Rita Rio and Her Orchestra (1939) 

Facebook brought me here in 2022!!! Wonderful clip!

Rita Rio, aka Dona Drake was a little ball of fire!

Bill Furrow was my grandfather. What a great man he was, still love him.

Dona Drake identified as mixed-race and had both Black and white ancestry.

She had 3 Black Grandparents and one White. She wasn't Mexican. But she was married to Designer William Travilla who designed Marilyn Monroe's famous white halter top dress.

Rita was very talented. I liked her rendition of - I Cried For You.

Soooo. Much energy ..!!!! Oooooo

Passed as white by taking a Spanish name and pretending to be a Mexican. Those were trying times indeed.

Does anyone know of Rita and her orchestra made any phonograph records? I must get one, at least.

Dona Drake was a black actress, singer, and dancer who was famous in the 30s, 40s, and 50s. However, publicly, her fans would not learn of her African ancestry until years later after studio publicity inaccurately claimed that she was born Rita Novella in 1920 in Mexico City, giving the impression that she was of Mexican heritage. In actual fact, she was born November 15, 1914 in Florida to Joseph Westmoreland (of Arkansas) and Novella Smith (of Alabama) and they named her Eunice Westmoreland. U.S Census reports of her family history show her grandparents were one Black couple and one couple that was Black/White. Because of her features and dark curly hair, film makers often cast her when they needed to fill the role of an ethnic character that looked native, gypsy, or middle eastern.”

John vichyzender ,Rio Rita starret with Alan ladd in 1952 movie iron mistress

Originally released in July 1939.

The Exhibitor called Rita 'the sensuous little exhibitionist' and sniffed that the short 'should appeal, in a certain degree, to the jitterbugs' (7/12/39, p 404).

Whatever happened to Rita?

There was Spanish back then than now and there’s ten times more Spanish speakers ! Haha

Rita Rio (Dona Drake) is as "Latina" as Iron Eyes Cody was "Indian". Google it, kids. Ya gotta do watcha gotta do to eat.😂

Only in America you could speak with such a thick accent and fool everyone that you were Mexican. Just by the way she says 'margarita' I could tell right away she is not native to any Spanish-speaking country, and Spanish isn't even my first language.

7:45

What century are you clowns in??? These are human beings NOT livestock!!!

THIS WAS ACTUALLY PRODUCED FOR PUBLIC DISTROBUTION ,,,,,,,,WEIRD !