paul robeson was among those. he speak out against the song?ever spoke out about it. you know, there are a lot of-- one person told me that. it was never recorded anywhere that this was the way he felt. there were many, many issues pertaining to this song that i tried to research for this book and couldn't get definitive answers to. it kind of falls between the cultural cracks. so i don't know if paul robeson ever wrote that. i never came across any reference to it. my feeling is that as originally sung by billie holiday, it was not a song about victimhood so much. i mean, she was-- but as it became associated with her and-- because of her attitude when she first did it-- as it became associated with her and as it became more poignant to listen to, perhaps that's the coloration that it took on. she certainly grabbed ownership of it even, as you point out, in suggesting in her autobiography that she had some part in shaping it. and she objected when other people performed it? well, she objected when josh white performed it. josh white also playe

i can't tell you how many people said paul robeson's wife. i knew he had a wife but i didn't know much about her. eslanda robeson indeed was a remarkable person and a biographer's treasure because she had such a rich life and she spent a lot of time documenting that life so that made my job a little bit easier but she began her career as a chemist working at at columbia presbyterian hospital then quickly shifted to serve as the architect of paul's early career. she was his manager, publicist etc. but that's not really her main contribution our accomplishment. i was most drawn to her and interested and excited to do this work because of her largeness of her life and i mean that on a global stage. i think the importance of telling her story in particular and rosa parks is the international significance of their political contributions and eslanda robeson in particular was an anticolonial activist, a writer and human correspondent, an anthropologist. she was someone who was there the founding of the united nations in 1945. she traveled to the fro

following year, 1959, paul robeson came to play "othello." and over thoerz years actors of -- black actors have gained in their classical skills and they -- this is the first time we fielded an entirely black cast. it just -- it happens to be black because that's how we chose to do this particular production. but there is no shortage of exceptional talent in the u.k. >> rose: is voice especially important in shakespeare? >> it is. it's very important because, you know, in the prolong to romeo and juliet he says "if you with patient ears attend --" that's one of the great differences. we talk about television audiences, we talk about theater audiences. it's about hearing. it's about how the language itself can create the story. can create the magic, i think. >> rose: when you look at this, what was the hardest thing for you to do. you had already developed a play in south africa in 1995. >> that was a very special experience. the -- it was with the national theater studio. we were invited -- my partner anthony cher and i were invited as part o

profiled in that way, paul robeson, some of king's family members and a host of african-american people because owen said, hoover said king was the dangerous negro leader in america and they begin to witch hunt him. host: your story recounted this morning front page of the "new york times" of how the i have a dream speech came about. many people may not know his speech originated in part in detroit. explain what dr. king was saying two months before. guest: yes, i'm from detroit and i grew up there. with aretha franklin's father and many other prominent ministers in detroit. dr.king participated in a huge march in detroit leading down near cobal hall where he delivered a similar speech and he talked about using our resources to make sure justice will be delivered. he talked about some of the same things he did in washington. he also talked about obviously detroit being the headquarters of a tremendous labor movement with u.a.w. the local focus in terms of negro rights was extraordinarily powerful. so dr. king founded some of those things but of course took them to a new level in washing