Fanny Belle DeKnight

Fanny Belle DeKnight (May 22, 1869 – April 28, 1950)[1] was an actress in the United States who worked on the theatre stage and on the movie screen in the 1920s and 1930s. She was most well known for her role as the mammy in the 1929 musical film Hallelujah by King Vidor.

Fanny Belle DeKnight

Career

Born Fannie Belle Johnson in Richmond, Virginia, she married and toured with piano player Samuel Knight throughout the 1890's, with DeKnight acting as a comedic reciter.[2] She later advertised herself as a dramatic and dialect reader in The Crisis in 1913.[3]

She was personally selected for the 1929 musical film Hallelujah by King Vidor because he needed someone to fit the role of a mammy in the film.[4] She also co-starred in the 1932 short musical film A Rhapsody in Black and Blue with Sidney Easton, with both of them being uncredited for their primary roles.[5]

Theater

Filmography

References
  1. "Fanny Belle DeKnight (1869-1950)". bnf.fr. Bibliothèque nationale de France. November 22, 2021. Retrieved February 4, 2022.
  2. "Y.M.C.A. Notes". The News. March 31, 1894. Retrieved February 5, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. Bois, William Edward Burghardt Du (May 7, 1913). "Crisis". Crisis Publishing Company – via Google Books.
  4. "Daniel Haynes, Honey Brown and Mme. DeKnight In Vidor's New Picture". The New York Age. October 20, 1928. Retrieved February 4, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. Barnett, Kyle (2021). Record Cultures: The Transformation of the U.S. Recording Industry. University of Michigan Press. p. 179. ISBN 9780472038770.
  6. "New York Critics on Plays of the Week". The Indianapolis Star. April 8, 1922. Retrieved February 4, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. Carter, Elmer Anderson, ed. (1969). Opportunity. Vol. 4. National Urban League. p. 134.
  8. Snelson, Floyd G. (January 2, 1932). "Snelson Reviews Theatre". The Pittsburgh Courier. Retrieved February 4, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. ""Carry Nation" Is Presented At Biltmore". Brooklyn Times-Union. October 31, 1932. Retrieved February 4, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. "Hallelujah". Variety. December 31, 1928. Retrieved February 4, 2022.
  11. Dickstein, Martin (August 21, 1929). "The Cinema Circuit". The Brooklyn Daily Eagle. Retrieved February 4, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. Riccardi, Ricky (2020). Heart Full of Rhythm: The Big Band Years of Louis Armstrong. Oxford University Press. p. 106-107. ISBN 9780190914134.
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