that skin quality at nearly 80, incredible

[@anonymousgirl799]

@Barbara O Bach Wig???? That is Ms Hornes hair. Are you kidding? She had beautiful hair well past her 80s.

[@suzettebennett816]

I think that is her hair.

[@victoriavancartier7379]

That is not her hair.

[@wilburmcbride8096]

​@@victoriavancartier7379Why not? My grandma had hair like Ms. Horne well into her nineties. Everyone is different!

[@rowbygoren1830]

I went to see Lena when she did a one woman show in Los Angeles. I think it was at the Music Center. The audience loved her. You could feel the love radiating back and forth between Lena and the audience. It was an evening of Song and Lena that I will never forget. ...Rowby.

[@agwestbrook4112]

Wonderful! I loved Lena Horne every since I was a little guy growing up in the 60's and 70's thanks to my wonderful grandparents who again blessed me in the 80's with a ticket to A Lady and Her Music.

[@tonjawragg4496]

I love her! Her class and dignity was impeccable A!

[@voceval1]

The irony is that every musical clip filmed at MGM showcased a spectacular Lena Horne. She didn't realize that seen today each film performance are absolute classics in every which way.

[@brianoyler706]

voceval1....yes, you are correct!!! Lena Horne was very fortunate to have been presented as such. She may not have liked what MGM was doing with her or being in California, but for the times she lived it was all very new and never done before. In comparison to many other black performers of her day, she was well regarded by many. I hope she was grateful for that.

[@MilesLikeDavis09]

@@brianoyler706Why should she feel “grateful.” If it was not the treatment she wanted, then there is no need to feel grateful just because it was better than the treatment some others received.

[@brianoyler706]

MileslikeDavis....you totally missed the point...reread my comment again.

[@seriesscratchx9807]

Wonderful that her father so forcefully took up for her!

[@ivalinapasse2469]

Great

[@JSB1882]

Lena Horne had so much talent and beauty. Here two albums with Harry Belafonte are my favorites.

[@davidallen508]

Always a most attractive woman with a great sense of style.Lena comes across as refreshingly non-bitter.Thank you for this posting.

[@realshaho3180]

Happy Birthday, Ms. Horne 🕊💛

[@barbaraobach]

One of the greatest stars ever

[@misteradamadamlopez]

Wow that was amazing

[@micoofficial7699]

As a young guy I can't help but notice how attractive she is - even in her older age.

[@queenjetblack2647]

and she was stunning in her younger age.

[@BoBo-ti6jh]

I never think of her as an actress. Wonderful singer and entertainer.

[@lf1496]

She was a great actress, only allied to do so on Broadway

[@waynej2608]

She was an amazing actress. The small mindedness of the early studio days didn't give her much to work with, script wise.

[@elijahrose2144]

She was monument actress and very humbled

[@alonzocole7547]

For one of the ALL TIME GREATS in black entertainment as well as a true pioneer she is extremely humble. I didn’t hear a single arrogant breath out her period.

[@jamiejamie8545]

thank you so much for the interviews. I love Lena Horne so much!

[@donnareed1015]

Love Her❤❤❤

[@waynej2608]

Awesome! I hadn't seen this since it first aired in the '90s. It was a wonderful interview. Lena is insightful, intelligent, and still beautiful. ❤👍

[@piustwelfth]

My Mom had a collection of 78 records and an old-fashioned record player. When I was a kid, I would play the records, and two of my favorites were "Stormy Weather" and "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man". I think the latter is her greatest song.

[@outinsider]

I love what she says about placing an entire people on one person and what a burden that is on them. She felt it in the 1940s. I hope wherever she is, she can see that there is more representation and it isn't weighed on one person.

[@BlackPantherStudios]

Great Lena Horne video.

[@orfaosky]

I am a big fan on Lena Horne and a lot of other actors. Why was Bill Robinson (Bojangles) not in Cabin In The Sky made in the same year as Stormy Weather?

[@VictoriaN72]

Have loved her for so long❤

[@JSB1882]

Who does these interviews? I like how she doesn't interject - just asks the questions and fills in info if the star can't remember.

[@HaFannyHa]

When I first saw a picture of Lena (when I was a child in the early 70s) I thought she was white. All I knew was that Lena was my Dad's favourite female singer (Bing and Dean Martin were his male faves). I loved her singing straight away. It took a long time for me to find out about Lena's activism and tremendous courage. She is one of my heroines, as well as one of my favourite singers. And such a beautiful woman. This is a great interview!

[@adambrocklehurst4211]

A strong, intelligent and beautiful woman.

