No Maps on My Taps

No Maps on My Taps (1979) was director George T. Nierenberg and writer Lynn Rogoff's tribute to three legends of tap dancing--Chuck Green, Bunny Briggs and Harold "Sandman" Sims--and to the art form itself. In the late 1970s, tap dancing was all but dead, having long fallen out of favor. What might be called the golden age of tap dancing occurred at a time when vaudeville, night clubs and legitimate theater were the stomping grounds for tap dancers and some of the most famous dancers would successfully make the transition to film, like The Nicholas Brothers, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, John "Bubbles" Sublett and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson. But society was changing in the 1950s and 1960s, and musical genres changed along with it. Rock and roll (which Sims blamed for the demise of tap) had replaced jazz as the dominate genre for radio and record sales, and tap could not adapt to the tempo or the themes of rock and roll, which created its own dance styles, like The Twist, The Monkey and The Shag. On Broadway, new, "modern" choreographers like Bob Fosse were moving away from tap as well. Coinciding with the societal change was the advent of television, which kept potential audiences home and away from theaters and nightclubs and helped put the coffin nail in vaudeville, leaving tap dancers out in the cold. It would take Gregory Hines' Tony-nominated performance in the Broadway musical Eubie! to ignite the revival of tap in 1978. Hines would later make several dance-themed films before his death in 2003. Director Nierenberg felt a personal connection to tap because his mother had been a tap dancer who had once danced for the inmates at Sing Sing prison as a child, but his passion grew out of seeing Sims perform with the singer Eddie Jefferson in the mid-1970s. "I thought it was amazing, terrific, just great. I thought it was fabulous. You didn't normally see that kind of thing, and you weren't seeing that kind of thing very much at all." Nierenberg's goal for the film was to showcase the different personalities of the three dancers and how a dancer's own personality was reflected in the way they tapped, much the same way as a guitarist or pianist has their own tone. For this he chose his three veteran dancers, Green, Briggs and Sims. The result, as Joan Acocella wrote in The New Yorker, was that "we get three vivid portraits, like something out of the National Gallery." The story comes full circle with the mention of John "Bubbles" Sublett, who had been a mentor to Chuck Green, with Green later helping Harold Sims, who would himself give Gregory Hines lessons in the alley behind the Apollo Theater. Bunny Briggs was chosen as a six-year-old to tour with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, but, to his lifelong regret, his aunt, who was a chorus girl, convinced his mother that it would not be a good environment for a child. Nierenberg hired jazz great Lionel Hampton to play at the famous Small's Paradise jazz club in Harlem to accompany Green, Briggs and Sims in a "dance-off" challenge, which allowed each man to shine in the spotlight separately before having all three appear on stage together. It also stood as a testament to and an historic record of their considerable talent. No Maps on My Taps connected with audiences worldwide, including festivals like the Chicago Film Festival, where it screened in October of 1979, and on college campuses. It would air several times on television, both in the United States and abroad. To help promote the film, the stars would travel to various screenings, sometimes supported by Cab Calloway and his band. Nierenberg would follow up No Maps on My Taps with About Tap in 1985, also with Chuck Green and featuring Gregory Hines. No Maps on My Taps was restored by Milestone Films in 2017 from the original camera negative and re-released into theaters, where it once again met with critical acclaim. By Lorraine LoBianco SOURCES: Acocella, J. (2017, July 10). "No maps on my taps" is back. The New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/07/10/no-maps-on-my-taps-is-back Milestone films restores two tap dance classics in time for NYC's tap week. (n.d.). New York Amsterdam News: The new Black view. https://amsterdamnews.com/news/2017/jul/20/milestone-films-restores-two-tap-dance-classics-ti/ 'No maps on my taps': Film review. (2017, July 7). The Hollywood Reporter. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/no-maps-my-taps-1019463 No maps on my taps. (n.d.). Milestone Films. https://www.milestonefilms.com/products/no-maps-on-my-taps No maps on my taps. (n.d.). Screen Slate. https://www.screenslate.com/features/502 Review: A revival of a revival: 'No maps on my taps' and 'About tap' bring dance back to life. (2017, September 14). Los Angeles Times. https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-capsule-no-map-my-taps-about-review-20170914-story.html