Hazel Scott: The Disappearance of Miss Scott is a documentary film which premiered on US television (PBS) in 2025.
It is an episode of the long-running program American Masters.
It is about the life and career of the African American musician Hazel Scott (1920-1981)
Here is some basic information about this film:
** Director and producer: Nicole London
** Excerpts from Hazel Scott’s unpublished memoirs are read by Sheryl Lee Ralph
** Language: English
** Subtitles: English
** Run time: 83 minutes
Several persons are interviewed in the film
Here are the names of the participants
Listed in alphabetical order
** Mark Cantor – director of the Celluloid Archive
** Marcia Chatelain – an author
** Karen Chilton – author of a biography about Hazel Scott
** Michael Eric Dyson – an author
** Farah Jasmine Griffin – Professor of English, Columbia University
** Mickey Guyton – a country star
** Murray Horwitz – a playwright
** Tammy L. Khernodle – a musicologist
** Ashley Khan – a music historian
** Dwayne Mack – Professor of History, Berea College
** Jason Moren – a jazz musician
** Monica O’Donnell – author of dissertation about Hazel Scott
** Adam Clayton Powell III – a journalist – he is the son of Hazel Scott and Adam Clayton Power, Jr.
** Lauren Schoenberg – a musician, a saxophonist
** Amanda Seales – an actress
** Gretchen Sullivan Sorin – an author
** Carole Stabile – Professor, University of Maryland
** Tracie Thoms – an actress
** Camille Thurman – a jazz musician
Archive footage is used between the talking heads. Archive footage is used to support and supplement the statements made by the talking heads.
This film covers the life and work of Hazel Scott in great detail. It covers the life of the African American musician from the beginning in 1920 until the end in 1981.
Hazel was a talented pianist. She played jazz and classical music. She was a singer and an actress. She was a civil rights activist.
She was born in Port of Spain in Trinidad. In 1924, when she was four years old, she moved with her mother and grandmother to New York City.
In the US, she became a famous pianist and singer. She was strongly opposed to racial discrimination and racial segregation.
Her contract included a passage which stated that she was not going to perform in front of a segregated audience. This passage was important to her. If the organizers were not prepared to obey this passage, she refused to play.
She was married to the African American Baptist pastor and politician Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. They were married in 1945.
In the beginning, things were going well. Hazel and Adam were a famous couple in the African American community. Later, things were not going so well. First, they separated. In 1960, they divorced.
Hazel and Adam had a son who was born in 1946. The child, who was named Adam Clayton Powell III, appears in this film. He is one of the many persons who are interviewed here.
In 1950, Hazel was listed in a pamphlet with the title Red Channels. This pamphlet named more than one hundred persons who were accused of being communists. Hazel was included, because she was opposed to racial discrimination and racial segregation.
In 1950, the US was in the middle of the Second Red Scare. Senator McCarthy was beginning his persecution of people who were suspected of being Communists.
Hazel was the first African American woman to have her own television show which ran on a weekly basis. But her show did not last long.
The first episode aired on 03 July 1950. When she was named as a communist in the pamphlet, her show was cancelled. The DuMont Television Network said they could no longer find a sponsor for her show. The last episode aired on 29 September 1950
Since she was accused of being a communist, it was at first difficult and later impossible for Hazel to work as a musician in the US.
In this situation, she decided to go to France for a while. She went there several times in the following years. In 1957, she decided to stay there on a permanent basis.
Life was easier for her in France, because there was no racial segregation there. She found that the French public appreciated her more than the American public did.
In 1967, when she returned to the US, she found that the country had changed in several ways while she had been away. A civil rights movement was active, but it was not easy for her to connect with this movement, because it operated in ways which were strange for her.
She had been a popular artist in the US during the 1930s. During World War II, she and actress Lena Horne had performed for American troops who were stationed abroad with great success. But when the war was over, things began to change.
In the 1950s, she felt she was being pushed out of her own country. She moved to France. She disappeared from the US. Hence the subtitle of this film:
The Disappearance of Miss Scott
When she returned in 1967, she did not really feel welcome. Many members of the civil rights movement regarded her as someone who was out of touch with the current situation.
She performed occasionally in a night club and she had small roles on some television shows, but she was not able to rebuild her career.
It was never the same as it had been before and during World War II. When she died in 1981, she was almost forgotten by the general public.
What do reviewers say about this film?
On IMDb it has a rating of 79 percent
Reviewers praise the director for covering the life and career of an artist who had been almost forgotten.
Hazel was not only a talented pianist, a singer and an actress. She was also an outspoken person, but America was not to accept an artist who was opposed to racial segregation.
Some people decided she had to be taught a lesson. She was blacklisted and vilified so much and so hard that she felt she had to leave the country.
Hazel was a civil rights activist before there was an organized movement. She was almost on her own.
She conducted a one-woman crusade for civil rights. She paid a high price when she insisted on her right to speak out and say what she believed.
This film shows her talents as a musician, a singer and an actress. It also reveals the price she had to pay for speaking out. She was silenced so much that she was almost forgotten by the general public.
The topic is important. The story deserves to be told, and in this film, it is done very well. I want to go all the way to the top with this product. I think it deserves a rating of five stars (100 percent).
PS. Hazel is often described as the first African American woman to host a television show which aired on a weekly basis. This description is true.
The Hazel Scott Show ran for three months in 1950. But Hazel is not the first African American woman to host a television show about herself.
This distinction belongs to the African American singer and actress Ethel Waters (1896-1977) who hosted a television show about herself before World War II.
Her show aired on NBC on 14 June 1939. But there was only one episode. Her show did not run on a weekly basis. In addition, not many people had a television set in 1939. Not many people were able to watch this show.
Ethel Waters is not mentioned in Nicole London’s documentary film about Miss Scott.
REFERENCES
# 1. The following items are available online
Joe Bendel
“American Masters: The Disappearance of Miss Scott,”
J. B. Spins
19 February 2025
John Anderson
“The Disappearance of Miss Scott: A Virtuoso Revealed on PBS,”
Wall Street Journal
20 February 2025
This item is placed behind a pay wall
Jevon Phillips
“Hazel Scott, a trailblazing entertainer and activist, was silenced. A PBS doc brings her to light,”
Los Angeles Times
21 February 2025
Rick Kogan
“American Masters brings jazz giant Hazel Scott out of the shadows,”
Chicago Tribune
04 March 2025
This item is placed behind a paywall
# 2. Books
Hazel Scott: The Pioneering Journey of a Jazz Pianist from Café Society to Hollywood to HUAC
By Karen Chilton
(2008 = hardcover)
(2010 = paperback)
The Rebel Café: Sex, Race, and Politics in Cold War America’s Nightclub Underground
By Stephen R. Duncan
(2018)
When Women Invented Television: The Untold Story of the Female Powerhouses Who Pioneered the Way We Watch Today
By Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
(2021)
*****
Hazel Scott:
The Disappearance of Miss Scott
This documentary film
premiered on US television (PBS)
in 2025
*****
The African American musician, singer,
actress, and civil rights activist
Hazel Scott
(1920-1981)
*****
The Hazel Scott Show
aired on the DuMont Television Network
from July to September 1950
*****
Red Channels:
The Report of Communist Influence in
Radio and Television
Published by Counterattack
(1950)
*****
Hazel Scott
The Pioneering Journey of a Jazz Pianist from
Café Society to Hollywood to HUAC
by Karen Chilton
(2008 = hardcover)
(2010 = paperback)
*****
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