Kitt, Eartha Mae

Impact on the world

Built a celebrated career as a singer and actress through the 1950s and 1960s, including her signature hit 'Santa Baby' and the role of Catwoman on television's 'Batman,' before her career in the United States collapsed virtually overnight in January 1968, when she publicly denounced the Vietnam War during a White House luncheon hosted by First Lady Lady Bird Johnson, reducing the First Lady to tears and prompting the CIA to compile a hostile dossier branding her, in its own internal language later exposed by journalist Seymour Hersh, in deeply derogatory terms designed to destroy her reputation and career; she spent most of the following decade performing in Europe and Asia rather than the country that had blacklisted her.

Life & background

Born Eartha Mae Keith in North, South Carolina in 1927, the result of rape and abandoned by family members throughout a childhood she described as marked by extreme poverty and abuse, Kitt moved to Harlem as a child, trained at the New York School of Performing Arts, and joined Katherine Dunham's dance company, already profiled in this collection, touring internationally before a Parisian nightclub owner discovered her and launched her solo career; she quickly learned French and built a following in Europe before returning to the U.S. and achieving stardom through the Broadway revue 'New Faces of 1952' and a string of hit recordings. Invited to a 1968 White House luncheon specifically because of her volunteer work with at-risk youth, one of only seven Black women among 41 guests, Kitt grew increasingly frustrated as other speakers offered anodyne remarks about beautifying highways before finally being given the floor, at which point she directly challenged the Vietnam War, telling the assembled guests that the country sent its young men to be shot and maimed and that no one should be surprised when young people rebelled in response; the White House failed to arrange her promised return transportation afterward, and news coverage framed the encounter simply as Kitt having made the First Lady cry. The CIA opened a file on her dating back to 1956 and, after the luncheon incident, compiled additional material documenting her personal life and relationships specifically to discredit her; when the dossier became public in 1975, Kitt responded that she had nothing to hide and granted the New York Times permission to publish it. She rebuilt her career gradually through European and Asian performances and a celebrated 1978 Broadway return in 'Timbuktu!,' continued working steadily in television and voice acting into her eighties, including an Emmy-winning run voicing the villain Yzma in Disney's 'The Emperor's New School,' and became an outspoken advocate for LGBT rights and marriage equality later in life, framing it explicitly as a civil rights matter; she died of colon cancer in 2008 at 81.

Sources

1. Encyclopædia Britannica; EBSCO Research Starters; Vice (The Enduring Legacy of Eartha Kitt); South Carolina State Museum; UMKC Women's Center