Mayday Plays - Heroes You Should Know: Josephine Baker

Episode Date: March 18, 2021

Join Allegra and Zakiya as they discuss French resistance agent and entertainer Josephine Baker.

Music Hi friends! Welcome back to Heroes You Should Know, the big silly double nerd show where I talk about historical figures that I think we should know about that we don't for a myriad of reasons. And then I turn them into D&D characters because why not? This week I am honored to have our wonderful artist, Zacchia with me. Hi buddy! Hello buddy, how are you? Oh, I'm just peachy keen, how are you? I'm vibing, I'm doing good. Excited.

Me too. So basically what's going to happen, I will tell you about this wonderful person that I've researched these last couple weeks. And then Zacchia will tell me what they built for our person. And then I will tell you what I built for our person. That's about it. It's history nerd meets D&D nerd meets happy times, friendship, love. So this week we are going to be doing Josephine Baker, who was an entertainer, a civil rights activist, and a spy. Yes. She's cool as hell. So you've probably seen Josephine Baker at some point in your life.

If you've ever looked up old pictures of vaudeville, you've almost definitely seen her. She's, there's, there's a, if you've seen the woman in a skirt made of bananas, that's Josephine Baker. That's, that's like the biggest thing that, like that's the biggest picture of her that there, that there really is. She was also the first black woman to start a major film in 1927, Siren of the Tropics. But before that, she was Frieda Josephine McDonald born in St. Louis, Missouri, June 3rd in 1906. So her family was pretty poor growing up. Her mom took on the laundry, her stepdad wasn't, wasn't employed. And so by the time she was like eight, she was working as a live in domestic. And by 12, she dropped out of school and was

kind of living on the streets, doing odd jobs. And her mom, because her mother and stepfather had three other children. So, you know, she was that ripe old age of 12 in the early 1900s, where she got a job and got out of the house. Getting up there. Yep. And then a year later at 13, she was married for the first time, very briefly, to a man named Willie Wells. Um, and that marriage began and ended in 1919. I couldn't really find any information on him, if he was also an early teenager. It's my only hope. I don't, I don't, I, hopefully he was also a teen who- We will keep hope alive then. Yes. Just two teens in love. But apparently it wasn't a happy marriage as two teens in love

wanted to not be. Exactly. And they divorced in that same year. At some point while she was living on the streets, she worked as a waitress at the old chauffeur's club and was dancing on street corners to get a little bit extra money. And eventually she was, she joined the Jones Family Band and they traveled a bunch all over the country. And during that time, well, technically during that time, at 15, she had her second husband, Willie Baker, in 1921. She left and divorced him in 1925 when her vaudeville troupe got booked in New York City in the midst of the Harlem Renaissance. But she kept his last name for the rest of her career because that was kind of where she was. And that was what, what she was known for when her career started. So she couldn't

very well be like, I'm Josephine Baker. Never mind. I'm Josephine McDonald again. Hello. Um, especially like the 1920s when we just had newspapers and word of mouth. And so it made sense. Um, she and her mom had a pretty strange relationship. Her mom didn't want her to be an entertainer. Because I read somewhere that her mom was also an entertainer who had just like a rough, a rough life, a rough go of it, which, yeah, it's not, it's a rough, it's a rough time anytime, but especially as a black woman in the 1920s. So in, when she was on Broadway, she was in Broadway, or sorry, when she was in New York City, she was in Broadway reviews, like shuffle along Adelaide Hall. And in the vaudeville acts, she was usually the last of the chorus to leave

the stage. And so usually they do it in like a goofy, silly way, like they pretend they forgot the choreography or they'd like break a prop or they'd fall down, something ridiculous, like some kind of ridiculous antics. But during the encore, they would come back and have like the correct choreography or even more complex choreography. So she was, she was kind of like featured because she was like, fucking funny, and also real good at dancing and other stuff. But like, that was, that was mainly what the, what the end of the, the line of the chorus people was for. So she, she was doing pretty okay in New York. And then in 1925, she went to Paris, she said she couldn't stand America anymore, which fair. And she was one of the first black women to move to

Paris alongside Bricktop, who was a jazz singer, dancer, and also a vaudeville performer. So they were breaking into a new country, a new scene of entertainment. And she was a, she became a burlesque dancer and toured Europe. And then returned to Paris in 1926, where she eventually became the most successful American entertainer working in France at the time, which is cool as fuck. Wild. All people, notable people that she worked, worked with. Can you work with Hemingway, Picasso, or Jean Cocteau? Maybe, maybe not. Also, I'm going to apologize right now for all my French pronunciations. I took Spanish and Russian. French means nothing to me, French means nothing to me. Silent letters, ways of, no, no, no, no. I can read Cyrillic or I can say it phonetically,

those are your choices. That's okay. We'll look at other black female performers' buys. Russian ones next time. Perfect. Thank you. That'll sort of merge the one. Yeah. Anyway, so yeah, she, she hooked up with, not like hooked up, but like came into contact with Hemingway and Picasso. And she was getting some pretty, pretty serious acclaim, especially through the 1920s and early 30s. She started in several highly successful European films, including, as we said, Siren of the Tropics, which was the first. Juju, Zuzu. I think Zuzu. Okay, great. Probably Juju, right? Yeah. In America, they definitely said Zuzu though, so you're fine. Yeah. And then Princess with an E at the end,

Tam Tam. Princesse. Princesse. Princesse. Thank you. So yeah, she was doing pretty well in France. And then she returned to Broadway in 1936 for a revival of the Ziegfeld Follies, but she never really received the acclaim that she did in France. Three guesses why. And there was a pretty brutal New York Times review that kind of left her heart broken. And she was like, I'm fucking done. I don't, I'm done with like this American bullshit. I'm going back to France where they like me, and they care about what I do and that I'm good at things and that I'm amazing. So fuck you. So she left and then she married French industrialist Jean. I'm saying lion because it's spelled lion. I'm sure I'm spelling it wrong.

