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When he was eight, John W. Bubbles teamed up with six-year-old "Buck" Washington. As Buck and Bubbles, the singing-dancing-comedy act lasted nearly half a century.
They were featured in Ziegfeld Follies of 1931 and were the first black artists to play New York's Radio City Music Hall. Bubbles is best known for originating the role of Sportin' Life in George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess (1935). Yet his most significant contribution as an artist was to amalgamate jazz into tap dancing, placing his signature on the form during a vivid era of innovation. By adding heel drops, turns, and syncopation, he altered both accents and timing, simultaneously grounding rhythms and projecting an easy nonchalance.
The popular American song-and-dance act appeared frequently in Britain in the 1930s. Indeed, they had the distinction of appearing in the first public televison broadcast in Britain. This was transmitted by the BBC on 2nd November 1936 from the Alexander Palace in Muswell Hill, London, (known as the "Ally Pally").
Long associated with the Hoofers Club in Harlem, Bubbles went from three-shows-a-day in vaudeville to Broadway and a stint in Hollywood, where he appeared in Varsity Show (1937), Cabin in the Sky (1943), and A Song Is Born (1948). He played the Palace Theater with Judy Garland in 1967 and appeared in Black Broadway (1979). Bubbles received the 1980 Life Achievement Award from the American Guild of Variety Artists.
Buck (Ford Washington Lee (1903 - 1955) &
Bubbles (John William Sublett (1902 - 1986)
