‘A Fairy Tale Figure Come to Life’ – Louis Clausi Reflects on the Late Anitra ‘Opera Diva’

Featured photo by Samson Smithsonian

Of course, it’s the people that make Savannah what it is – the great, talented, selfless and indescribable. Unfortunately, they are not with us forever. This new page is meant to highlight those who have passed.

By Louis Clausi

April 15, 2025 – I saw Anitra on the cover of Connect Savannah with an article promoting her first show in town. I thought, “Who is this woman?” and that Savannah had acquired a very unique force of human persona. I had to work the night of the event, but the name Men Smash Atoms and Anitra’s image stuck in my head.

I crossed paths with her and Nico, had some short chats. Each time Anitra emanated an essence of other worldliness. A fairy tale figure come to life. A queen wandering amidst the common folks. I found myself being shy around her.

Then Ryan Graveface asked me to be in one of his projects. Anitra and Nico were also part of the adventure. One evening I was given the task of picking the two of them up in a 1983 Cadillac Hearse to bring them to set. Again she was a specter of poise, grace and elegance. I shared information about Savannah with them. She seemed incredibly disinterested. It wasn’t until years later that I learned how fascinated she was with what I had told them.

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In 2014, Spirits of Savannah held its book launch party and asked Anitra and Nico to perform for the event. I remember watching them with a great sense of fascination. It gave me the sense that I knew them and their spirit, all while riding the feeling of being in NYC in the 1990s.

Shortly there after I went over to their house to do some recording with Nico. I could tell he was a bit nervous. I was so surprised. Meanwhile, Anitra was quiet and reserved. I did not realize that she too was shy on occasion.

We remained acquaintances until Nico’s death.  At the end of his memorial, I went to say hello and she put her arm in mine and asked me to walk with her. I found it easy to talk to her and felt as if we had been friends all along. That night we walked together into our future. Anitra reached out to me regularly and I began visiting often and it took no time at all for us to become incredibly close friends. There were many that visited and consoled her in her grief, but that dwindled and as time passed, she called me more and more. We would have dinner; she would reflect upon her past and tell stories. We talked about music and about NYC. These conversations exposed how many times we had crossed paths and had been at the same events in NYC.

She talked about her family, tales of her grandmother losing her husband on the first day of WWII and her experiences of endurance. How her grandmother’s singing helped her through those times, tales of her mother, her dancing days and how she attempted to dissuade Anitra from pursuing singing opera. And of course, of her handsome father who worked in the regal establishments of NYC, how he could have gone to Hollywood, but instead hung about with gangsters and how he always told her, “Never get old kid, it is no fun at all. Do your best to avoid it.”

She talked about how she spent much of her childhood alone, or with adults and about her love of animals. She told me she found great joy in exploring the nature along the train tracks and how on many of these walks how she would encounter stray animals and how they would follow her on these journeys as she talked to them. She was an enchantress. Her mother would yell at her and demand that she didn’t bring any more animals’ home with her, but of course she would do it anyway.

“I love animals much more than people. People are cruel and can go die, but animals connect deep in the soul”, she would often say.

She reflected upon female animals birthing litters in the family’s basement. How one of her dogs would nurse the babies whether they were dogs, cats, rabbits or whatever.  She expressed times of joy when she would go and spend her time with them.

She told me a funny tale of trying to escape from the house and how she had climbed out the window of her second story bedroom and hung from the window ledge too afraid to let go. She contemplated and kept telling herself “Just let go”, but she couldn’t. Eventually she was grateful when her mother came into her room, searched for her and finally found her hanging from the ledge and pulled her back inside.

She spoke of her mother urging her to be a dancer and her grandmother inspiring her to be an opera singer. Of her estranged sister, of getting into the dance troupe, how tough the teachers were and how they made her hang from a ladder every day to straighten out her spine. She danced with Martha Graham, who had lived once upon a time with Joseph Campbell. Their discussions inspired Martha to create what is now modern dance. She told me of meeting famous people here and there, of selling shoes in Miami, of the many nights she and Nico would film their television show in night clubs around the world. These stories filled my heart, and these conversations brought us closer and closer. I lived around the corner from her Lincoln and Henry Street apartment and visited often. Many nights we shared our joys and our hurts in life. I was intrigued, compassionate, patient, kind and appreciative. She broke her ankle, then her other foot and I would pick her up and take her shopping or go for her if she was in too much pain. We found times to travel arm and arm out to events, to parties and to visit with other friends. Each time was an adventure in a one of the many body suits that she adorned and became a fashion tag line for her. Appropriate for a fairy tale character.