And because of that, she became a French citizen in 1937. So she kind of like gave up American citizenship to become a French citizen with her husband. So cool times, great times, and then naturally World War Two happens because it's history. Yes, yes. For 1939, a friend had declared war on Germany. And so she got recruited by recruited by the Doshimae Bureau. There's an X in the middle that made me panic. Sounds good to me. We're going to say that. So it's basically a French intelligence agency within the military. Yeah. And they called her an honorable correspondent. So what that means is because she was famous and beautiful and charming, she was rubbing shoulders with, you know, like higher

up people, German, Japanese, Italian government officials, military leaders at like parties and summits or whatever the Axis powers did, I don't entirely know. But they were like traveling around doing douchey shit. And she was an entertainer and she was beautiful and charming. So of course, she would, it would be really easy for her to hear information or like charm something out of someone or just like, and especially even like, I'm going to pull. It's the 1930s and 40s. And she's a woman, they're not going to think that she's smart enough or whatever enough to, you know, be a spy. Yeah, exactly. Which is their own fault for being assholes. So she, so she, you know, gather all this information without suspicion and then bring it

back to the ally forces. So then eventually Germany invades France and Josephine leaves Paris and goes to the Drajeunet department. So departments are like counties in France. So this is in the south of France. And she lives in this manner called the Chateau de Milandes. Sounds great. Great. Awesome. And so she, she is kind of like housing people who want to help the free French and the free French is just basically the government in exile, like the French, the French leadership has been exiled. They're not really in charge anymore. But Charles de Gauguin, the guy gaze, I'm saying the guy is, he's still trying to like lead France from a distance and from, you know, where it's been invaded, essentially. So they're based and set up in London in 1940,

and they're organizing resistance from a distance. So he's basically he's in particular has pulled her in. And was like, look, I need you to get information from the inside. And just like, keep, keep the people who are trying to keep France alive, like keep them safe. And so that's basically what she does in this giant castle thing. And it's this is actually the same castle or manner that it goes back and forth when they talk about it. It's the same place where she raised her kids later. Oh, my God. Imagine being like an eight year old like my mom helped people in here. She gets them safe from Nazis in here. This is our spy castle. This is where I live. Like, just sitting in history, just sitting there, ultimate lie and reset. So

someone comes up to you and says, I live in a spy castle. You're like, sure. Sure. Exactly. Um, so yeah, super cool. She's basically harboring resistance members in her home. Um, and so since she's an entertainer, she has this excuse to travel this excuse to go to different nations and try and, you know, like sow seeds of connection. She goes to like neutral nations like Portugal and space in South America. She passes information to England. She's like all over the place and they don't think anything of it because she's she's just an entertainer. She's just this woman. Um, but she would write her like write notes about whatever until she found an invisible

ink on her sheet music. Just so cool. Galaxy brain like deep spy shit up in there. Like, this is how I'm going to get past them. I have invisible ink on my sheet. Yeah. I'm like, do you have a, do you have an invisible ink plug? Probably not. I want to give her the credit of making it, but that is not based on any real fact. No, I mean, like, if we're going to believe national treasure, there was invisible ink, like a long, long time ago, but that's believing I don't treasure any kind of authority. So that was a choice. That was a trick. They made a sign. It doesn't matter. Um, I don't think she made invisible ink, but I like the idea that she did. I'm going to say she was the first person to put invisible ink on sheet music. And we can,

we can say that. I have the power and I'm going to use it. So, um, in 1941, she's touring the French colonies in Northern Africa, like Monaco, and then she'll like, she'd like go up through Spain to get back into everything. And she'd pin Intel like inside her clothes or inside her underwear because she's an entertainer. They're not going to strip search her. And then she'd do, you know, actual shows for British American French soldiers who are stationed in like the, in the, the Northern African theater of things. So she was, she was actually doing what she was supposed to do, but she was also like doing spy shit from the other side. She was also

getting information from allies and taking them back to allies. She was like, she was like in a lot of danger, honestly, if you think, like, if they'd found that on her, it's, it's fucking over. Yeah, I, I don't know. I feel like she was in enough danger. And she was like, let me just take this other job that is also like infinitely worse and cut straight to the point. Yeah, a little bit extra. That's, yeah. Not like extra, like extra, but like a little bit of extra danger is, no, see, I don't know. Being extra as well to take that. I mean, a little bit, but she's cool as fuck. So after the war, she receives a buttload of accolades, like the Quadrager, the Rosette de

Resistance. She's made a Cavalier, or Chevalier, I think it's Cavalier, a Chevalier of Ligeon Dionard. Cavalier, the Legion of Honor, I'm assuming, by, by the, by Charles de Gaille, who was the one who inducted her into this. And she's, so after the, after the war, she marries her fourth husband, Joe Bouillon. That's what I'm thinking. I think so too. In 1947. However, what we haven't touched on yet is that she was my sexual as fuck. Yes, she was. She had a fair, well, she, and she'd have affairs with men and women throughout all of her marriages. I don't really care about the men right now. It's fine, whatever. The women though, that, that could just be, you could, you could just say that about me at any point though.

