Saint Suttle (February 1870 – February 4, 1932), was an American composer and performer. Suttle was well known as a
cakewalk artist and vaudeville performer in Chicago.
An
African American
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
, he was a pioneering performer in early film of the late 19th-century.
Biography
Suttle holds hands and kisses
Gertie Brown
Gertie Brown Moore (born Gilberta Gertrude Chevalier, August 23, 1878 – February 24, 1934) was a vaudeville performer and one of the first African-American film actresses. Brown is most famous for her part in the 1898 silent film ''Something Go ...
in the short film ''
Something Good – Negro Kiss
''Something Good – Negro Kiss'' is an American short silent film from 1898 of a couple kissing and holding hands. It is believed to depict the earliest on-screen kiss involving African Americans and is known for departing from the prevalent an ...
'' (1898), made by
William Selig
William Nicholas Selig (March 14, 1864 – July 15, 1948) was a vaudeville performer and pioneer of the American motion picture industry. His stage billing as ''Colonel'' Selig would be used for the rest of his career, even as he moved into ...
.
It is the earliest known kiss between black people captured on film.
This example of black intimacy on film was a positive depiction, pushing back against the dehumanizing stereotypes often seen in film in this time period.
In 2022, the film was included in the exhibition ''Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898 – 1971'' at the
Academy Museum of Motion Pictures
The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures is a film museum opened in 2021 located in Los Angeles, California. The first large-scale museum of its kind in the United States, it houses more than 13 million objects, and is dedicated to the history, sc ...
in Los Angeles, an exhibition with the objective of showing the contributions of Black artists and filmmakers from the start of the American film industry, that at times pushed against the conventional stereotypes.
Suttle and Brown are pictured on the 1898 sheet music for
William H. Krell's "Shake Yo' Duster".
Suttle, Brown, John Brewster and Maud Brewster performed as a group called, "
The Rag-Time Four" that was responsible for popularizing a variation of the cakewalk dance.
In 1901, one of Suttle's cakewalk performances that toured was called the ''Coontown 400.'' He was also involved in developing plans to build a theater that fell through.
Musical compositions
*"Old Jasper's Cake Walk" published by
S. Brainard's Sons
*"That Creole Gal of Mine" published by S. Brainard's Sons
*"She's Ready Money" published by
Joseph Flannery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
See also
*
Suttle
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Suttle, Saint
1870 births
1932 deaths
African-American composers
African-American male actors
African-American male composers
Artists from Chicago
The Rag-Time Four members