27. She Credited Paris With Making Her a Superstar
Baker remained forever grateful to France for providing her with the platform from which she vaulted to greatness. As she stated in a 1974 interview: “No, I didn’t get my first break on Broadway. I was only in the chorus in ‘Shuffle Along’ and ‘Chocolate Dandies’. I became famous first in France in the twenties. I just couldn’t stand America and I was one of the first coloured Americans to move to Paris“. She came to regard France as her new home – one that afforded her opportunities that the color of her skin had denied her in America.