That's an important part of heroes you should know is. Were they gay? Can we talk about the women? Yes, we're not focused on, on women being married to men here. I have, I have, I have, oh man, the next person I want to talk about is French too. Shit, I gotta learn better French pronunciation. Anyway, anyway, so she, the notable women that she is, she's had affairs with. There's a French novelist Collette. There is a blue singer named Clara Smith. There's also Ada Smith, who is Bricktop, who she moved to Paris around the same time. So like, cross the sea girlfriends, who's to say? I'm not, I'm not making that assumption, but I'm making that assumption. Yes. And then the, another, another very cool one, who is not confirmed, but pretty heavily

rumored is Frida Kahlo, who I will talk about at some point because we love a disabled Mexican bisexual woman so much. Though we're talking about Josephine right now, who is such a badass. I was, this, okay, so here's the thing. There was so much fucking information about Josephine Baker, and this is such a bare minimum of her life and all the cool shit she did. Yeah. You can, if you are very interested in Josephine Baker, which I, you should be, I've spent so long reading about her and I want to read more, you can, you can literally just search her name in Google and then just read for days and days and still not feel like you know everything. And it's amazing. Or, oh, my other favorite thing, my other favorite thing, you can just, you can just go on YouTube,

you can see her dance. You can watch this woman dance and sing and act and talk about like civil rights issues, like from the early 1900s. This, we haven't had this with our other people, but like, yeah, that's true. That you can just go like, here's, here's fucking Josephine. Look at her, go see her. I mean, go see her. You could go visit her grave if you want to, but like, not right now, we're in a pandemic. That's true. Stay home. Outside of the paragraph, we can go. Yes, exactly. Sorry, I got a little off track there getting emotional about hearing her sing. Her voice is so nice. It's so like, I have notes about her voice. We're going to talk about her voice. Good. It's like, lilting and warbling and beautiful. I love it. Yes. Anyway, we'll talk,

we'll talk about her voice in a minute. Yeah, I don't want to cut you off. No, no, we can, we can talk about her singing all the time. I have so many more notes to talk about. Anyway, so after the war, she's like bolstered into guards starts like going big with like song choices and like, like get like feeling herself. And then also she starts covering like more serious subject matter, especially because like the civil rights movement is, is moving on up and being a thing. So in 1951, she's invited back to the US to perform all over. And one way she starts kind of like using her power, which is super cool, is to, she wouldn't perform in, in audiences that weren't that were segregated. Yes. Yeah. So she wouldn't, she would, she was like, you have to have an

integrated audience or I'm not coming. And like there, there's a specific club in Miami that was like, we will give you $10,000. She's like, nope. Fucking fucking desegregate it. Do it now. And they fucking did. So she travels around like she does this national tour all over like in the South and in Vegas and shit like that. And, and they do it because it's fucking Josephine Baker. They're like, yeah, okay. Yeah, we can have integrated audiences. Absolutely. She just, she's just the power I love. Like she, like she knows what they want from her. And she can be like, yeah, okay, do what I want first though. Yes, I love her. Yes. Powerful. Along this road, there's like a big old, like there's a big old stinkeroo in New York because there's a club that

she, oh man, I should have written the song more specifically. Basically, there's like a club in New York that she's going to perform at and it's like a restaurant and a club and they're, they're being more reticent about integration and like make and get accessible to everyone. And Grace Kelly is there. Princess Grace Kelly is there. And she hears them being like shit asses to her and she's like, goodbye. I'm never coming back. I'm fucking Grace Kelly. You'll never see me in this establishment again. She doesn't stick to it. She goes back with her husband, the prince, like four years later. But like just once I think, but still like girl, stick sticks to your guns. God damn it. So close. I know. I know. But so, so she's like, she's been, she's been super vocal about

civil rights issues in the US. She's bros with Grace Kelly now and Grace Kelly is like sort of standing with her. And then there's like a, like a pretty big pushback in the, in the media print, in print, it's just print right now that she like just about her and like it's really, really terribly racist. And there's insinuations of her being a communist. And as a result of it, her work visa gets terminated and she gets sent back to France, which is fucking wild. Before that, though, she was one of the only women to speak at the March on Washington with Dr. King. She worked with the NAACP. Fun fact, May 20th is Josephine Baker Day. So on 420, no, 520, 520. I was wrong. I was wrong. So close. So close. Math, math, math. On 520, so every Josephine

Baker listen to some music, go watch her do cool shit. Listen to her talk, listen to her speech at the March on Washington. It's fucking good. Become a spy. Yeah, do it. Infiltrate. For something. For someone. Do it. Pin information inside your underwear and wear it around. Do it. That's festive. I like that. That's how you celebrate Josephine Baker. Do more, do better things than pinning things inside your underwear. Anyway, so after the Dr. King, Coretta Scott King flies to Netherlands and asks Josephine Baker to become like the new face of the civil rights movement. And she considers it. She thinks about it for a few days and then ends up eventually saying no,

that she doesn't want her children to lose their mother at such an early age, because she had 12 of them. 12 little babies. So back in the 40s, she had a bunch of miscarriages, the last of which resulted in a pretty serious infection that required a hysterectomy, but the infection still got worse. And she was at one point, here's the thing. At one point, while she was touring, being a spy and like doing resistance shit, she was also septic. She had a fucking sepsis. And she was still going around doing this shit. Yeah. No. Yeah. Yeah. You can't even all muscle memory at that point, because you're not going to remember the show. You're not going to remember hear anything. Oh, probably fevered out of her fucking mind.

