{{Short description|1920s musical revue}} {{distinguish|Plantation Revue}} '''''Plantation Days''''' (1922) was a touring musical revue with Sam Wooding<ref>{{cite book | last=Deffaa | first=Chip | title=Voices of the Jazz Age: Profiles of Eight Vintage Jazzmen | publisher=University of Illinois Press | publication-place=Urbana | date=1992 | isbn=0-252-06258-2 | oclc=25499699 | author-link=Chip Deffaa}} page 11</ref> and James P. Johnson<ref name=petersen/> as musical directors at different stages of the tour. Produced by Morris "Maury" Greenwald,<ref name=riamco>[https://www.riamco.org/render?eadid=US-RPB-ms2015.018&view=biography "Blondie Robinson collection of African-American Minstrel and Vaudeville photographs (MS.2015.018), Biographical/Historical note." Brown University Library.] ''Riamco.org''. Retrieved 16 December 2022.</ref> the touring show was conceived to capitalize on ''Plantation Revue'' (1922-23), the successful show staged by Lew Leslie.<ref name=petersen/>

Beginning its inaugural run either in Chicago<ref name=riamco/> with Johnson as a principal performer, accompanied by Marjorie Sipp and The Plantation Four, among many others or in New York,<ref name=petersen/> it was staged by Leonard Harper (who also performed in the revue with his wife, Osceola Blanks),<ref name=petersen/> and featured acts by Eddie Green, The Crackerjacks,<ref>{{cite book | last1=Cullen | first1=Frank | last2=Hackman | first2=Florence | last3=McNeilly | first3=Donald | title=Vaudeville, Old & New: An Encyclopedia of Variety Performers in America | publication-place=New York | date=2007 | isbn=978-0-415-93853-2 | oclc=62430748}} Volume 1, pp. 277-8</ref> and The Three Eddies, among others.

At the end of its first US tour, the show was scheduled for a week February 1923 at New York's Lafayette Theatre.<ref name=petersen/> However, a court order forced the show to drop three of its most popular numbers, by Noble Sissle and Eubie Blake, which had been pirated from their successful ''Shuffle Along'' (1921).<ref name=petersen/> The show, minus the three numbers, eventually opened at the Lafayette just over a month later,<ref name=petersen/> with Sam Wooding's orchestra.<ref name=petersen/>

Following its run at the Lafayette, the show moved to London, where it was initially integrated, as a 12-minute segment, into Gershwin's ''The Rainbow'', which opened at the Empire Theatre in April 1923,<ref name=petersen/> brought over by the British promoter Albert de Courville.<ref>Barker, Clive; Simon Trussler (1994). [https://books.google.com/books?id=UtoZmij14FYC&q=plantation ''New Theatre Quarterly'' 37: Volume 10, Part 1, p. 37. Cambridge University Press, 26 may 1994.] ''Google Books''. Retrieved 17 December 2022.</ref>

Although Ethel Waters had originally been approached by Greenwald for the London run,<ref name=petersen/> she actually joined the company in Chicago in August 1923, as an "extra added attraction" to "save the fast-flopping revue".<ref name=petersen/>

Revived in 1925,<ref name=petersen>{{cite book | last=Peterson | first=Bernard L. | title=A Century of Musicals in Black and White: An Encyclopedia of Musical Stage Works By, About, or Involving African Americans | publisher=Greenwood Press | publication-place=Westport, Conn. | date=1993 | isbn=0-313-06454-7 | oclc=65336150}}</ref> it was during its run at the Royal Theatre, Baltimore, in 1927, with Blanche Calloway as one of the main acts, that Cab Calloway, with his sister's help, joined the revue "as a replacement for the first tenor in a vocal quartet",<ref name=petersen/> and decided to devote himself to show business.<ref>{{cite book | last1=Hildebrand | first1=David | last2=Schaaf | first2=Elizabeth M. | last3=Biehl | first3=William | title=Musical Maryland: A History of Song and Performance from the Colonial Period to the Age of Radio | publication-place=Baltimore | date=2017 | isbn=978-1-4214-2240-4 | oclc=1002109162 | author-link = David K. Hildebrand}} p. 138</ref>

==References== {{Reflist}}

Category:Revues Category:1922 musicals