[@lindseycarribean5113]

Stormy Weather 🎼🎵🎶🎤💽📺

[@brianoyler706]

There was not so much mentioned about her 'gigs' with Noble Sissel and Charlie Barnett Orchestras. I loved her renditions of Where Or When and The Lady Is A Tramp from Words And Music 1948. She recorded and filmed Liza with Avon Long for Ziegfeld Follies (1945), but the film had to be cut down due to running time. Liza and some other numbers were cut out before the release. I wonder whether any negatives or bits remain of Liza!? It would be another treasure from the MGM vaults.😊👍

[@formerlyarandompropernameb9327]

It’s funny it definitely could be just my perception, but you can almost tell the quality of the interviewer by the person being interviewed. She (that is Ms.Horne) looks like she was just really politely tolerating this interviewer....Granted, well-known stars of her caliber do so many interviews, and naturally, they just get bored with the same boring questions and topics, so that could also be it. But I’m just picking up “let me just tolerate you” vibes. Lena Horne seemed here to be her gracious, classy self, as it would seem to me. No doubt any Black person living in the times that Lena Horne lived through surely honed, and perfected the skillful art of having to be gracious and steady at all times- even in the presence of the egregious ignorance that mostly prevailed in Hollywood, as well as most all of America.

[@lesliemartin8669]

Les Martin Jr. Lena Horne was one of the Classes,sexy, prettiest Black women that I ever seen.she Paved the way for most if not all of the Black Actresses and Singers in the Business that came behind her. Rest In Peace,Lena Horne...

[@lourindawilliams6871]

Mrs. Horne is very beautiful, impressive and a sophisticated Iconic black representative of survival of an African American! ❤

[@Buffaloc]

I love her voice both singing and talking. She was also one of the most beautiful woman in the world.

[@AlphonsodeBarbo]

Wonderful!

[@notemachinist2314]

WoW! 😁🙌🙏🏼

[@sandrashevey8252]

I have always felt that Lena HOrne had more sex appeal than ElizabethTaylor or Marilyn Monroe. I think it comes across here as it does in the `cameo` singing roles from the films. Good interview. One observation though. Why didn`t the interviewer make it clear that Lennie Hayton was a White musician? And follow up with what a mixed race marriage was like back then? Also about Lena`s mother, an actress, who passed for Latin? Big Gap in the interviewer`s knowledge. Horne did do dramatic roles but not at MGM. She did race films before being signed by Metro. In 1938 she did `The Duke is Tops` for Million Dollar Productions. She had not developed that angular style of the MGM STudio days. She was pleasantly plump and had a voluptuous personality. Charming! When she mentions here about wanting to be the next Jeanette MacDonald I thought she was being clever. When you watch the film `The Duke is Tops` you see her style is very much in the style of MacDonald. Probably thought being light they`d pass her off as White as they tried to do with Rita Moreno and as was done with Merle Oberon (Indian) For some reason this did not happen. Perhaps on account of Horne`s bolshie father who bossed LB Mayer and told him his daughter would not appear as a `domestic` inasmuch as he pays for her maid.

[@suzettebennett816]

Bougie

[@CymoneHicks-lz6fz]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[@ivalinapasse2469]

Trailblazer for Real. Great entertainer

[@maxlinder5262]

HATTIE MAC DONALD... WAS A STAR...........DONNA DRAKE PASSED FOR WHITE............................WHERES THE REST...............????????/ SHE IS SOOO INTELLIGENT & SMART...LOVE HER.........

[@divox9pqr]

My God....all the movie roles and theatrical productions she could have done. She could have had a totally different career.

[@reneebradley8316]

Fred Sanford loved her!!!

[@nr30199]

A man and his Horne😂

[@direfranchement]

Her early career was rather unfortunate due to the racism of the era, but she was later able to come into her own as an entertainer and fully blossom away from Hollywood.

[@montecox264]

Touche'

[@CymoneHicks-lz6fz]

💜💜💜💜💜

[@dwightpowell6673]

Lena Horne did a unscripted interview years before she died in which she talked about the advantage of having a Caucasian mate/lover,.She said in her own words that a White man could afford a black- woman protection and priveledges that a Blackman could never.She said the whites would kill the blackman before they allowed him equal priveledges,they she saw it done".That's why her daughter Gail married that unattractive Sidney Lumet..their divorce...and her subsequent marriage to another Caucasian...My mother knew Lena Horne very well when she lived in Stuyvesant Heights in Brooklyn...a little known fact. Her and Richard Widmark were lovers...she lived with him in his house in Hollywood..his white neighbors in her own words treated her disrespectful and Richard Widmark did nothing about it was a he cause of their break up.

