Diahann Carroll Biography Update, Age, Personal Life, Career, Songs, Death

Diahann Carroll, born Carol Diann Johnson on July 17, 1935, was an American actress, singer, model, and activist. Throughout her career, she earned many honors, including a Tony Award in 1962, a Golden Globe in 1968, an Academy Award nomination in 1974, and five Emmy nominations between 1963 and 2008.

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Carroll became well known for her roles in some of the first major studio films with Black casts during Hollywood’s Golden Age, such as the musicals Carmen Jones (1954) and Porgy and Bess (1959). She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her leading role in Claudine (1974). Some of her other notable films include Paris Blues (1961), The Split (1968), Eve’s Bayou (1997), and Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters’ First 100 Years (1999).

Profile Summary

Age

Carol Diann Johnson was born on July 17, 1935, in New York City.

Biography

Carol Diann Johnson was born on July 17, 1935, in the Bronx, New York City. Her father, John Johnson, worked as a subway conductor, and her mother, Mabel (née Faulk), was a nurse. When Carroll was an infant, her family moved to Harlem, where she spent most of her childhood, except for a short time living with an aunt in North Carolina. She attended Music and Art High School and was classmates with Billy Dee Williams. Carroll often spoke about how supportive her parents were, enrolling her in dance, singing, and modeling classes.

By age 15, Carroll was modeling for Ebony. “She also began entering television contests, including Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts, under the name Diahann Carroll.” After finishing high school, she went to New York University to study sociology, “but she left before graduating to pursue a show-business career, promising her family that if the career did not materialize after two years, she would return to college.”

Career

Carroll got her big break at 18 when she appeared as a contestant on the DuMont Television Network show Chance of a Lifetime, hosted by Dennis James. The episode aired on January 8, 1954, and she won the $1,000 top prize for singing “Why Was I Born?” by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein. She continued to win for the next four weeks, which led to performances at Manhattan’s Café Society and Latin Quarter nightclubs.

Carroll made her film debut in a supporting role in Carmen Jones (1954), playing a friend of the lead character, portrayed by Dorothy Dandridge. That same year, she starred in the Broadway musical House of Flowers. A few years later, she played Clara in the film version of George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess (1959), though her singing parts were performed by opera singer Loulie Jean Norman. The next year, Carroll appeared as a guest on the TV series Peter Gunn in the episode “Sing a Song of Murder” (1960).

Over the next two years, Carroll starred with Sidney Poitier, Paul Newman, and Joanne Woodward in Paris Blues (1961). She also won the 1962 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical—the first Black woman to do so—for her role as Barbara Woodruff in No Strings by Samuel A. Taylor and Richard Rodgers. Twelve years later, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in Claudine (1974) with James Earl Jones. The part was originally written for Diana Sands, who had appeared on Julia as Carroll’s cousin Sara. Before filming began, Sands learned she was terminally ill with cancer. She tried to continue with the role but became too ill and recommended Carroll as her replacement. Sands died in September 1973, before the film was released in April 1974.

Personal life

Carroll was married four times. Her first marriage was in 1956 to record producer Monte Kay, with the ceremony led by Adam Clayton Powell Jr. at the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem. Her father did not attend the wedding. The marriage ended in 1962. Carroll had a daughter, Suzanne Kay, born on September 9, 1960, who later became a journalist and screenwriter.

In 1959, Carroll began a nine-year relationship with actor Sidney Poitier, who was married at the time. In her autobiography, Carroll wrote that Poitier encouraged her to divorce her husband and promised he would leave his wife for her. She went through with her divorce, but Poitier did not immediately follow through. He eventually divorced his wife. According to Poitier, their relationship ended because he wanted to live with Carroll for six months without her daughter present, so he would not be “jumping from one marriage straight into another.” Carroll refused.

Carroll dated and was engaged to British television host and producer David Frost from 1970 to 1973. In February 1973, she surprised the press by marrying Fred Glusman, a boutique owner from Las Vegas. After four months, Glusman filed for divorce in June 1973. Carroll responded but did not contest, and the divorce was finalized two months later. Reports stated that Glusman was physically abusive.

On May 25, 1975, at age 39, Carroll married Robert DeLeon, who was 24 and the managing editor of Jet magazine in New York City. They met when DeLeon assigned himself to write a cover story about Carroll’s 1975 Oscar nomination for Claudine. DeLeon had a daughter, Monica, from a previous marriage. Carroll moved to Chicago, where Jet was based, but after DeLeon left his job, they relocated to Oakland. Carroll was widowed when DeLeon died in a car crash in Beverly Hills on March 31, 1977. Her fourth and final marriage was to singer Vic Damone in 1987. Carroll described the marriage as turbulent; they separated legally in 1991, reconciled, and then divorced in 1996.

Death

Carroll was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1997. She said the news “stunned” her, since she had no family history of the disease and had always lived a healthy lifestyle. She went through nine weeks of radiation therapy and remained cancer-free for years afterward. Carroll often spoke about the importance of early detection and prevention.

She died from natural causes at her home in West Hollywood, California, on October 4, 2019, at the age of 84. Carroll also suffered from another form of cancer and dementia at the time of her death, which was unrelated, though actor Marc Copage, who played her character’s son on Julia, said that she did not appear to show serious signs of cognitive decline as of late 2017.

Songs

• Diahann Carroll Sings Harold Arlen Songs (1957)
• Best Beat Forward (1958)
• The Persian Room Presents Diahann Carroll (1959)
• Porgy and Bess (1959) (with the André Previn Trio)
• The Magic of Diahann Carroll (with the André Previn Trio) (1960)
• Fun Life (1961)
• The Modern Jazz Quartet, The Comedy (1962)
• Showstopper! (1962)
• The Fabulous Diahann Carroll (1962)
• You’re Adorable: Love Songs for Children (1967)
• Nobody Sees Me Cry (1967)
• Diahann Carroll (1974)
• A Tribute to Ethel Waters (1978)
• The Time of My Life (1997)