We found comfort in each others eccentricities and creative aspiration, talked of future creative endeavors together and truly learned that she was sad, reckless, wild and yet always refined, kind and humorous.

It was surreal to be a part of the crew that organized sales, purged her of things she no longer used and to pack up her life on Lincoln Street to move her to Victory Drive. Her possessions were like artifacts with stories she dispersed to the world.

Within a week of moving to Victory Drive the four unit building caught fire. She was swooped out of the structure cradled in the arms of firemen that broke down her door in the middle of the night. “My cats, get my cats” she hollered at them. Her apartment was the only one that survived and remained habitable; even though it was covered in a thin layer of soot and continued to reek of smoke for many months afterwards.

She was alone in that building and endured a treacherous staircase each day.

I would visit anytime that I could. Each time organizing the apartment and making it more comfortable for her to live, while she would sit on the couch and tell stories.

I continued to take her shopping, to events and to where ever else.

We then started to do performances together, It was an honor to be on stage with her and to watch her sing, interact with the audience and to hear that big beautiful voice rise out of her lungs. It was amazing to watch her interactions with children. They recognized that she was a grown child herself and saw a sense that there were those rare specimens that did not fit into the every day mold.

We became more playful with one another as time moved along. I would push her to do things for herself, to accomplish goals, to rise above her sorrow. I would tease her, laugh and laugh with her and did my best to keep her spirit focused on her potential. She would remind me of the many amazing things she had already accomplished.

She told stories of Spain, of a woman trying to sell her a baby in Turkey, her meeting Nicodimus in NYC, them traveling to Australia, Germany, her getting parts in theater shows, traveling with the dance troupe, being attacked in L.A. moving to Miami, then eventually landing in Savannah,

There were also times where she would talk and fall into a dark place, then in an instant she would lash out with some humor and become the rambling brook of her positive essence and bring herself out of the funk. Humor was a constant.

A soft gentle kindness and tough bitch to boot, with a mouth that cursed like a sailor.

Anitra “Opera Diva” Warren seen in this video performing (Videos courtesy of Danny Deverewuz and StellaRanae Von Schmid).

Then I helped move her to her last stop, the old Telfair Women’s Hospital. Jill Brougher, Ben Clayton and I made many car trips back and forth to move her things and then she hired a couple of guys with a moving truck to get the larger items that remained. When all of her possessions were at the new place, I again organized the way too many boxes in the small space so that she would be comfortable and so that she could actually entertain guests. Many thought the Telfair was a great place for her and that with all of the tenants around that she would have more to do and more people to look after her.

I visited often, had dinner, watched movies, laughed and felt sorrow as I watched her decline little by little. But then she would brighten up, get herself together and come out to events. We then had a three-month period of doing more performances. The Halloween performances in Parkside were monumental, uplifting and memorable. Anitra shined like a star on the front porch.

Then it seemed like she was having more and more physical erosion, more and more accidents, more visits to the ER and my heart broke each time. I joked and said I was going to create a photo book called “Anitra Falls Down” and would get images from each of her spills. She would laugh as she told me of her hospital visits, how on one occasion she didn’t remember going to the hospital and thought all the nurses and doctors were in her apartment, how everyone began to know her by name and she knew she needed to do differently, even though the stories were sometimes funny.

She continued to call me often and my life had become busy and I didn’t get to stop my as often. I thought nothing of it as I took it for granted that she would always be there.

After three weeks I finally got to see her. It was on the Saturday before she passed. I visited for three hours, set up her DVD player, had some food and talked about future projects. She looked the most beautiful that I had ever seen her. She wore little makeup, was smiling and vibrant, even with her physical tribulations that caused her to roll herself around the apartment in a wheelchair and she seemed eager to make something of her future.I had actually felt very optimistic about her situation and looked forward to the next time that I would get to see her.

The next time is only in my minds eye.

I got a call on the day that she passed.

I was beside myself. I lost one of the most beautiful friends that I ever had.

My heart expresses nothing but gratitude for having become so close to her in the last five years. My memory bank is filled with great moments and great appreciation for having been able to share the world with an enigma such as she.

I miss her dearly already and know that I will think about her for the rest of my days.

She made our world a better place.

Thank you Anitra.

May I meet you walking the tracks on our next incarnation.

See the Lady dancing – She danced to escape

To become art as she danced from the heart

and the world is hers to taste.

Waltz me ballerina – till my feet don’t touch the Ground

Waltz me into traditions where my ears can hear the sounds

Of Gentle Love

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