Some Days Wake up and Think, at Damn Debbie Allen,” She Says With
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By Regina R. Robertson CENTEPhotography Kwaku Alston # WITH LIMITLESS TALENT AND AN UNWAVERING DEDICATION STTO THE ARTS, DEBBIE ALLEN HAS FOUND A NEW PASSION— NURTURING THE NEXT $CROP OF PERFORMERSGE Some days ! wake up and think, !at damn Debbie Allen,” she says with a laugh, speaking of herself in the third person. “She always has an idea and I wish she’d just leave me alone sometimes!” "ven as she jokes about the prospect of slowing her pace, she knows that’s not who she is, or ever was. It’s just before one o’clock on a Saturday, one of the busiest days at the Debbie Allen Dance Academy in Los Angeles. On this particular day, however, there is more activity than usual. Just as a meeting with parents of new students is adjourning out back, a group of preteen girls of every height and hue gathers inside to audition for The Hot Chocolate Nutcracker (BET will air last year’s production in December). This is the fourth year that the show, Allen’s twist on the classic ballet, will play at the University of California at Los Angeles’ Royce Hall, and news of the open call has spread like wildfire. But before any dancing commences, Ms. Allen—as her students and faculty call her—wants to see everybody in the room. Dressed down in a white button-up top, hot pink cargo pants and matching Nikes, she directs the girls to walk across the floor, row by row. Step, step, walk…step, step, walk…step, step, walk… Watching her in action is like going back in time to her days as Lydia Grant, from the 1980’s movie and TV series Fame. But really, that was more than three decades ago. Allen, now 64, has accomplished so much since then, and it’s likely her young BLIPP charges know her for very di!erent reasons. Perhaps they’ve seen her sit at the judges’ table on So You Think You Can Dance. TO BRING BUY. HAIR,TO WHERE SEE DETAILS, CLOTHING FOR RANDYFULLER/SISTERSTYLING.COM. NATALIE & GIOLLIOSA STODGHILL/OPUS BEAUTY USING They’veAVEDA. MAKEUP, TRACY KENNEDY. STYLING, probably read her children’s books, too, and attended her stage productions. Maybe they’ve even felt the buzz TO LIFE SEE PAGE 9 TO LEARN HOW. DECEMBER 2014 ESSENCE.COM 109 Sharing the gift of the arts is a whole new purpose in my life. It goes beyond me. surrounding the prime-time shows she currently stars in and directs. All in all, it speaks to the legacy she has been building for years. Debbie Allen is a dancer, singer, actor and choreographer, just as she’s a writer, producer, mentor and community leader. She’s also a wife and the mother of Vivian Nixon, 30, and Norm “Thump” Nixon, Jr., 27. She wears many hats, but she sticks to a simple method for managing it all. “When I’m here, audi- tioning children, I’m not thinking about directing Scandal or Grey’s Anatomy,” she explains. “But if I’m working on How to Get Away With Murder, I don’t want to hear about anything else, because I’m totally focused on getting that story on film. I do one thing at a time.” Clockwise from top: Wayne Mackins-Harris Big Dreams (Prince), Taína Lyons (Ballerina), Savoy Bailey Dance is her core. It’s the well from which she derives her (Bollywood), Ryan Phuong (Candy Cane), inspiration. But to understand the magic of Debbie Allen, to truly Amanda Harris (Angel) and Allen. appreciate the force that she is and that she brings, it’s neces- sary to take a look back at the people and places that shaped but when I tried to explain to my mother what happened, she her. The third child and second daughter of Pulitzer Prize– said, ‘You failed.’ ” The lesson was hard, but she got it, eventu- nominated poet Vivian Ayers and the late Dr. Arthur Andrew ally. “Mama was trying to explain that I couldn’t lay blame on Allen, she was raised as a “child of the universe.” She was once somebody whose idea it was that I was not right. It was up to asked what religion she practiced. Her response: “I am a free me to do something to get where I wanted to go.” mind.” That independent spirit was her mother’s doing. “That rejection hurt her so much that she stopped dancing Growing up in Houston during the sixties could have been a for a year. She was crushed,” recalls Rashad, who graduated limiting existence, but while her father, a prominent dentist, was from Howard University before making her way to New York, teaching his children about the power of community, her mom with Allen close behind. “I used