Provides a history that reveals a place both mythic and real, Black Hollywood, distinct from the studio-system-dominated Tinseltown--a world unto itself, with unique rules, institutions, and personalities. Bogle tells the story of such legends as Bill "Bojangles Robinson, Hattie McDaniel, Lena Horne, Dorothy Dandridge, and Sammy Davis Jr., and introduces readers to the stories of lesser-known artists, such as the scandal-plagued heartthrob James Edwards and the enigmatic Madame Sul-Te-Wan. He also shows us other members of the Black film community--from the White stars' Black servants to gossip columnists and hairstylists--and the world that grew up around them along Central Avenue, the fabled Harlem of the West. --From publisher description.

"The story opens in the silent film era, when white actors in blackface often played black characters, but also saw the rise of independent African American filmmakers, including the remarkable Oscar Micheaux. It follows the changes in the film industry with the arrival of sound motion pictures and the Great Depression, when black performers such as Stepin Fetchit and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson began finding a place in Hollywood. More often than not, they were saddled with rigidly stereotyped roles, but some gifted performers, most notably Hattie McDaniel in Gone With the Wind (1939), were able to turn in significant performances. In the coming decades, more black talents would light up the screen. Dorothy Dandridge became the first African American to earn a Best Actress Oscar nomination for Carmen Jones (1954), and Sidney Poitier broke ground in films like The Defiant Ones and 1963's Lilies of the Field. Hollywood Black reveals the changes in images that came about with the evolving s