Nang by Nang

Nang has written her own script. Born in the Trinidadian village of Basse Terre in 1934, she grew up poor, illegitimate, mixed-race and female, but she survived by defying convention. She left the first of five husbands when he cheated on her. With no formal training, she danced with choreographer Geoffrey Holder, who later won Tony Awards for The Wiz. In her twenties, she went to work in the Orinoco delta in Venezuela, and saved enough to buy a house. She started university in New York in her 40s. Stubbornness, resourcefulness and resilience have allowed Nang to surmount life’s scars and tragedies. As her many changes of first and last names suggest, she was constantly reinventing herself. In this vivid portrait, filmmaker Richard Fung gets to know his first cousin at her current home in New Mexico and on the road in Trinidad.