And still amazing, incredible. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, so she's, you know, she's septic, she's gathering information. Obviously, she gets better. So after that, she decides to adopt not one, not two, but 12 children, two daughters and 10 sons, which why is that the ratio? My god. I have two brothers and I'm like, that's, that's enough. That's plenty. I love, I love my brothers, but that's, that's plenty. You don't want 10 more? No, thank you. So she refers to this as her rainbow tribe. This is basically to prove that people from any background, religion, race, ethnicity, whatever, can still like come together, love each other and be family, be brothers. And that's like, that's, that's she has, and she raises them all

differently. She, she had one kid that she raised Muslim, she had one kid that she raised Roman Catholic, she had one kid that she raised, I think she raised one of them agnostic, like she, like she kind of ran the gamut of like languages and everything. Yeah. If you've been to all of those places where those kids are from, might as well. Yeah. If we're still going on tour, just bring them. We'll just hit everyone's hometown. Yeah. Just sweep it and check it in. So yeah, that was like, I also, how do you, how do you, first of all, I don't like, how do you raise 12 kids in different religions? Because they're, I mean, they're all living in the same house. There are different holy days. There are different like practices. There are

different traditions. Bring your own religion. Like, I'm going to try to remember your holy days, but that's your responsibility. You remember this. You're six years old. Remember your holy days. Here's the notebook. Right. I will put like a chart. Oh, you know, there's a chart in the kitchen. Chart. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, she has like a cheat sheet. She's like, okay, Timmy is Hindu. Great. Yes. And you know, there's like a decent staff that you can distribute the lower, not lower, is it real? Yes. Yes. Yeah. That's, that's just wild to me. Like being a parent, being a parent's a lot. And then on top of that, remembering like 12 different religions for your kids. Next level. So later in life, unfortunately, she falls on hard times due to unpaid debts.

And she loses her, her spy castle, unfortunately. But Grace Kelly helps her out, gives her an apartment in Monaco, because she is the princess consort of Monaco. And she can do that. She can just be like, here you go. This is yours. I say so because I'm the fucking princess. Sure. Wild. That's girl power. Yeah. Power of friendship. Anyway, so yeah, she's hanging out in Monaco, but she's still, you know, performing and traveling and doing things. And in that kind of time period, she's divorced her fourth husband. And she becomes involved with our artist, Robert Brady, but they never get married. They're just kind of like lovers on the side. Is that a thing you say? I don't know. I don't know why I said

lovers on the side like that. That was a weird thing to say. Is that like a vernacular of anyone, anywhere? Did I just say it? But it is now. That's her lover on the side. You go to the courthouse and you file the paperwork. This is my lover on the side. Oh, why do I say words sometimes? I hate it. It's real now, like embrace it. It's not even on the side. She's divorced. But on the side now. I think I meant to say like, just like chill, like lover, like chill lovers. Yeah. I'm talking about going to a deeper hall of massive chill lovers. Chill lovers. I like chill lovers, better than lover on the side, like lover on the side insinuates that it's like there's someone else. Yeah, but there's a lover

in the front. Yeah. And now we move past that. Go ahead. Go ahead. Right. 1973. She is invited to perform at Carnegie Hall. So the last time she was in the US, it was like late 50s, early 60s. It was, you know, like shit was rough. And so she's, you know, she said she was really nervous about going due to how it's spoken. She was about the civil rights movement and how terrible her reception had been, you know, before right before she left. And the fact that she was getting, you know, she's getting older as a performer. She was closing in on 70. She's, you know, she's been performing for literally her entire life. That's got to wear on your body and on your mind. So she's, you know, she's, she's got a lot of like nerves, but she goes,

and apparently when she went on stage before anything happened, she didn't speak, she didn't sing, she didn't dance, she didn't do anything. She had like a standing ovation, which I think is just nice. Like everyone was just happy to see her. So sweet. I know. And you're not expecting it? Yeah. I mean, that's crying. You're crying already. Oh, yeah. I like, I almost cried reading it. I was like, Oh, okay. Good. Thank you. So she performs, she keeps performing her entire life right up until April 8, 1975. This is her last performance, and it is a retrospective review in Paris to celebrate her being in show business for or publicly being in show business for 50 years.

