Word: cooperating
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Among the agents who roam the communal dressing room, talk of Cooper is couched in terms of awe. "He's a saint. The world will never know how many big names owe everything to him," says Bobby Robinson, a producer who has prowled the performers' room for 30 years...
...applause -- would pocket just $200. And, of course, there is that infamous Apollo audience, an orchestra and two balconies bursting with folks who give no quarter. Ella Fitzgerald's hazing is a legend. She managed no more than a few off-key notes before Master of Ceremonies Ralph Cooper came out to save her. Stilling the jeers, he won her a reprieve and she started again. On the second try, she brought down the house...
Upstairs, where he is searching for a pink tie that will do justice to his natty brown suit, Cooper is a picture of tranquillity. In a few minutes, he'll saunter into the spotlight. As always, the crowd will treat him like a favorite uncle, respectfully silent while he explains the rules...
Swapping greetings with the regulars who drift in and out at will, Cooper has to be prodded before he'll explain just how he does it. "The Apollo is a very sophisticated audience, but that doesn't mean they're fair, least not all the time. If I wasn't here to keep control, it wouldn't matter how good some kid was. They'd just tear the act to pieces, never give the ones who deserve it a chance. But you know what? The ones that are going to make it, they'll always be back. If they...
...Apollo was a shuttered reminder of Harlem's faded grandeur. The problem was simple economics. By the mid-'70s, big-name acts wanted so much money that it was impossible to squeeze a worthwhile profit out of the "small" 1,500-seat auditorium. Until the theater's closing, Cooper's amateurs still packed 'em in, but on most other evenings, the place was dead and empty...