By Neely Tucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, March 11, 2006; C01
There was this moment last night when they were trying to get a picture together before the broadcasters' party started. This was in an elegant little conference room at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel.
"Etta James!" the organizers call out. The rhythm-and-blues legend is over there on the right, hard to recognize at first because of the surgery that has dropped 200 pounds from her frame.
"Epatha Merkerson!"
The Detroit-born actress, pride of Cooley High, "Law & Order" regular, Emmy Award winner, is chatting with a friend a few feet over.
"Terrence Howard!"
"Can I finish this fry?" the Oscar-nominated actor hollers back, trying to eat from a room-service tray.
But by then there was a general din and chatter and bustle, largely because our personal heartthrob, Alicia Keys, just walked in ('Leisha! Honey!) and that's when the moment came -- the realization that there was probably no greater concentration of black talent in any other room in America last night.
The occasion was the annual awards dinner of the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters Inc., a black-tie, $600-per-seat evening that both honors and features ridiculous amounts of talent each year. The 30-year-old organization, comprising 240 black-owned radio stations and 20 television stations, puts on the event for black-owned broadcasting outlets.
Right here, while shamelessly name-dropping, we should note that also in the room were gospel legends Albertina Walker and Dorothy Norwood, as well as BET founder Robert L. Johnson.
Upstairs, mingling somewhere else, were Aretha Franklin, Steve Harvey, the Rev. Al Sharpton and actor Jeffrey Wright.
But right now, sitting right beside us, is The one! The only! Etta James!
Something told me it was over
When I saw you and her talkin'
Something deep down in my soul said, "Cry, girl"
When I saw you and that girl walkin' around
She's looking great. Got her long eyelashes on. Still has a few medical issues, a little slow getting around.
But what do you want -- born Jamesetta Hawkins in Los Angeles in 1938, she's been recording since 1954. Back then, she had a song called "Roll With Me Henry." It was considered too risque for radio.
Goodness.
But she's still here, five decades in the business, here tonight to pick up what she calls a "still hanging in there award." Actually, it's a lifetime achievement award. Walker is picking up one, too. Past recipients are people like 'Retha, James Brown, Quincy Jones, Muhammad Ali.
James lives in Riverside, Calif., about 40 miles outside Palm Springs. Does a couple of shows a month these days. Likes coming to Washington, because she remembers it as having "the dancingest people I've ever seen."
"But I always wished I'd learned how to play the piano," she says, extolling the virtues of being able to sit down while performing in the latter stages of your career. "I guess I'm doing my best to be who I should have been all along."
Merkerson we catch up with in the hallway.
She's fresh off her Emmy Award as best actress for the role of Rachel "Nanny" Crosby on HBO's "Lackawanna Blues," and is now finishing up filming this season's episodes of "Law & Order." After that, she goes to another film.
She's here to collect the Pioneer in Entertainment Award, and then it's right back to New York for filming.
"It's incredible being in this room," she says. "That's Albertina Walker, right over there! I grew up listening to her."
Hovering is what people are doing around the social magnet of the evening, Keys. There's always a crowd, through which you can sometimes see her tresses. While getting elbowed by photographers, we notice she has incredibly good posture. Bright eyes and a megawatt smile (see: personal heartthrob, above.)
She bends over and whispers to James while the pictures are being snapped.
"Ain't you sweet!" James says back.
Upstairs, on the main floor, hundreds of people are finding their tables. The house band swings into "C-Jam Blues," a nice little Ellington riff, appropriate for the Duke's home town. Harvey comes out, introduces people. Teases the Geico executive unmercifully about the company mascot, that "little lizard," or gecko, that's so prominent in the company's ads.
"Black people don't like lizards!" he says. "Get a bunny rabbit!"
Jim Rouse, born in the Bronx River Projects (and darned proud of it) and now owner of two radio stations and a newspaper in North Carolina, is right there at Table 1, soaking it up.
He doesn't just own the stations -- he's the on-air host for the morning-drive shift, writes a column in his newspaper, keeps the books, everything.
"I'm probably the most unique guy in here," he says, playfully, just before Aretha comes on to sing.
On another night, he might just be right.