So the show is, is financed by Prince Rainier and Princess Grace Kelly of Monaco and Jackie O. Randomly and sure, super cool. Great. She should, she should get all the support she needs for this show. Hell yeah. So opening night was huge, like so huge that they had to pull out, fold out chairs and like set them wherever they could. I'm sure they broke fire codes because it was the 70s, no one gave a shit. Yep. Yep. And some of the notable people in attendance, Liza Minnelli, Diana Ross, Shirley Bassey, Sophia Loren, and Mick Jagger. They were all like, fuck yeah, this is Josephine Baker, we're going in, let's go fam. So she has this wonderful performance. The reviews are rave, like they're all

just enamored of her because she's incredible. And you know, she's, what, 60, she's almost 69. Nice. So like the reviews are just glowing. Unfortunately, four days later, she was found in her hotel room in a coma. She had a cerebral hemorrhage. And on April 12, 1975, she passed away. Her son, Jean-Claude, I think he's one of her older sons, wrote and published her biography, Josephine the Hungry Heart, in 1993. Where he, you know, he talked about it, I think from his perspective, but also like perspective, the perspective of knowing her. He said that, like the, like the thing, like she wanted like the acceptance, but she also like wanted to move stuff forward. So with like the Rainbow Tribe, before they lost the castle, she would like

she would like invite people to come and like there'd be like a mission fee or something. And just watch the kids play and like see them all interact and just like be good to each other, I guess. And so like, he was like, that was, he was like, he was, he was kind of torn about it because he knew like where she was coming from, but he was also like, we were kids and it's a lot, like we just wanted to be kids. We didn't want like that responsibility on us. So it was a whole, it was a whole thing, but like the way they talk about her that was just like, very lovely and like good mom vibes. So yeah, that's, that's, that's our, that's our girl. I love that. Yeah, I love that. Okay. She's so cool. Do you want to talk about her voice? No?

Yes, let's talk about her voice. Okay. Okay. So I have, I have, I watched a documentary today because I was like, I want to, I want to beef this up, which only made it harder. And I understand like limiting the notes was for our benefit because there's so many things about her. Like you said, it's impossible to build including every hour. We would be here for hours if I wanted to talk about everything. Yes. And you told me that and I was like, great, let me get more information to confuse myself. But I heard like the French, the French academics and the British academics have tried to say everything about the way that she dances and the way that she sings apart from saying the phrase good vibes, which I'm glad that this year happened because now

they can say it and it's legitimate. But they were like, literally they were like, she's not a technically trained singer. She, French is obviously not her first language, but even like she can sing in French and it's sounds good. Amazing. Yeah. But did she give a damn about French diction? No, which is why I'm like, why should we, but she sounded good and it felt good to hear. And that was enough. And that was it. And I was like, you could never like so much. I don't, I feels like that feels like such a classic era, which is such a 2021 perspective, but for people to really be like, it doesn't really matter if she sings the right words, or if we can even understand her, I just want to hear her sing.

Yeah. And like if we're filling that from like second hand, third hand recordings, you know, more than almost 100 years later, how, how did that have to feel like sitting in her presence and hearing her like, it was, I don't even like have the right words for it. Because it's not, it's like you said, it's not technically. She had this, it's like, yeah, it's like little, yeah, it's like little technic, like baby vibrato thing. It's like, like wind chimes. I don't know what it is. It's, it's wind chimes. Yeah. That's a good word for it. It's like, it's like floaty wind chimes. Yes. That are just like, it's like lilting, but like also like commanding a little bit. I don't, it's strong. Like, yeah, you don't get lost, but it's

yeah, she's incredible. Yeah. It's like, it's like, it's not a style I've heard anywhere else. Exactly. It's very, it's very particular. And hearing her, like hearing her speak, it makes sense that she sounds like that when she sings. Yeah. Super cool. Yeah. But also her, her dancing is kind of like that too. Like there was, I can't remember her name, but it was a, a woman who writes about dancing about how important like classical dance was at that point and how she again, didn't give a damn. And like, there was this emphasis on like posture and height and length. And every time she danced, I mean, it was also in style for like the kind of dancing. It was during the Harlem Renaissance. So a lot of melanated people were dancing like this,

but she was dancing like this in white spaces and getting paid and living and winning. Like the whole point, every, every move she did was like, I see your classical dancing and it's not hitting for me. That's not it. That's not what I want tonight for all of us. Yeah. So good. So playful. I don't want to, I don't want to be like, it's like, it's just a vibe, just to be like, it's a vibe, but it, it kind of is. It's like, it's not even, like there's not a good, just like there's not a good enough descriptor for it. It just, it's like the embodiment of what it's supposed to be. Yeah. You know, I know what it is when I see it and I've seen it and that's what it is. Yeah. Like there's, that's it. Exactly. People that are watching this, please,

please go watch her do things. It's, it's such, it's like a warm feeling. Yeah. Yeah. It's so, it's so cool. I, I, I just get like caught up in that same idea of what must that have been like, to just like, watch this in real time. Yeah. She just, she nailed it. She nailed it. That's it. I want to, so would you, would you like to, like to, like to give us your, your Josephine Baker belt? Yes. Okay. I gave myself the absurd challenge of no bards. I, I, I started there and then I was like, no, but I want a bar. I want a bar. It's really hard. Light regrets, but no regrets. Here we go. So of course, she's a human. And I made her a monk. The, the way of the drunken master, but replaced drunken with dancing, but also drunken could still work. And I, to level six,

and I made her a rogue mastermind to level three. Amazing. And I just gave her a point in Sorcerer, just one level in Sorcerer, because I want her to have magic. She needs to have magic. She does. Yeah. So I really, I don't, I think Josephine Baker succeeds without weapons. She doesn't need weapons. I don't think she works up a sweat unless she's on stage at a party and it's performing. Right. That being said, I did give her a little pistol. Oh, I love that. Named Pony after the position in the course line that she was in, because it's like the last girl in the line. It's a last resort. She has Pony if she needs it, but it does do 1d10 piercing damage. So Pony's there with her. I think her fighting style, it looks exactly like how she dances,

or it's incredibly subtle. Like she's literally entertaining at a party and you realize that you've been shot and you don't know how that happened. She's called by her. Yes. Oh fuck. Yeah. And then like the room is spinning and you're gone. That's her. Yes. Oh, well, let me have the actual. What are, what did you, what, what, what, what did her stats end up like? Okay. Yes, that was tricky. Because that's what, yeah, I was going to say that's got to be wild. So from the top, we're going to of course give her charisma. Um, with a 17, we're going to have 14 for dex, you have 14 for wisdom, 13 for strength. She doesn't need to be strong, but she can certainly like, because she can dance her ass off.

