Diahann Carroll.Photo: Everett
Born Carol Diahann Johnson to subway motorman John and nurse Mabel Johnson in the Bronx, New York, Carroll grew up in Harlem, where her family moved when she was an infant. Carroll started her career at 15, modeling forEbonymagazine but her heart was in performing: “I always knew I had to do something that was in front of an audience,” Carroll told PEOPLE in 2008.
Carroll’s other prominent film roles during that time period include Clara in 1959’sPorgy and Bessstarring Sidney Poitier, Dandridge and Sammy Davis Jr. and Connie Lampson in 1961’sParis Blues, opposite Poitier, Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward. Also during that time Carroll and Poitier began anine-year love affair, though both were married when they met: Carroll to her first husband, record producer Monte Kay, and Poitier to his first wife, model Juanita Hardy.
In 1974, Carroll was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress for her turn inClaudine.
In 1983, she was the first black actress to replace a white actress in a dramatic role on Broadway inAgnes of God. And when she joinedDynastyin March of 1984, as the glamorous, jet-setting Dominique Deveraux, half-sister to Blake Carrington, Carroll became the first black person to star in a primetime soap. In 1986, she wrote an autobiographyDiahann! with Ross Firestone.
Carroll told PEOPLE she found the pioneer label to be a complicated but tremendous blessing, particularly with regard toJulia. “The attention and responsibility were so stressful,” the actress-singer said in 2008. “But I’m enormously proud of that show.”
Other more recent memorable roles include Norma Desmond in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musicalSunset Boulevard, Dr. Preston Burke’s demanding mother Jane Burke onGrey’s Anatomyand savvy widow/landlord June on USA’sWhite Collar. In 2008 she wrote a memoir,The Legs Are the Last to Go.
After decades in the spotlight, Carroll will long be remembered for her tremendous and trailblazing talent.
TheAPfirst reported news of her death.
source: people.com
