Finis Henderson: all in the family - son of dancer Finis Henderson Jr. and nephew of actor Bill Henderson

Ebony, April, 1993 by Aldore Collier

FINIS Henderson is one of those entertainment rarities, a chameleon who defies pigeonholing. He has audiences roaring with laughter at his standup comedy, staring at each other in amazement at his stunning vocal skills and applauding his dancing.

One minute he imitates Nat King Cole and Frank Sinatra, the next he easily glides across a stage and belts out Sammy Davis Jr. standards or throws out jokes in dialects from around the world.

He describes himself as simply "an entertainer," but adds, with a little laughter: "I've always been a clown."

Growing up in Chicago, Henderson told jokes and did near-perfect imitations of the numerous celebrities who visited his parents' home. After all, his father, Finis Henderson Jr., was a veteran dancer who managed artists like Brook Benton and Godfrey Cambridge and staged shows for megastars like Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack. (Both father and son generally drop qualifying numbers and Jr. and Sr. designations.) His uncle, Bill Henderson, is also a recording artist and actor who has appeared in the movies City Slickers and White Men Can't Jump.

"I guess I got into music because of being around my father," Finis Henderson III says. "My mom also pushed me to do something with my talent. She just kept pushing; she's a real driver, a retired Avon district manager who has won a lot of awards for salesmanship."

The multitalented entertainer was a member of two Chicago singing groups, entertaining audiences all over the city. "First," he says, "I joined the Chicago Community Music Foundation. Then several members of that group got together, and we formed the Weapons of Peace." That group eventually recorded an album on the Playboy label.

Restlessness soon set in as jobs became scarce. For a couple of years, he pondered what to do next. Then, in 1980, he moved to Los Angeles, where he formed an alliance with Al McKay, a musician who had just left the supergroup Earth, Wind & Fire.

"He and I kind of gelled," Henderson says. "I moved in with him and was lead singer for a group he created." He worked with McKay for several years and started doing comedy at night.

He says that every comedian hopes to be discovered on some magical occasion, and that breakthrough occurred for him in 1981 when he took to the stage at the famed Comedy Store in West Hollywood on Audition Night.

"It was a star-studded night with people like Sally Field and Richard Pryor in the audience," he recalls. "So I worked my way toward center stage and started singing songs and doing impressions. The next thing I knew, everybody's clapping more and more, and I'm clowning. The next thing Richard Pryor comes onstage. Then Robin Williams comes onstage. We do an improv together, and that's the first night of many nights that things happened like that."

Soon afterwards, celebrities started coming to the Comedy Store to see Henderson perform, and, on a night he will never forget, he got a special telephone call from Richard Pryor's office.

"Pryor's people said, "Richard wants you to open for him Live On Sunset,'" Henderson recalls. "I went like, |Thank you, Jesus.' This was the opportunity of a lifetime, opening up for a superstar."

In addition to opening for Pryor on several occasions, Henderson also opened for Smokey Robinson, Rodney Dangerfield, Russian comic Yakov Smirnoff and country superstar Barbara Mandrell. And his growing popularity led to a recording contract with Motown Records, although his recording experience has not been nearly as successful as his stage career.

"I was with Motown from 1983-85," he says. "They brought me in like gangbusters, but I was there when the company was going through turmoil. There were personnel changes, and they were moving into motion pictures. My first album sold well."

But things stalled, and he was forced to put his recording career on hold while he earned a living in the movies and night clubs.

Henderson performed in the films Wired and I'm Gonna Git You Sucka. His television credits include performances on 227, Bustin' Loose, Dance Fever and Nashville Now. He was featured in the recent ABC-TV mini-series The Jacksons: An American Dream as the emcee at the Apollo Theater.

The singer/comic/dancer/mimic is already booked solid through 1993 in comedy clubs and in Atlantic City and Las Vegas.

It was during one of his performances in Las Vegas seven years ago that he met Mary Stanton, who became his wife in 1987. "Both of us were performing at the Dunes Hotel in different rooms," he recalls. "She was singing and dancing in a stage revue, and I was doing my show. I saw her sitting in the hotel lobby and started talking to her. She didn't like me at first, a stranger just coming up talking to her. It's like anything else. You just have to be persistent, and eventually it worked out."

Their interracial marriage caused a few eyebrows to rise in the beginning of their whirlwind courtship. "But," he says "it didn't take long for everybody to get to know each other. Now, everyone gets along extremely well," The Hendersons are expecting their first child. If it is a boy they will, to no one's surprise, name him Finis IV, but they haven't decided on a girl's name yet.