That force is incredible. We're going to give her 10 intelligence. I don't know. I know she's super fucking super. And Constitution nine. That's technically average Constitution, but that's not super vital, other than maybe she's to hold her liquor. But I think a nine con. She'll be alright. Yeah. Oh, sorry. Charisma is 18 because I gave her the actor fee nice. Yes. Let's see. What else is there? What about like big? What are her big, like scale proficiencies? What are like her ones that are? Yes. Yes. I have like windows. Sorry. One second. You're good. Okay. She is like insane. I broke D&D beyond when I was making this character.

This is not a smart character to play, but it's great. No, smart characters here. We're making historically accurate characters here. Exactly. Her highest skills are performance and acrobatics with a plus 11 to performance and a plus 10 to acrobatics. Insane. But I really I wanted to give her obviously those two. High insight, high deception, high sleight of hand, constantly thinking about fitting notes in your underwear and what checks have to be made for that through the airport. She has a pretty decent investigation. What else is there? Yeah, because those levels in Rogue have to give her some shit like some good shit. That's honestly, I picked mastermind in Rogue only for like,

okay, so you choose this archetype at third level. So you gain, no, that's it. I mean, she has a proficiency with a disguise kit and a forgery kit. But she really only always shows up as herself. I don't think she has to pretend to be other people. That's how she gets in. But she also gets a help action as a mastermind, which is helpful. I don't know. A lot of these, of course, because D&D is like a combat based game, a lot of these make sense if there's someone else she's fighting with. But there was a remark about how most of her career, she was not necessarily literally alone, but she really only had to worry about defending herself. Yeah. Like all of her partners were

really like, because she wanted to have fun with them, but it wasn't like she was responsible for them, they could hold their own. Yeah. So that but. You good? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. What else about Rogue? Yeah. No, I think that's it, because it's only level three. Right. Yeah. You said you gave her the actor fee. Did you just do ASI for her other one? Or did you? Or no, I guess you couldn't have done another ASI because she's three and one. Yeah. Well, did I? No. Oh, no. Okay. So she does have an ability score improvement because of her monk score. And I gave it to Dex and Charisma. Make sense. Because I want them to be in the sky. Hell yeah. I gave, oh yeah, she's an aberrant mind sourcer. Again, I chucked it her way

because she deserves magic. But also, oh yes, that's right. Okay. So there was a line in the documentary I watched about how important it was that she, we're going to get, again, where it's going to get real nerdy history here again. Do it. Do it. That's all right. But that she, one of the things that made her so freaking successful was that she embodied this like French man's ideal of the black woman because colonialism, that's happening. And she's this incredibly beautiful woman, but she's also like, like literate in European culture, can dance her ass off, is very polite, except when she doesn't want to be. So it was like this fantasy that she was embodying, which she could not have

done on accident. Like she was all of her decisions. Oh yeah. So like if we're going to give her a Sorceress Origin, it's going to be about like psionic shit, I think, because double consciousness is real. And this is the time where it's being written about. So aberrant mind. No, that totally makes sense. Because she like, that wasn't like, she was fully aware of like, what they were going to think of her and what they were going to like, what box they were going to put her in or whatever. And she was like, okay, that's fine, but I'm going to use it against you. Like she like the mentality that had to come from like, okay, I know that like, I know where this is going. I now know how to like divert them, which is exactly.

Yeah. Yeah. Even though like, I mean, because people kind of get at her for doing stereotypical shit, but also again, 1920s. Yeah. So like really have a choice. Yeah. Like she has to like find where her, where she can like take those, those like, like turns away from it, you know. Yes. And even when she did do it, she did it, laughing. Yeah. Like she was making fun of it the whole time, which is like, that's why that's what was like, she's playing 40 chess. So we're going to give her the aberrant mind. Yeah. Oh, but with that comes a couple of spells. I mean, some of them are just like practical dancing lights, minor illusion, message, and mending. That's just some costumes. That was why I gave her mending too. Yes. And then we gave, I gave her absorb elements

and Featherfall, which was honestly just a play on words, because one of the performances that essentially launched her into fame in France was the one where she appeared on stage with nothing but a pink Feather. And that was the first time she'd ever done that. Yes. And everyone, literally, the world lost their shit. Like France was like, hell yeah. And the United States was like, oh. It was so good. So good. The pink Feather's going to come back because I gave her two magical items. Yes. Oh, okay. Before we get to magical items, I gave her, of course, the entertainer background. So we get that acrobatics and performance proficiency. Yes. Also, she has favor and an admirer, which is literally everyone, but it's Grace Kelly. Yeah, it should be. Yeah. But I gave

