Honoring Martin Luther King Jr.
The man with the familiar receding hairline and thin mustache stood at the podium, and soon the familiar voice of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. filled the small banquet hall in South Los Angeles. “He lives,” came a whisper from the back.
King remains buried in Atlanta, of course, but people in the Compton area could be forgiven for believing he had risen. For three decades, Saul Lankster, a less than holy local political figure, has performed a pitch-perfect imitation of America’s secular saint.
Monday morning’s rendition of excerpts from three of King’s speeches is only the latest of the more than 1,000 shows that he has put on since first reciting the “I Have a Dream” speech before a Compton audience in 1969. In recent years, Lankster as King has addressed Internal Revenue Service employees in San Jose, belted out “I Have Stood at the Mountaintop” to Border Patrol officers at the San Ysidro checkpoint and appeared in schools across the state.
“The first time I heard Saul do this, I was standing behind a stage, and I thought they were showing a videotape of Dr. King speaking,” said Corinne Neal, a special education teacher in Fountain Valley. “I peeked around and I saw this man who looked just like him.”
The similarities between the men, in sight and sound, offer an inadvertent reminder of one of King’s less known gifts: imitation. In private, according to biographers, King did uncanny impressions of friends and famous figures. And in public, he borrowed liberally--so liberally that some scholars label him a plagiarist--from the writings and deliveries of other preachers. In particular, he modeled his bearing, composure and humble demeanor on Gardner Taylor, the famous pastor from Brooklyn, N.Y.
“In a sense, he did what any imitator does: He memorized long sections of writings and literature and sermons and worked them into his own speeches,” said Richard Lischer, a professor at Duke University’s divinity school and author of a 1995 book, “The Preacher King.”
“In some ways,” Lischer added, “it’s surprising we haven’t seen more people imitating King in the way that the actor Hal Holbrook does Mark Twain, for example.”
Lankster, 55, began playing King as a lark. As a college student in Alabama in the early 1960s, he had met King during demonstrations there; Lankster was arrested and spent a week in jail. After college and an Army tour in Vietnam, Lankster followed a brother to Compton. At an event organized one year after King’s 1968 assassination, then-Compton Mayor Douglas Dollarhide looked for volunteers to honor King. Lankster memorized “I Have a Dream” in 30 minutes.
A Variety of Careers
Over the last 32 years, Lankster has pursued many careers, including fire dispatcher, police officer, lawyer, florist, cable TV show host, teacher, politician and, for the last three years, adjunct professor at Cal State Long Beach, where he teaches about civil rights.
His impressions of King have been a constant in a fast-shifting life.
He has performed at jails, gymnasiums and private parties. As the King holiday has become ingrained, he has become well-known in school districts across the county. His sister-in-law, Lula Lankster, said that when she brought Lankster to talk to her first-grade class in Long Beach, “some of the children asked me whether he was Dr. King’s brother.”
Jim Mogan, a teacher in Downey, said Lankster created such a sensation among his fifth-graders at Williams Elementary that he was invited back to address the entire school.
“If you were to close your eyes, you would think Saul is King,” Mogan said.
Lankster used to visit Compton schools often, but his reputation--and his enemies--have hurt demand for his impressions in town. Lankster is a political oddball, a Republican with a long record of picking fights in a predominantly Democratic town. A perennial candidate for office, he has challenged nearly every politician in town at one time or another, seeking offices from community college trustee to congressman.
Opponents have questioned his ethics, citing a 1985 conviction related to false certifications at a driving school he owned. Lankster said, “I did wrong” in that case, but said that a judge later set it aside and cleared the way for his return to public life.
He has served on Compton’s elected school board since 1995, a post he has used to become the city’s most forceful critic of the district’s state manager. He often refers to state schools Supt. Delaine Eastin, who oversees the Compton district under a 1993 state takeover, as “our slave master.” Most board members and school administrators say they have never glimpsed his King side.
“He just astounds me completely,” said Fausto Capobianco, the spokesman for the district’s state-appointed administrator, who has tangled with Lankster. “I admire Mr. Lankster for his exceptional talents. Sometimes, I’m very surprised at how he uses them.”
On Monday, Lankster invited about 40 friends and supporters to Sam Littleton’s Patio, a banquet hall just north of Compton, to celebrate the holiday and push his latest political campaign: for Compton mayor. Over doughnuts and fast-food breakfast sandwiches, Lankster and his audience discussed King’s legacy before he launched into his impersonation.
The transformation was immediate. As himself, Lankster is funny and emotional, with a deep voice and expressive face that acquires a sharp, prosecutorial edge during school board meetings. As King, Lankster’s facial muscles tense, and he seems more restrained and dignified. His voice adds a tremor that gives the speeches King’s familiar timbre and a certain vulnerability. Lankster is particularly adept at capturing the weariness of King, who had to travel so much and sleep so little.
His Voice Changes Unlike King’s
Lankster offers some personal touches. He dwells more than King ever did over the line, “Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California” in the “I Have a Dream” speech. As he ages and his voice deepens, Lankster finds it harder to strain his natural bass to imitate the baritone of a man who died at age 39. “He is forever young and I’m not,” Lankster said.
Monday’s audience, like most, sat hushed and on the edges of their seats as Lankster recited sections of “I Have a Dream” from Washington 1963, the “Sweep Streets Like Michelangelo” address of Chicago 1967, and “Mountaintop,” delivered in Memphis the day before he died. Afterward, the hall shook with applause as Lankster stared awkwardly at the podium.
“Occasionally, when I’m doing Martin Luther King, I feel like I get a message from him,” Lankster told them. “And that was just him talking to me right now.”