#BTColumn – Celebrating Joe Tudor and Carpentier

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the author(s) do not represent the official position of Barbados TODAY.

by David Comissiong

The year 2022 is the year in which we Barbadians will be commemorating and celebrating the 100th anniversary – the centenary – of the birth of the late, great Joe Tudor, and the 50th anniversary – the golden jubilee – of the establishment of diplomatic relations between CARICOM and the revolutionary Republic of Cuba. And I wonder just how many Barbadians are aware that there is a link between these two historic commemorations? No doubt, there are many young and not so young Barbadians who would not even be aware of the name Joe Tudor, much less of the historical significance of the man. So please permit me to spend a little time and space sketching the career of this critical architect of Barbados’ entertainment industry.

Joe Tudor was born in the year 1922 into what would have been characterised back then as a “respectable coloured middle class” Barbadian family whose patriarch was the wellknown and very successful Roebuck Street merchant, Joseph “Jottie” Tudor. But in the interest of historical accuracy we should note that Joe was actually christened with the impressive name of Joseph Onesimus Tudor.

At the time of his birth and upbringing it was expected that the young Joseph Onesimus would dedicate himself to his father’s respectable and commercially successful family business, but with the passage of time it became clear that the affable and gregarious young man felt himself drawn to the performance stage and to the then fledgling and not so “respectable” Barbadian entertainment industry.

Thus, by the early 1950s, Joseph Onesimus Tudor had transformed himself into Joe Tudor – the actor, comedian, master of ceremonies, radio host and entertainment promoter extraordinaire – and commenced a twenty-year mission of building up Barbados’ entertainment industry and helping it to achieve legitimacy and respectability.

A short list of Joe Tudor’s contributions to the development of Barbados’ entertainment industry is as follows: host of several Barbados Rediffusion programmes, including “Flying High”, “Let’s go somewhere with Joe Tudor”, and along with Olga Lopes Seale, “Children’s Party”; promoter and Master of Ceremonies of multiple shows at the Globe Cinema; featured entertainer at several local hotels; pioneer of Barbadian stand-up comedy; and organizer of Barbados’ first entertainers’ union.

But how, you may ask, is the ebullient, pioneering Barbadian entertainer connected to the Republic of Cuba and to the historic happenings of 8th December 1972 – the day on which the then four independent Commonwealth Caribbean nations of Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago defied the mighty USA and extended diplomatic recognition to the then ostracised revolutionary Republic of Cuba? Well, if we are to appreciate the connection we have to go back to the year 1958, and to that moment in history when the young Fidel Castro was on the verge of bringing his people’s historic revolutionary struggle to a successful conclusion in the mountains of Cuba, and another equally famous Cuban – the outstanding scholar and intellectual named Alejo Carpentier – was sojourning in Barbados and was analysing and writing about the culture and arts of our then colonial society.

And, needless to say, one of the Barbadian artistes that Carpentier witnessed in performance and wrote about, was the inimitable Joe Tudor. And why, you might ask, were Alejo Carpentier’s views and opinions about Barbados’ arts and artistes important? Well, back in 1958, Carpenter was a fifty-four year old world famous Cuban novelist, essayist and musicologist who was keenly interested in cultural developments in the Caribbean and in progressive Caribbean political expressions such as Fidel Castro’s July 26 Movement. Not only was Alejo Carpentier a great, internationally regarded artiste and intellectual whose artistic judgments were highly regarded, but he was also a man of deeply rooted progressive political convictions. Indeed, earlier in Carpenter’s life – in the 1920s – his deep commitment to progressive political ideals had caused him to experience imprisonment and exile at the hands of the then Cuban dictator, Gerardo Machado.

Furthermore, although Carpentier was something of a multi-faceted “Renaissance Man”, he was best known for his writing of novels rooted in the literary style known as “magical realism”, and he used this avant-garde technique to explore the fantastic quality of Latin American and Caribbean history and culture. Indeed, his most famous “magical realist” work was “The Kingdom of this world” – a novel about the Haitian Revolution of the late 18th century.

Here then is Alejo Carpentier’s 18th of September 1958 priceless description of a Joe Tudor performance at the Empire Theatre in Bridgetown, Barbados:- “Finally the curtain goes up to reveal an orchestra of calypso musicians, in shirt sleeves on account of the heat. Joe Tudor, the top comic in Barbados, then makes his appearance to enthusiastic cheers and the show begins.

From his very first gesture it is clear that this is a true actor, blessed with exceptional presence and a style all his own. He starts telling extraordinary lewd stories, all the while remaining totally deadpan and with an economy of gestures, very reminiscent of an English eccentric.

He tosses off his devastating punch lines without the slightest dramatic emphasis, turning away towards the musicians, whilst an avalanche of guffaws is unleashed behind his back.

The odd thing about Joe Tudor is that his art in some sense reproduces, in this little England, the techniques of the “caricato” that gave rise to a typically Creole theatre style in early nineteenth century Havana. The first exponent of the art was one Covarrubias, forebear of Arquimedes Pous and Acebal the “negrito”, whose stage manner was identical to that of this Joe Tudor, capable of keeping a full house entertained throughout an entire performance without needing even a straight man to engage in a dialogue.

The pièce de résistance of this Barbadian “caricato” is undoubtedly a one-man sketch in which Tudor simultaneously performs the role of a racehorse, its jockey and a radio announcer calling the race.” What a magnificent tribute the great Cuban writer paid to our very own Joe Tudor w24 years ago!

But Alejo Carpentier’s impressive assessment of the outstanding ability of Joe Tudor must cause us to question whether we have done enough as a nation to honour and memorialize this great Barbadian artiste. Whatever the answer to that question may be, let us, at least, use this year of 2022 to celebrate, not only Joe Tudor, but also our connection to Cuba – to Alejo Carpentier, to Fidel, and to our 50 years of a beautiful CARICOM/Cuba relationship.

David Comissiong is Ambassador to CARICOM.