Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer

Left: Fitz Weir gives his memo-ries of Miss Lou.   Right: Fae Ellington reads from the article 'Walk Good Miss Lou' on Sunday at the the Dennis Scott Studio Theatre, Edna Manley College.

There were 'drinks' and 'puddn' on the table onstage and merriment as well as respectful attention in the substantial audience as Aunty Roachie marshalled the witnesses to Miss Lou's life and kept a watchful eye on the snacks at the Dennis Scott Studio Theatre on Sunday morning.

With Dorothy Cunningham as Aunty Roachie, there were theatre tales, beginning with Bob Kerr, along with testimony to Miss Lou's basic decency and abundant warmth.

"The first time I went on stage at the Ward Theatre it was a play Miss Lou wrote called Bus Business," said Fitz Weir.

A mother

"Miss Lou was like a mother to me," he said, recalling a scene where Miss Lou was in a night-gown with a duppy after her. "She have lines, but nobody no remember them," he said, to laughter.

Allan Jones remembered 1988, when he played Marcus Garvey's father and Miss Lou Garvey's mother in a production staged in Toronto, Canada. "I am respectful, so I will not say she forgot her lines. What was in the script was not what she was saying," he said, to more laughter. At the end of the day "I left with more respect for Miss Lou as a wonderful human being. She taught us to really feel good about self."

Fae Ellington said "she influenced me not only as a theatre practitioner but as a broadcaster." Miss Lou recorded her shows at the same radio studio she used and "we shared a lot, including patties. She loved patties and it was not only one."

Then there was that first pantomime, where Ellington was understudying Faith D'Aguilar. On one fateful night D'Aguilar was nowhere in sight as it was coming to her time to be on stage. "I sidled up to Miss Lou and said between my teeth 'Faith is not here'," Ellington related. And Miss Lou replied, between her teeth, "hup child, hup!" And 'hup' Fae Ellington went.

Easton Lee said he met Miss Lou in Pantomime 45 years ago, but their relationship extended beyond that to her work in communities, where she would have him go around with her and split classes with him. "I did not know she was setting me up. She was moving on and needed a replacement," Lee said. Above all, he said, "Miss Lou was a wonderful friend."

Good teacher

In a dramatic and humorous talk, Alma Mock-Yen said "if I can remember something she teach me roughly 50 years ago she is a very good teacher." And obviously she was, as Mock-Yen used the mime Miss Lou taught her to tell the tale of Miss Lou's like and love. "The first time I hear she laugh I say 'wha kin' a woman dat?" Mock-Yen said.

Joan Andrea Hutchinson, accompanied by young Natasha on stage, said "to me, more than all those wonderful things, Miss Lou is a person." On one visit to Canada five or six years ago to do recording with her, Eric Coverley fell ill the night before.

Miss Lou simply opened up her home to the team, the furniture being pushed aside, "and we did this absolutely wonderful recording."

And in the closing stages, after dramatic impersonations of Miss Lou and Ranny Williams, Nexxus came back for Evening Time in the early Sunday afternoon, the witnesses gathered on stage and Louis Marriott detailed his experiences with Miss Lou from the late 1950s to being taken to classes, like Lee.

Alma Mock-Yen swayed forward with a basket of greenery on her head, placing it on the stage and behind them an animated, projected, large as life Miss Lou said "walk good".