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Authors: Diahann Carroll
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Shortly after, someone, perhaps the KKK, stepped in and building supplies stopped arriving at the site. Then the contractor disappeared. Now, these days we have contractors disappear on us for all kinds of reasons. This was very different, and it took fortitude to overcome. But eventually, the house was finished and my father moved us inâme, my mother, and my brand-new baby sister, Lydia. He kept shotguns in the closet, âjust in case,â heâd say.
I didnât pay any attention. If I had not been so preoccupied with my music and learning lines for my high schoolâs sophisticated productions, going to see MGM musicals whenever I could, and then reading about singers and actors in magazines, perhaps I would have heard my parents discussing how someone drove by early one morning and fired shots through our front window. I would have heard about how the local police came to investigate the incident, butâno surpriseâfound no leads and never followed up. I would have heard about how someone from the neighborhood piled kindling alongside our home and set it on fire. Fortunately, the facade of our house was brick, hard as our determination.
And just as luckily, most of the movies those days were of an escapist nature that kept my anxiety level low. I considered myself, from a young age, a movie connoisseur. Though I wasupset that, except for the occasional character actor, these films were devoid of anyone but white actors, I saw almost everything. I took it all in. I saw Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind, and like many black girls of my era, I wanted to be Scarlett OâHara. And although that was impossible, I knew when I saw her performance, which displayed the same composure and manners my mother had been trying to teach me my whole life, that I could also be an actress.
The one black female performer in those days who truly inspired me was Lena Horne. I was thirteen when I first saw her in Words and Music, the 1948 MGM musical based on the partnership of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. Lena had a âguest appearance.â This was Hollywoodâs way of featuring black performers in white movies but not weaving them into plotlines so that their scenes could be cut from versions distributed in the South. It made me happy to know she was out there, and there was nobody else like her on-screen or onstage at the time. She just overwhelmed everyone with her beauty in a way that made race less relevant. Beauty and talent, it seemed, allowed race barriers to be relaxed.
I have to laugh at how my mother went out of her way to keep me from seeing Lena on film. Iâm not sure if she didnât want me to compare myself to her or think that I didnât have a chance, because there was only room for one genteel black actress. Later, as my singing began to draw reviews and critics began to call me the second Lena Horne, I told them that I preferred to be known as the first Diahann Carroll. That came from my mother, who had nurtured me to believe that all things were indeed possible.
But thatâs getting ahead of the story. When I was a young teen, the only person comparing me to anyone on the big screen (other than my mother of course!) was me. I took in all kinds of movies and held them close to my heartâdramas, comedies, and, of course, musicals. And I carefully studied the performances in them, taking in every detail, from costumes to gesture, diction, and the impeccable timing of dialogue. My father found this level of interest a bit intense. âYou need to focus on your textbooks,â he said. âYouâre going to college, not Hollywood.â But Mother was more complicit with my ambitions. She would always take the time, when she had it, to discuss the films weâd seen together.
We were as close as any mother and daughter could be, but I wasnât long for the racist troubles of Yonkers or a long commute to school in Harlem. To be able to maintain
I didnât pay any attention. If I had not been so preoccupied with my music and learning lines for my high schoolâs sophisticated productions, going to see MGM musicals whenever I could, and then reading about singers and actors in magazines, perhaps I would have heard my parents discussing how someone drove by early one morning and fired shots through our front window. I would have heard about how the local police came to investigate the incident, butâno surpriseâfound no leads and never followed up. I would have heard about how someone from the neighborhood piled kindling alongside our home and set it on fire. Fortunately, the facade of our house was brick, hard as our determination.
And just as luckily, most of the movies those days were of an escapist nature that kept my anxiety level low. I considered myself, from a young age, a movie connoisseur. Though I wasupset that, except for the occasional character actor, these films were devoid of anyone but white actors, I saw almost everything. I took it all in. I saw Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind, and like many black girls of my era, I wanted to be Scarlett OâHara. And although that was impossible, I knew when I saw her performance, which displayed the same composure and manners my mother had been trying to teach me my whole life, that I could also be an actress.
The one black female performer in those days who truly inspired me was Lena Horne. I was thirteen when I first saw her in Words and Music, the 1948 MGM musical based on the partnership of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. Lena had a âguest appearance.â This was Hollywoodâs way of featuring black performers in white movies but not weaving them into plotlines so that their scenes could be cut from versions distributed in the South. It made me happy to know she was out there, and there was nobody else like her on-screen or onstage at the time. She just overwhelmed everyone with her beauty in a way that made race less relevant. Beauty and talent, it seemed, allowed race barriers to be relaxed.
I have to laugh at how my mother went out of her way to keep me from seeing Lena on film. Iâm not sure if she didnât want me to compare myself to her or think that I didnât have a chance, because there was only room for one genteel black actress. Later, as my singing began to draw reviews and critics began to call me the second Lena Horne, I told them that I preferred to be known as the first Diahann Carroll. That came from my mother, who had nurtured me to believe that all things were indeed possible.
But thatâs getting ahead of the story. When I was a young teen, the only person comparing me to anyone on the big screen (other than my mother of course!) was me. I took in all kinds of movies and held them close to my heartâdramas, comedies, and, of course, musicals. And I carefully studied the performances in them, taking in every detail, from costumes to gesture, diction, and the impeccable timing of dialogue. My father found this level of interest a bit intense. âYou need to focus on your textbooks,â he said. âYouâre going to college, not Hollywood.â But Mother was more complicit with my ambitions. She would always take the time, when she had it, to discuss the films weâd seen together.
We were as close as any mother and daughter could be, but I wasnât long for the racist troubles of Yonkers or a long commute to school in Harlem. To be able to maintain
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