New musical sees James Brown through his daughter’s eyes

In 1974, James Brown performed on “Soul Train,” but it was his 5-year-old daughter who stole the show.

“It was a big moment. I’ve had celebrities come to me and say, ‘’Are you the little girl dancing with your dad on TV?’” said Deanna Brown Thomas, who wore a jumpsuit that matched the one her famous father donned that day. “I remember standing on that stage under those lights.”

She recently got to revisit those dance moves as she attended rehearsal for a play she helped pen with Jeremy Cormier, an Atlanta playwright. Their collaboration, a musical called “Papa Didn’t Take No Mess” will be performed for three weekends in Decatur beginning Oct. 17.

Cormier is a long-time James Brown Family Foundation Board member who has traveled extensively with Thomas to various engagements over the years.

On those journeys, she shared stories with him of growing up with the Godfather of Soul. When Cormier first mentioned the idea of transforming her memories into a play, she laughed. She was too busy.

“I’ve got set things I have to do — J.A.M.P. (James Brown Academy of Musik Pupils), turkey and toy (the annual holiday giveaways) that I know I have to be there for. J.A.M.P. is all-year round. I’m definitely in the middle of turkeys and toys. I’m up to both hands and feet, legs, ears, eyes, eyebrows and eyelashes everything. I really wasn’t interested,” she said.

But Cormier was. And his commitment to preserving her memories and the Godfather’s legacy made her take notice. She started collaborating with him.

Thomas is a morning person. After her daily devotions, it was off to writing. She’d write and send it to Cormier.

“I’d get my God download then my Godfather download. It was coming so naturally to me. I’d remember things, little anecdotes. I realized this is really supposed to happen,” she said.

Growing up, she had one view of the man she called “Daddy.” She knew he was popular and that his job took him away for long periods of time. It wasn’t until she started her own career in radio that she came to appreciate the artist known to the world by nicknames including Mr. Dynamite and the Hardest Working Man in Show Business. She also went on tour with him and styled his hair for many years.

No matter what city she was in, everyone seemed to have their own James Brown story.

She remembered a veteran who told her that her father’s music saved him while he was in Vietnam. It gave him the strength to keep going every day.

“People loved my father. The messages in his songs changed people’s lives,” she said.

While it’s James Brown through Deanna Brown Thomas’s eyes, “Papa Didn’t Take No Mess” is “legacy driven, love driven, community driven,” she said.

The title is a play on his song “Papa Don’t Take No Mess.”

“That was a song everybody danced to and enjoyed, but I lived it, so we changed it a little to ‘Papa Didn’t Take No Mess,’ and he didn’t,” she said.

Shows will be at 8 p.m. Oct. 17-18, 24-25, Oct. 31-Nov. 1, 2 and 8 p.m.  Oct. 19 and 26, 3 p.m., Oct. 20, 5 p.m., Oct. 27 at the Porter Sanford III Performing Arts & Community Center, 3181 Rainbow Dr, Decatur. Tickets are $40-$55 and are available here.

Some of the proceeds will benefit the foundation and its’ programs, and she hopes that Atlanta is only the first of many stops for the production.

“Let us hope that God and the Godfather are happy with our work, and we get those blessings,” she said.

Charmain Z. Brackett, the publisher of Augusta Good News and Inspiring: Women of Augusta, has covered Augusta’s news for more than 35 years and is a Georgia Press Association award winner. Reach her at charmain@augustagoodnews.com. Sign up for the newsletter here.