[@CymoneHicks-lz6fz]

💎💎💎💎💎

[@barbaraobach]

It's interesting they created a makeup just for her, light Egyptian and wonder if they still use it

[@keithmyers1926]

I remember back in 2004 there's was a biopic in motion for ABC, and Janet Jackson was producing and starrring in it, but after the Super Bowl debacle, Ms. Horne didn't want her to be apart of the production so she left, but the entire film got scrapped bc other creatives walked out when Janet did. Although I'm a big Janet fan I think it was divine intervention because, she was, supposedly, going to actually sing all of Hornes music and as I stated before, love Janet but, real talk, she's not exactly a powerful vocalist.

[@jeannetteduette6704]

Keith, I always envisioned Hailey Berry in the role of Lena for a biop. Alas, it is too late but Hailey could have shined as Lena.

[@keithmyers1926]

@@jeannetteduette6704 exactly...im not her biggest fan, but she was excellent as Dorothy Dandridge...another figure Janet wanted to portray lol

[@alonzocole7547]

I don’t think Ms. Horne wanted the movie after Janet. Because Ophra wanted the movie for her production company with Alicia Keys as Ms. Horne and it never happened.

[@richardbullis156]

Halle.

[@bbrown333]

@@jeannetteduette6704 Who is Hailey?

[@bigceazer]

Alicia Keys should play her in a biopic. she looks jut like her

[@greggp9555]

i think they look very similar! two beautiful black ladies

[@itsthehumor95]

That was the plan many years ago but the plan got axxed by Lena's family. Perhaps we'll still get it in the future with someone younger

[@tbec3011]

Lovely, talented Ms. Lena Horna. I do not understand why TCM chose to let their interviewer, on numerous interviews, ask questions without a mic. Unnecessarily distracting.

[@permijitdunkley1697]

😎

[@MarvinHicks-dd7qb]

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

[@coreycanada7104]

It was a good thing she brought her Daddy

[@donnacobb4027]

Miss Lina is so beautiful

[@richardbullis156]

Lena with an 'e' not i.

[@begood4786]

@@richardbullis156 F off you clearly know what they meant

[@suzettebennett2564]

Lena

[@barbaraobach]

When she says Spanish, wasn't she actually mostly of Spanish/Portuguese ancestry ?

[@anonymousgirl799]

@Barbara O Bach No, wrong again. How about read books written on Horne? Lena was a mixed black woman. Jewish, Black, European, Creole. Neither her mother or father were pure blood anything, like most American Blacks, decendants of American Slaves.

[@barbaraobach]

@@anonymousgirl799 So again,per scientist there's no such thing as race and most people aren't 100% of any specific ancestry, did you say 'pure blooded',that's how Nazis spoke, that's ignorant and racist, Lena Horne had mostly WEuropean ancestry, and partially WAfrican, one ancestry doesn't cancel out the other, she also had a bit of Native American dna

[@DeVron83]

Her father had a black mother and native american/white father. Her mother had one Black parent and one Black/White parent. She has more Black ancestry even with her keen features. Never read or heard she had any Portuguese or Spanish heritage.

[@barbaraobach]

@@DeVron83 Actually she had more WEuropean ancestry 56% , some Native and aprox 44% WAfr dna,per her daughter, and there's nothing wrong with that, so again, per scientist ,there's no such thing as race,just ancestry, but Lena Horne leaned Euro dna, and that's okay , it doesn't matter. Most who identify as 'black American' have er 23%me,5-15% British ancestry, that's okay to,most Americans are genetically diverse, and Africa is a continent ,not a race, no such thing, but it's the most diverse continent dna wise.

[@marliseisrael3017]

No

[@barbaraobach]

Lol,she says Afro American, difficult or confusing for her being from the 40's 50's to say African American, probably weird terminology for her and Africa is a continuous with ethnically diverse dna countries , she probably didn't understand being from another time,but went with it

[@marliseisrael3017]

That was a term they used for Negroes as well.....none of those names matter because We now know who we raeally are Israelites

[@sayahy4575]

VANITY/ JIM CROW, least she escaped playing a maid, and pass the brown paper bag.

[@danielstanwyck2812]

i've heard yjis interviewer with serveral other stars. not good. imcluding her rather shrill voice.

[@richardbullis156]

She is a little too fair but always dark in nature.

[@grant1088]

Can't believe you said that what can she do about the way she was born 15:33

[@beyourself2444]

I 2as never a fan of Lena. She had a magnetic personality but her acting wasn't great

[@MarvinHicks-dd7qb]

💜💜💜💜💜

[@MarvinHicks-dd7qb]

💎💎💎💎💎