Open the Door, Richard

[Randy Twizzle]

Here's an interesting look at the 1940s novelty tune by David Hinckley in the NY Daily News

For as long as there had been a 125th St. Apollo Theater, Clinton (Dusty) Fletcher had staggered across its stage, ladder in hand, imploring his roommate to let him in.

"Open the Door, Richard" was Fletcher's routine, and you probably had to have been there to understand how it became a signature for both Fletcher and the Apollo through the 1930s and 1940s.

Fletcher played a fellow in an advanced state of inebriation who returns home to find he can't get in. He can't find his key. And he can't wake the landlady, considering that he and Richard are 11 months in arrears on their $3-a-month rent.

His only hope is to awaken Richard. But, while Richard is definitely inside, no amount of shouting seems to rouse him. Thus does Fletcher turn in desperation to the ladder, which alas he has insufficient dexterity to position and climb, owing to his current inebriation and all.

It simply ain't fair, Fletcher mutters in the course of this five-minute exercise in futility: "I owes just as much back rent as he does."

Eventually Fletcher and his ladder lurch offstage to appreciative applause from an audience that has probably seen the routine a dozen times.

It isn't recorded whether Fletcher performed "Open the Door, Richard," on the Apollo's opening night in 1934. But he was on the bill, so he probably did.

He definitely performed it right through the war, until vaudeville vets found themselves being phased out.

He was semiretired in 1947 when an odd thing happened: Suddenly the whole world rediscovered Richard.

Because Fletcher had worked the whole black circuit over the years, pretty much every black entertainer knew the routine. Thus one day in 1946 did bandleader Jack McVea, looking for fresh material, put it to music.

The lyrics didn't capture that much of the spirit of Fletcher's original routine, but the music gave it a fresh edge and, as it happened, the country was ripe for a new song-inspired catchphrase.

McVea recorded the song late in '46 for the Los Angeles-based Black and White label, and when it started to make some noise around L.A., New York's National Records hustled Fletcher into the studio to cut his own version.

There was room for both, it turned out - and more.

Count Basie cut a version in which the speaker became a bit more sophisticated, saying things like, "Common? I got class I ain't even used yet." The Three Flames cut a version. The Charioteers cut a version. Louis Jordan cut a version with new lyrics straight out of "Amos 'n' Andy": "He was abnoxicated . . . ."

"Open the Door, Richard" raced up to No. 2 on the R&B charts, blocked from No. 1 only by another Jordan hit, "Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens."

On the pop chart, with no such obstacle, "Richard" went to No. 1, an astounding crossover that landed him smack dab in the middle of mainstream culture. Jack Benny, Jimmy Durante, Fred Allen, Bob Hope and other major stars dropped Richard references into their comedy bits. Bing Crosby thought it was so funny he not only used the line, but recorded his own version of the song.

Mercifully, Crosby's record was never released. But it was released by artists as white as the Pied Pipers and Burl Ives. Hank Penny cut a country version and there were recordings in Swedish, French, Spanish and Yiddish.

Now Richard was not only popular, he was valuable. National Records, nominally on Fletcher's behalf, sued for composer credits. At the same time, old-time comedian John (Spider Bruce) Mason went to court claiming that Fletcher had learned the routine from him - which apparently was true, though Mason himself may have picked it up from a 19th century skit writer named Bob Russell. As Russell was no longer around to pursue legal claims, the lawsuits ended there.

Ultimately Fletcher and Mason were assigned co-credit for the lyrics, with co-credit for the music going to McVea and Dan Howell, the latter a nonexistent person who was there simply to funnel a quarter of the royalties to National Records.

Meanwhile, WOR announced it was so sick of Richard it was banning all versions of his song. The NAACP blasted the song and Fletcher for perpetuating negative stereotypes of black folks in lines like "I gwine back on relief Monday."

Whether these criticisms had any effect, the "Richard" craze burned out fast. He was in free fall by the time the first wave of answer records hit, so they mostly flopped, suggesting the general public lacked the Apollo audience's tolerance for multiple repeats of the routine.

Yet Richard wasn't that easy to kill - and besides, as Fletcher and the Apollo audience knew, you had to be there. Fletcher's career was revived and he went right back to the Apollo, where he appeared for the last time just three weeks before his death in 1954.

Descendants of the character portrayed in "Richard" would become staples in rock 'n' roll, from the Coasters' "Charlie Brown" to Bob Dylan's "Basement Tapes."

Perhaps most ambitiously, some gave Richard a larger-than-life metaphoric presence, seeing "Open the Door, Richard" as a coded commentary on all the closed doors in American society. Perhaps not wholly by chance, they suggested, was the song a hit at precisely the moment Jackie Robinson was photographed figuratively and literally walking through the long-slammed portal of American's National Pastime.

In coming months and years, a Michigan minister used "Open the Door, Richard" for a sermon denouncing housing segregation. Civil rights demonstrators made it part of their call for desegregated public accommodations.

Even if, in Dusty Fletcher's case, all he really seemed to want was a place to sleep one off.

[ghost of miles]

Thanks for posting that, Randy. I think I've heard some versions as well in which there's an implication that Richard is inside with the narrator's lover/wife. What were some of the "answer" songs? (There's a topic unto itself.)