Diahann Carroll Looks Back – And Forward
by David Lefkowitz
Note: This article first appeared in Long Island Woman, Oct. 2008.
Few of us lead lives glamorous enough to merit one autobiography let alone two, but when you’re beautiful, famous, talented, groundbreaking, extravagant, four-times married and a survivor of both spousal abuse and cancer, well, that’s worth a little extra space on the bookstore shelf, no? Especially if your husbands and boyfriends were occasionally world famous, your lifestyle was to die for and your skin color could easily have been a social barrier to your extraordinary success.
Such is the story of Diahann Carroll, singer, actress, larger-than-life personality, and now, just as importantly, senior citizen. Still looking great and maintaining a regimen of healthy eating and training, Carroll is nonetheless aware that no matter how one tries to turn back the clock, time pushes on and sounds occasional alarms. Her new autobiography, co-written with Bob Morris, begins with her dressed to the nines (as always) and stepping ever-so-fabulously out of a hotel on Park Avenue South. That’s when her Armani coat tangles with her Aubergine boots, and she tumbles to the ground.
Carroll, unhurt, lets the incident become the unstated theme of “The Legs are the Last to Go”: every element of your persona can be arranged perfectly, yet life can still send you sprawling. The actress may have earned Broadway kudos for House of Flowers and her Tony-winning role in No Strings, but that didn’t save her from disastrous relationships with men. She may have reached international stardom playing “the first black bitch on television” – Dominique Devereaux on “Dynasty” – but that doesn’t heal old childhood wounds. She may have secured diva status playing Norma Desmond in the Canadian mounting of Sunset Boulevard, but a year later she’d undergo radiation treatments for breast cancer. And Carroll may have all the fame and wealth she could ever need, but what actor doesn’t fear the day the phone stops ringing and the body starts failing?
“All sorts of things happen as we age,” Carroll says in our early summer phone chat. “Once you’re in your sixties, you begin to see changes, and you have to stay on top of the situation constantly. Through diet and exercise, you make the body as strong as it can possibly be. So far, I’m doing rather well; I have a trainer three times a week. But some days are tougher than others. The discipline of it is both horrendous and wonderful at the same time. Still, even on days I don’t do anything, we walk up and down the hills of Beverly, and I like the way I feel when I do that.”
Carroll also feels lucky her tumor was detected early enough to be treated with radiation without resorting to chemotherapy, and she’s now been cancer-free for eight years. “I consider myself very fortunate and have turned the experience into something positive by sharing my story and getting the message out,” she says, alluding to a passage in “Legs” that notes, “The whole world of cancer needs demystifying…women are still intimidated.”
Carroll elaborates: “Ten years ago, when I went for my yearly mammogram, the doctor saw something and asked me to come back in three weeks. He found the malignancy, which was less than a centimeter.” Each treatment took less than a half hour, and the radiation darkened a spot of her skin but was painless. Her doctor even encouraged her to have a glass of wine with lunch after the treatment, something that allowed her to feel more relaxed and human about the whole process. “You have to keep living,” the doctor told her.
Of course, Diahann Carroll is someone who knows how to live. Since her early stardom, she’s enjoyed a rarefied world of fine hotels, great cars, haute couture fashion and celebrity pampering. But it wasn’t always thus. Though she’s undergone three divorces (her third husband was killed in a car crash) and surprising physical and verbal abuse from at least two of her partners, the single most psychologically destructive event of her life was parental – and it was actually done, to some extent, out of love.
John Johnson and Mabel Faulk treated little Carol Diann Johnson well, but she was a surprise baby, and her father doubted whether he could establish himself financially with another mouth to feed. So one day, when Carroll was still a toddler, they drove her from their Harlem home to an aunt’s house down South and left her there. A year later they took her back, sans explanation, before or after. “That one year without the security of my own parents has stayed with me all these years,” writes Carroll in “Legs.” “I was left with such a deep feeling of abandonment that I took it with me…all the way into middle age and beyond.”
Therapy helped. “It was a very difficult decision for my mother, and I now understand it,” Carroll says in our talk, “but it was also one of the most damaging things that ever happened to me. There are issues that mark you, though you might not be constantly aware that you’re operating out of that trauma, and that it hasn’t completely left your behavior. So therapy is extremely important, and it was not an unhappy time for me.”
Eyebrows might lift when readers learn that her analysis was assisted by – of all things – LSD. “That wasn’t uncommon in practice back then,” notes Carroll. “Several of us in Hollywood – including Cary Grant, I think – found it helpful and informative about areas of our lives that were not clear. And LSD was called `the truth serum’ because you were able to hallucinate and regress while you’re under. I actually had a memory of being in the womb, listening to my parents argue.”