her an amulet of proof against detection and location, because mind your business. And I gave her, essentially, it's the like bracer's of defense, but it's a pink Feather defense, and it gives her plus two to ac, while she's wearing no armor and no shield. And then she had no clothes. So of course, it's going to work. That's such a good way to frame it. I love it so much. Yeah. So there's like, there's little bits into that, but that's essentially my build. Oh, I love it. Oh, that's so good, dude. The pink Feather's going to come back. I'm going to use that for me, private, like in my games. Yes. But okay, go ahead. Where are you at? Okay. All right. We had, we had a similar idea with sorcery and psionic shit. I, psionic,

psionic sorcery. Yeah. And then I caved and gave Bard. At one point, I had 15 tabs open on my computer that were just different subclasses. Dude, yes. I don't know. I don't fucking know. I had like a warlock one. I had a pallid, I had like four for pallid, and I had a few for, I think I had a cleric one in there. Yeah. No, no, no, no. And then I was like, but Bard works. So I gave her six and psionic soul and four and Bard glamour. So obviously she also has entertainer background. Her charisma is 18, wisdom's 15, intelligence is 13. I gave her constitution 11, just because like she, she fought off sepsis, man. And kept being a fucking spy. Like, that takes a little extra. Yeah. Yeah. Dexterity is 14. And then I dumped strength. I don't, I had a dump.

If you're, yeah, she's all right. She'll be all right. It was between con and con and strength. And the only reason I didn't, didn't dump con was because so I also gave her inspiring leader. Yes. Yeah. Because that I just, it, yes, it fits. It's inspiring leaders so she can give people like extra temporary hit points. And then because of Bard, she gets expertise. And she can double the proficiency on two of her skills. So I doubled performance and persuasion. So they are at plus 12. Stupid. She'll be fine. And then her acrophobia is plus six, her deception is plus eight, and her insights plus six as well. So she has, for instance, with the disguise kit,

I kind of took that as like, she could disguise like where her information was, or like even just disguise her, like disguise her as a different version of herself. Yes. I gave her common in Elvish because Elvish seems like a snooty language. Correct. And then so, so the, the entertainer background said I could have an, an instrument. But I decided instead of that, I was going to give her proficiency of an alchemist kit, because spy shit. Like, you kind of have to know how to, how to, how to like deal with invisible, you have to be able to, you should be able to make invisible link, then you have to be able to, well, yes, invisible, the invisible link. So that, I love that. I love that.

And then her arcane for, let's try again, her arcane focus is her sheet music. Yes. Because that's where all the secrets are kept. Because she's a sorcerer, she gets metamagic. So I gave her twin spell and subtle spell spy shit. She gets weapons, but like you said, she doesn't, she doesn't need physical weapons. But I gave her a club and then she got daggers, but I gave her the club because I like the idea of her having, you know how like an old vaudeville, they'd have like a cane. Yes. It's a, it's a cane that like, when you swing it, like gets into like club shape and then like shrinks back. Hell yeah. I would, yes. Yes. This is, there's a lot of editorializing in here. It's fine.

Yeah, it's fine. So, so with the psionic soul, she gets psionic talent, which means she can roll, I'm still trying to figure this one out. I'm like, she, she has this like well spring of psionic energy and power within herself that kind of ebbs and flows when she channels it in various ways. So she can make a science discovery, which is to like, if she, if she, this is like in game, if she wants to like sit and meditate for 10 minutes, she can cast a sorcerer spell that she doesn't necessarily know. But like, is, if it's a divination or an enchantment spell, she can just cast it, which could be very useful. Yeah. On the fly. Yeah. The minutes before she goes on stage, she like, well, yes, like reorganize. She's like, okay, I don't need this all day,

but I can't get rid of it. So I'm just going to think about this other one and then I can do it. Exactly. Oh, psychic sorcery, which works for her so well. So she, so she uses this like psionic dye. And when, when she uses it, the spell requires no verbal components. And if you rather roll the level of the spell or higher on your psionic dye, it doesn't need put somatic or material components. So she could literally just like, exude it. Fair, fair. And it totally works for like her style of like dancing and singing and everything. It just like, it happens. Yeah, it just happens because it's her. And then telepathic speech, which would be very useful if you are a spy. Give information or give information. She also gets psychic strike,

which means she can channel her energy into, like if she uses a sorcery spell, she can roll a psionic talent dye, deal psychic, sorry, deal that much psychic damage to that person on top of whatever damage she's already dealt. So super cool, super powerful. And then for college of glamour, she didn't get much because it's only fourth level. So she can, so like, there's mental inspiration, which basically says that she can give herself this like incredible appearance, which now I think should tie back to the pink feather because hell yes. And so creatures, she can pick any number of creatures that can see her within 60 feet up to the number equal to the charisma modifier. They get five temporary hit points.

And they can immediately use a reaction to move like they're like to move somewhere else. So she's like kind of inspiring them with her existence. That is fair. Amazing. And then she also has an enthralling performance, which means that it's the same like the same thing, the same number of people they have to roll on a wisdom saving throw or they have to be charmed by her. And while she they're charmed, they idolize her, they speak glowy of you to anyone in the room hinders anyone who opposes you of voting violence unless it's already inclined to fight on your behalf. And it lasts for an hour. Perfect. It's just perfect for spy shit. And like, I don't know too, but like, in particular.

