In 1936, the writer George Frazier was a regular at the Theatrical Club, a cellar hideaway on Tremont Street known for its after-hours jazz. But the problem with the Theatrical, as Frazier saw it, was that all the musicians there were white. He conspired with bandleader Bobby Hackett to change that, and they did, by bringing the great Fats Waller to the Theatrical Club’s bandstand.

Take it from Fats—this joint’s jumpin’

Fats Waller was in town, headlining the Hot From Harlem Revue, which opened at the RKO-Boston Theatre on November 6. The Hot From Harlem stage show played Boston annually with a big cast of dancers, singers, comedians, and musicians supporting the show’s headlining star.

We can assume that the ebullient Waller played hits like “Honeysuckle Rose” and “Ain’t Misbehavin’,” and probably introduced a few new songs, too. Perhaps a party atmosphere prevailed among the RKO-Boston crowd, celebrating the fact that FDR had been re-elected by a landslide just two days before Fats opened.

But Hot From Harlem isn’t my reason for checking in with Mr. Waller today. I’m interested in his role in opening doors at the Theatrical Club.

The Theatrical Club was not a city-licensed nightclub as was, for example, the nearby Cocoanut Grove. It was a private club, organized under state charter, and operating with a different set of rules. Foremost was the rule about closing time…the Theatrical closed somewhere around 5:00 in the morning. The city mandated a 1:00 closing time at the Cocoanut Grove, but they were just getting warmed up at the Theatrical then. This annoyed the fellows running the Grove, of course. But somehow with its status as a private club, and a few tokens of gratitude slipped into the right pockets, the Theatrical Club ran wide open.

“Everyone went there of course,” recalled George Frazier, writing in his Boston Herald column in 1942. “Everyone you could possibly think of. Debutantes, racketeers, Harvard crew-cuts, musicians, newspapermen, the help from night clubs…And everyone had a swell time.”

Club manager Al Taxier hired a fine band for those late-night revels—Bobby Hackett’s splendid small group with Hackett playing Bixian cornet, trombonist Brad Gowans writing arrangements, Teddy Roy playing his Hines-inspired piano, reedmen Billy Wildes and Pat Barbara blowing, and drummer Russ Isaacs, a refugee from the society bands, swinging them all towards dawn.

Word about the Theatrical Club and Hackett got around, and the likes of Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, and Bunny Berigan, with bandmates in tow, came by to sit in. But not Basie’s band, or Lunceford’s, or Webb’s. They weren’t allowed. Which brings us back to Waller.

Hackett and Frazier kept after Taxier to let everybody in. He resisted, though, worried that a conservative backlash might pressure the city into curtailing the club’s after-hours operation. Eventually he relented, and Frazier took it from there. When the Hot From Harlem Revue hit town, Frazier approached Fats Waller to see if he would be willing to crash the party at the Theatrical. Fats said yes. So sometime after midnight on one of those November mornings, Waller strode through the club’s front door, unannounced. He took a seat at the piano, shouted “Look out now!,” and broke into his popular hit, “The Joint Is Jumpin’.” The crowd, as they say, went wild.

Proclaimed Fats: “Now this joint is officially jumpin’.” And that was the end of Jim Crow at the Theatrical Club. The backlash Taxier feared never materialized.

The glory days at the Theatrical Club only lasted for about a year, from the time Hackett’s band arrived in early 1936, until he left in early 1937. Hackett was a major part of the magic, and Taxier never found a suitable replacement. The musicians seeking jam session kicks went elsewhere, and without the first-rate music, the clientele drifted away. The club quietly closed in the spring of 1938. Jazz would have another day in that cellar, though. The Ken Club opened there in 1940.

Here is Fats and band playing “This Joint Is Jumpin’” but be advised, this film is a product of its time.