Ask American Profile 11/25/2007

Q Who sang “Down in Louisiana where the black trees grow, lived a voodoo lady named Marie Laveau”? Where can I find that song?
—Priscilla Milam, Point, Texas

Country singer-songwriter Bobby Bare had a 1974 hit single with “Marie Laveux,” a song about real-life 19th-century Louisiana voodoo queen Marie Laveau written by songwriter, author, cartoonist and poet Shel Silverstein. It’s on a new two-disc CD, Bobby Bare Sings Lullabys, Legends and Lies, a collection of 30 Silverstein-written songs recorded by Bare in the 1970s.

Q I miss seeing actress Marisa Tomei. What can you tell me about her?
—James Brown, Farmington, Utah

You can see Tomei in the movies Wild Hogs, the recently released Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead and the upcoming War, Inc. She made a brief return to television last year on the FX network series Rescue Me. The Oscar-winning actress was raised in Flatbush, N.Y., and dropped out of Boston University for a role on As the World Turns. She then moved to Hollywood for the TV series A Different World before beginning her film career. At 42, she has had several serious relationships, but never married.

Q In the 1980s there was an all-female group called Vixen. Whatever became of them?
—Melissa Bell, Gilbert, W.Va.

Vixen, which had a 1988 heavy-metal hit single with “Edge of a Broken Heart” and toured with Ozzy Osbourne, Bon Jovi, Kiss and Deep Purple, continues rocking with founder Jan Kuehnemund at the helm of a new group of female musicians. The re-formed Vixen released a 2006 CD called Live and Learn, available on the website www.vixenrock.com. In 2004, the group was featured on the VH-1 series Bands Reunited.

Q Did the movie Papillon film at Devil’s Island? I have pictures I took there while I was serving in the U.S. Air Force, and some of the scenes from the movie look very familiar.
—Joseph McCord, Ionia, Mich.

The 1973 movie Papillon starred Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman in the true story of Henri Charriere, a prisoner who survived and eventually escaped the brutally harsh conditions of so-called Devil’s Island off the northeastern coast of French Guiana in South America. It was filmed, however, in Hollywood-friendly Jamaica, the site of dozens of other movies over the years, including 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Club Paradise, Cocktail and the James Bond romps Dr. No and Live and Let Die.

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