Navigating Primitivism’s Persistent Gaze

This chapter examines Dunham’s work on Botta e risposta (1950) and Mambo (1954) to highlight the substantial creative freedom that midcentury European cinema granted to a Black woman choreographer. The Dunham company’s portrayal in these films suggests that her troupe’s fame in postwar Europe was filtered through the same crude ideas about Black cultures that informed Baker’s career. And yet within such a framework, Dunham was afforded authorial control over her dance scenes to an extent not possible in Hollywood and, like Baker, used these scenes to present a culturally complex vision of Black womanhood that countered racist misconceptions. The chapter establishes Dunham as a coauthor of Mambo by showing that her choreography is central to its artistic vision.