It’s mid-morning, and things are a little screwed up here at the Marquette elementary school.
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Mary Matthews Productions, a small group exotically dressed in burnooses, has just finished a rousing gospel set, and the temperature in the little auditorium has been rising. Gospel great Ed Tucker couldn’t get time off work at Federal Express, so he’s a no-show this morning, and Reverend Darius Brooks (“Simply Darius”) isn’t here yet because he thought the show started at 11, not 10. Reverend Willis, head of a church and a huge choir in Oak Lawn, pinch-hits, singing among other selections an a cappella rendition of the Bette Midler song from Beaches–which meets with a wild response from the kids, who wave their arms and shout their approval.
Separation of church and state goes out the window. “Stand up and say ‘I love you, Jesus,’” says Willis. They do.
Finally it’s time for lunch, and the kids march out clapping to Morris’s clapped rhythm.
He and Reverend Willis, who has stayed around, sing a duet; Darius plays the piano. They sound (and look) like a Wayne Newton/B.B. King combo–with a tinge of country. Towheads, redheads, Hispanic kids, Middle Eastern kids, and black kids watch rapturously.
