Robert Lévy(III)
- Producer
- Additional Crew
Robert E. Levy, (1888-1959) was a race film producer during the silent era, and founder of Reol Products Corporation, known for The Sport of the Gods (1921) (1921), The Burden of Race (1921) (1921), The Call of His People (1921) (1921) and Secret Sorrow (1921) (1922).
Under the label of Reol Films, Levy produced the first Hollywood-style race movies with an all-black cast, and they featured stories written by African American writers. Levy was credited in the press of the time with being the first to pioneer the idea of a black movie star.
Before producing race movies, Levy was the general manager of the Lafayette Players (1916-1919). Since his arrival in June 1916, this pioneering stock company regularly offered serious drama in Harlem including Broadway's hit musicals and plays written by M. C. Cohan and classics like Dumas and Goethe. Players and Levy were the first to premiere Shakespeare with an all-black cast in the US, performing Othello in July 1917 at Lafayette.
Levy's work with actors in black film and theatre challenged the stereotypes and racial prejudices prevalent in American society in the first decades of the 20th Century; he strongly believed that black artists could excel in any kind of drama.
Under the label of Reol Films, Levy produced the first Hollywood-style race movies with an all-black cast, and they featured stories written by African American writers. Levy was credited in the press of the time with being the first to pioneer the idea of a black movie star.
Before producing race movies, Levy was the general manager of the Lafayette Players (1916-1919). Since his arrival in June 1916, this pioneering stock company regularly offered serious drama in Harlem including Broadway's hit musicals and plays written by M. C. Cohan and classics like Dumas and Goethe. Players and Levy were the first to premiere Shakespeare with an all-black cast in the US, performing Othello in July 1917 at Lafayette.
Levy's work with actors in black film and theatre challenged the stereotypes and racial prejudices prevalent in American society in the first decades of the 20th Century; he strongly believed that black artists could excel in any kind of drama.