Um, yeah, so those are like really cool traits that she gets from from her classes, obviously, she gets jackal trade song of rest, all that good stuff. Um, magic, sorcery points, all of that hullabaloo. So she's got a fuck ton of cantrips and she knows seven hard spells and seven sorcery spells, because that's what happens when you double class magic was up. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. The usual, like you said, dancing lights, friends, message, mending, I gave her mage hand so that easy, easy to pass information, easy to get information. Minor illusion, I thought would be cool to like have just like, as I mean, like,

can you imagine like a vaudeville dancer that has minor illusion, and you can just like create whatever you want. Rest of the station, all that good stuff. I gave her heroism, Tasha city's laughter, charm person, comprehend languages. I wanted to give her a little bit of a little bit of like power. She needed it. So I gave her witch bolt, because I think which one's like a really good particular fuck you. Yes. Chaos bolt, because I like chaos. Because she she's real, she's real, she has no armor in mind. She's real squishy. And I want to keep her safe. Yeah, exactly. Also, enthrall, sky right, calm emotions. Hold person. And then I took mind spike crowd of menace and phantasmal force, just because it fits really well with like the

psionic stuff. Yeah. And then the last one, the last one I took was thunder step. Because can you imagine having a dance that ends in a fucking thunder step? So good, right? So good, especially because some of those shows have like, like 20 girls on stage, right? Yeah. And then you need a pony and then thunder step your way off. And it doesn't even matter if it's like, it's while she's doing in the like, she's a bad dancer act, or she has her life together, either one to have a thunder step. Powerful. Like what a what a closer. Yes. Oh, like shatter all the light bulbs and the fixtures. The lighting, people are like pissed, but they don't care because it was so cool. Right. Because everyone had to make a wisdom saving throw earlier. Oh, well, we can replace the lights. This is

amazing, as they should, because ending a show on a thunder step is a mood. And I want it. This makes me want to play a bar and I've never wanted to play a barred. That's incredible. Way to go, Josephine. I know. It's Hikers. Hikers miscares me. I had a few ideas of different, which we call it's magical items you should get. Obviously, like pearls of power, spell slot rings. The obvious just because she she deserves all the spell slots and all the power because she should have it. Yes. Her wand. I was also thinking that the club, Vod Vilcain, could also double as like a wand as an arcane focus if we didn't like the idea of the sheet music, double it up there. A cloak of many fashions. I thought would be super useful for just

costuming, but also to change her appearance around specific people. She had her military uniform, but she also had her lovely costumes for shows. It would just be nice if they were all in one place. And one. The perfume would be witching because hella charisma. And then a wand of smiles and because a wand of smiles is fun. And then a wand of conducting, which I thought would be cool if she could just she doesn't even need a band. She doesn't need anyone. She's just like, I'm here. Here's this fucking music and I'm singing to it. That's so good to just randomly start conducting. Yeah. Yeah, that's brilliant. So lots of lots of fun things, like very support, but also like doesn't need anyone. Yeah, yeah. And yeah, that's, oh yeah, she gets inspiration to D6,

but that's just, you know, lots of hard stuff. But that's that's about that's about it for my build on her. I was, I, I hemmed and hawed about her build so long. She was almost a swashbuckler rogue. That's how weird we were getting. No, I love it. I want it. Dexterity and agility. It was like Pirate Josephine Baker, but we're here. You could, you could say that spies are land pirates. We're going to say it now. Spies are land pirates. Did you say it? Maybe not. I already did though. So we're here. That's a fact. That's correct. Yes. Oh man. Thank you so much for joining me today, my friend.

This was so fun. I'm going to extend to you the same offer I've extended to Eli and Caleb. If you ever have a person that you like are super passionate about talking about, please let me know. We can switch places. You can run this, this nerdy show for, for an episode. I would love to hear anyone you want to talk about if you ever come up with anyone. Is there anything you want to like plug or talk about or mention or anything like that? Personally, because you're the coolest and you, the key makes all of our art. If you didn't know, you should know by now because I don't shut up about it. Um, I can't think of anything other than, yeah, I mean, obviously Ashoka's coming out

Friday, which is a wild sentence to say. Oh, I'm going to be on a charity stream on Saturday. What is it? Tell us what it is. It's a boy. It's not 20 productions they're doing. They play Pathfinder 2e, the wonderful people, um, but they are running a women's day charity one shot in noon on Saturday. Just check them out. They're posting about it and all the information is accurate, way more accurate than me right now, but that's it. Yes. Uh, for sure. Check out Zakiya and our friends at natural, is it not 20? It's not natural 20. It's the automatic like natural 20. No, yes. Our friends at Nat 20, um, their charity stream, that's going to be super exciting. Uh, check out Ashoka. Check out, uh, Zakiya's art. Um,

because it's fucking good and I lose my mind every time you show me new art and I cry a lot. Um, yeah, um, Aaron's going to be playing video games again on Monday. That's right. Check that out. Caleb is taking over where I left off on Ironsworn. Um, yeah. Those are all the things. Those are all the things. Thank you guys so much for joining us for this double nerdy adventure once again. I'll be back in a couple of weeks with another person. I have a few in mind, but if you want to drop suggestions and chat of people you'd like to see covered, please, please do. And I will, I'll add them to the ever-growing list. Um, thanks so much. Have a good night, everybody. Bye. Bye.

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