Richard Berry Harrison was an African American renowned actor and educator. He was well known for his portrayal of "de Lawd" in over 1600 performances in Marc Connelly's Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Green Pastures. He also taught elocution and dramatics courses at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College, Branch Normal College, and Flipper-Key College in Oklahoma.
Background
Richard Berry Harrison was born on September 28, 1864 in London, Ontario, Canada. He was the eldest son of Thomas and Isabella Harrison. Both his parents were slaves; his father was said to have been the property of the Bullock family of Lexington, Kentucky, and his mother was owned by the Chouteau family of St. Louis. They escaped to Canada by the "underground railway" and were married at London in 1854. They went to Haiti with a colony of freed slaves but as the plan did not work out they returned to Canada.
Education
As a boy Harrison sold papers in London. Later the family moved to Detroit and there he received some training in dramatics.
In the twenties he became a member of the faculty of the Agricultural and Technical College at Greensboro, North Carolina, teaching dramatics and elocution.
Harrison was given honorary degrees by several colleges.
Career
Harrison worked as bellboy, porter, and as a waiter on dining-cars, but from his childhood he had been found of the theatre, and he saw the best actors of his time and began to memorize their parts. A railroad official was impressed with his talent and put him in touch with L. E. Behymer, who operated a lyceum bureau and saw that he received the proper training. In 1891 Harrison made his first public appearance as a dramatic reader. He toured the Behymer and Chautauqua circuits with a repertory of three Shakespearean plays and fifty recitations.
In 1929 Marc Connelly wrote The Green Pastures, based on a story by Roark Bradford called Ol' Man Adam and His Chillun. Harrison was asked to play the part of "de Lawd" but demurred, considering it to be sacrilege, until his scruples were overcome by the Right Reverend Herbert Shipman, Suffragan Bishop of New York. The play opened February 26, 1930, and was highly successful; the part made Harrison and he made the play. When the Angel Gabriel announced: "Gangway! Gangway for de Lawd God Jehovah!" and he appeared in the simple black suit of the Negro preacher, he became more than the character in a play. The cast looked to him as a protective father, told him their troubles, and borrowed from him. The play proved to be the outstanding production of 1930.
After he had played the part 1, 657 times his tired heart gave way and he died in March 1935.
It was to his regret that he never played in any of the Shakespearean dramas. During one season he played the leading part in Pa Williams' Gal by Frank Wilson, but it was a brief engagement in an otherwise unimportant play.
Achievements
Personality
Harrison was a man of medium build with a soft resonant voice and, as Marc Connelly said, "the humility of a great artist. "
Quotes from others about the person
Although Harrison came from obscurity and for the greater part of his life was known as a lecturer, teacher, and arranger of festivals for colored churches and schools, at the time of his death the New York Sun said of him in an editorial: "If better sermons are preached to the current generation than he preached nightly in his rôle of de Lawd they have escaped popular attention. Call it fable or allegory or what you will, his dramatization of an idea of primitive faith was so moving in its tender simplicity that it deserves a place among the classics of life and letters where all greatness is truly simple. "
Connections
On December 11, 1895, Harrison married Gertrude Janet Washington. She was the first Black person to graduate from the Chicago Conservatory of Music. They had two children, Lawrence Gilbert and Marian Ysobel. He also has descendent family members in Kansas City, Missouri and throughout the Kansas City metro area.