Carroll probably sensed my own eyebrows going up at that moment because she added, “Again, it’s just a hallucination. But you can discuss those images and find clarity. The doctors ask, `why does your mind pick that hallucination,’ so the results can be very valid and helpful.”
Asked how her behavior benefited from therapy, not to mention age and life experience, Carroll offers, “I think my actions have become more mature, less needy. Something we see in my profession a great deal is that self-esteem is not as strong as one would imagine. And there’s heredity in there, too. Both my mother and I changed some lifestyle patterns, including social drinking that, for a while, we each carried a bit too far. But really, in writing the book, it was about understanding behavior patterns that are best not followed. Even as I was writing, I was re-examining these issues.”
And what about issues with the opposite sex? “No personal questions, please,” laughs Carroll, “they’re a pain in the neck. Though I’m not likely to marry again, and I like handling things on my own for a change.”
These are strong words from a woman who admits that no matter how mightily she could stride the stage or screen, she would find herself at a loss on the romantic and domestic fronts. A marriage to one doting husband was ruined by her mutual infatuation with the also-married Sidney Poitier – a tryst that wasn’t even consummated till years after its beginning. When I mention that the swoon-worthy actor is portrayed as something of a cad in the book, Carroll defends him, saying, “There was no reason for Sidney to come off badly, and I don’t think he’s pleased about all his actions. But we were young, and it was the only way he knew how to handle it at that time.”
Readers of “The Legs are the Last to Go” will also scratch their heads as to why she would turn down an engagement to TV mogul David Frost (easily the most princely beau in the book) or why, after decades of marital incompatibility, she would attempt the altar again with yet another mismatched partner, singer Vic Damone. Carroll blames the singer’s golf-widowing lifestyle – and his other extra-curricular activities – for that union’s collapse, but once again it was really about showbiz making, and breaking, strange bedfellows. As she puts it in “Legs,” “the combination of financial success and the glamour of Hollywood are too combustible a cocktail for most any marriage.”
Though Carroll’s romantic relationships became casualties of her fame, compensations include her pampered lifestyle and the ability to learn from an A-list of friends and colleagues. One of her prouder accomplishments was appearing in the socially conscious film drama, “Nadine,” with James Earl Jones. “Such an extraordinary talent,” she recalls. “So thoroughly dedicated to his craft. It’s a gift to work with him and benefit by being in his presence. We tried to work together again in 2005 and do On Golden Pond on Broadway, but I had a bursar inflammation in my hip and couldn’t. I was so disappointed.” (Leslie Uggams ended up co-starring.)
Carroll also has laudatory words for Katharine Hepburn, whom she singles out as having the greatest influence on her style. “It was her honesty. She integrated who she was offstage into her acting. She merged that into her work until she developed as an actress with a personality.”
Speaking of style and grace, Carroll, who was once dubbed “the black Jackie O,” knew and appreciated that first lady of the White House as well. “She was the most beautifully dressed woman I’d ever seen,” Carroll remembers, “and a wonderful hostess. She enjoyed socializing very much and carried that role very well. But it’s a little easier in politics to show just the good side. You never see the president or the first lady smoking or with a glass in their hands. The photographers understand why those images are not proper to project to the public. But that’s not true of actors. They love to see us in compromising positions. The pressure can be quite incredible.”
And so, as her twilight years approach, Carroll remains resilient but also cautious and realistic. “I feel very well, and I have no plans to retire. I figure I’ll do that sometime between now and my nineties. But it’s true that the older you get, the more you must maintain a stringent attitude in taking care of the temple of you. In my case, I’ll keep going as long as the legs will stand there – because, you know, the legs really are the last to go.”
SIDEBAR
Favorite Place: New York. I associate Manhattan with the best of everything.
When Might Retirement be an Option? Somewhere between now and my 90s.
Best Way to Deal with Insensitivity: Everyone should just take a breath before shooting off his or her mouth. Period.
Most Spiritual Mantra: Don’t be too hard on yourself, but keep a stringent attitude taking care of the temple of you.
Most Practical Mantra: You have to do the work that is required.
Biggest Personal Revelation: I no longer need a man to feel I am loved.
Greatest Personal Influence: my mother.
Greatest Acting Influence: Katharine Hepburn, because of her honesty and the way she integrated who she was off-stage with her development as an actress.
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