to copy everything Phylicia did,” was exposing them to the world beyond their block through art. Allen says, laughing. It was at Howard that she found her foot- “We went to museums and concerts, but because of segregation, ing. “Girl, I was at a party and in the middle of whatever funky we couldn’t go downtown to the movies, so we’d see them later, dance I was doing, I did a triple turn and a layout—bam!” Mike on television,” says Allen, who was mesmerized by musicals. Malone, the late legendary choreographer and director, was That’s where the dreaming began. “Listening to Lena Horne and impressed. “He said, ‘You know, you can really dance,’ and I was Dorothy Dandridge sing and watching the Nicholas Brothers and like, ‘Oh, hmmm, well…’ That was the turning point.” Fred Astaire dance had a big impact on me. Then when I saw Shirley Temple, I said, ‘I can outdance her. I know I can!’ ” Stay Ready “Deborrah is a little lady, but she is a large spirit. In junior Whether she’s working onstage, on TV or in film or literature, she high school, she joined the string ensemble and, if you can puts in the e"ort. She’s disciplined beyond measure and as a imagine, she chose the bass violin. She had to sit on a stool so result, her list of credits runs long. In 1973, Broadway came knock- her hands could reach the fingerboard,” Phylicia Rashad says of ing and Allen, a two-time Tony nominee, made her debut in her younger sister and frequent collaborator, whom she still calls Raisin (a musicalization of A Raisin in the Sun). The poster hangs by her given name. (Allen’s first manager suggested she shorten in her o!ce, just behind her chair. She then headed to Hollywood her name to Debbie—she agreed—and get plastic surgery on for a short-lived variety show, 3 Girls 3, which ran for exactly four her lips, which she vehemently refused.) episodes. Back in New York, there was more stage work and a While many of Allen’s memories are peppered with laugh- bit more “gypsy money,” as she refers to her starving-artist earn- ter, like meeting her husband of 30 years, former NBA player ings. Then came Fame, the series spin-o" of the 1980 film, which Norm Nixon, while filming The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh (“Ooh ran for six seasons and not only made her a household name, but child, that movie was a gift and a disaster!”), there’s one experi- showcased her skills as a director, producer and choreographer ence that brings her to tears. At 17, after years of training at the as well. She also made television history, earning the distinction Houston School of Ballet, she auditioned for the North Carolina of being the first Black woman to direct a single-camera drama. School of the Arts. “I was told that my body was not right for “That show catapulted me into doing every special in Hollywood,” ballet,” says Allen, who, ironically, was asked to demonstrate says Allen, who later served as choreographer for the Academy ballet combinations during the audition. Sharing the news with Awards for ten years. She earned a Golden Globe and three Emmy her parents was di!cult. “At first my father didn’t believe me, Awards for her endeavors and inspired a generation. 110 ESSENCE.COM DECEMBER 2014 “My sister Sandie and I were obsessed with Fame,” notes “Debbie has taught me that there are no throwaway lines or Shonda Rhimes, who has enlisted Allen to direct episodes moments,” he says. “She can be unpredictable, even in the of Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal and How to Get Away With most predictable circumstances...and she’s funny as hell!” Murder. “Even as a little girl, I knew that Debbie Allen was at the center of it all, and I can still recite her ‘You want fame’ Keep Dancing speech verbatim.” Allen herself delivered the words that made During an interview with bet.com last summer, a reporter her famous during the B-roll segment of her photo shoot. inquired about the di"erence between present-day fame When she looked into the camera and said, “You want fame? and that of yesteryear. Allen responded, “Technology has Well, fame costs, and right here is where you start paying, in made people famous that are not really gifted or talented. sweat,” everybody smiled. Everybody remembers. They are famous for what—eating a frog, for losing weight, At the suggestion she’s a pioneer, she agrees with a for acting badly?” She continued, “I don’t know when it nod, then a smile. “I guess so,” she says, “but I’m still doing changed.