Ben’s Diabetes Story
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Tony Award-winning actor and Broadway star Ben Vereen is partnering with sanofi-aventis, a world leader in diabetes care, to launch Take the Stage for Diabetes Awareness, a national awareness campaign designed to educate people living with diabetes about their condition. Check out Ben’s story here.
Faerie Tale Theater’s Puss in Boots
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1982. Shelley Duvall called my office about a series of shows she was putting together called Shelly Duvall Faerie Tale Theater. The show she wanted me for, Puss in Boots, starred Gregory Hines, Alfrie Woodard, George Kirbie, Brock Peters and yours truly as Puss. I recall the first day of rehearsal the stylish gentleman Gregory Hines, a dancer extraordinaire in his cuffed pleated baggy pants and a heavy silk cream over sized shirt. We embraced as kindred spirits and it was the beginning of a lasting friendship. As I stood there and watched him rehearse I flashed back to watching him and his father and brother on the Ed Sullivan Show. They were called Hines Hines and Dad and they were good. Over the years I watched the two boys grow into masterful artists and there I was, working with Gregory. He made it so easy to get into character and I became Puss, the cat. I would purr and he would stoke me. I nuzzled up to him and he would pet me. And when he dressed me in my stylish boots I became a fine cat indeed.
The March for the Atlanta Child Murders with Coretta Scott King
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1981. Headlines of the papers from Atlanta were grim. Children were being killed at random, mostly African American children. The country seemed paralyzed to do anything about it. As I read these headlines my mind wondered where were our leaders in this time, to confront this injustice and it dawned on me that they had all been assassinated. John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy and our Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. So when I got the news that Coretta Scott King was leading a protest in March of that year I knew I had to be there marching beside her with a sounding voice for justice. I’ll never forget that day because that was the first day I spoke as more than an entertainer. Mrs. King turned to me and asked if I would like to say a few words. Nervousness swelled up inside of me but I said yes. Eventually they found and arrested a young black man they claimed was the murderer. Since then there have been many protests against his conviction, many believing Wayne Williams is not guilty.
My first recital at Brooklyn Academy of Music
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It was Wednesday in Brooklyn, must have been the fall of 1968. I was hanging out on the street the way any eight year kid does after school when along came a gentleman down the block, a talent scout. I noticed him coming from quite a distance because he kept stopping and watching the kids play, then going up to parents and talking to them. I watched this keen looking gentleman, dressed in a herringbone jacket, black slacks and a white shirt and tie. His silver grey hair seemed to glitter in the sun. I especially noticed his classic shoes with white stitching, polished to perfection and wondered if he had gone to the shoe shine parlor known as Tip Tap and Toe right across the street from where I lived on Fulton St. at Troy Ave. This shoe shine parlor was a very important stop for the community, especially on Sunday for the Deacons of local churches. In those days we had something called the Blue Law in Brooklyn which meant there was no alcohol to be sold on that day. But from my window on practically every Sunday morning you could watch the lines of men leading into Tip Tap and Toe, I thought to have their shoes shined. But Tip Tap and Toe, the owners, who were once a Vaudeville act by the same name, would play jazz on Sunday, pop their shoe shine rags to the rhythm and do a time step as they sold Dixie cups of booze to their patrons. But on this particular Wednesday there were few patrons and a man in the herringbone coat approached me and asked “young man, are your parents at home?” I, in my eight year old voice said “Yeah, she’s up there” and pointed to the third floor. With that he turned on his heels and headed up to the top floor of our building to meet my mother Pauline Vereen. My father, James Vereen was at work. He worked in the day at a paint factory and my mother worked at night cleaning theaters. Fifteen minutes after he arrived my mother leaned out the window and summoned me upstairs. Walking into the kitchen of our four room Pullman, or railroad, apartment I heard the gentleman telling my mother about this dance school. With that, he reached down, took my leg and tested my flexibility, telling my mother how talented I was and how I could be a big star on TV by enrolling in the Star Time Dance School, which he represented. All she had to do was buy me a pair of tap shoes and pay the large tuition which we could not afford. But Pauline had a dream for this little boy that even his little eyes couldn’t see at the time. Somehow she afforded those tap shoes and the tuition and off I went to Star Time Dance Studio, my introduction to the arts and the beginning of a marvelous journey. I never learned much about dance at this school but I did learn the passion which touched my heart and is instilled in me to this day.
