I knew that my daughter was going to be really angry at me, and maybe for a long time. Kids want their moms. They want their moms to be around to take care of everything they don’t know how to handle yet. They want their moms’ full attention whenever they need it. They want their moms to be home when they go to bed and be there when they wake up. That’s how it goes. Kids want their moms to think about them first, not the next offer on the career table.
As an adult, Alex remembers me explaining to her, as a child, why I often had to be away. She gets it now. But as a kid, you’re not thinking about financial independence, security, or having some backup in the bank account. When you’re eight or nine, you just want your mom around.
Years later, it occurred to me that I had kind of done to Alex what had happened to me in my childhood when my mom was hospitalized. There were some differences. I couldn’t talk to my mom and had no idea when or if I’d ever see her again. Alex could always call me and find me. I never knew which adult might be in our house when I got home from school. Alex had my mom with her morning, noon, and night.
Here’s the deal. A regular mom might have said something like, “Yeah, I’d like to play a role in your movie or do my solo show in Vegas or have a TV series, but I’m a mom. In ten or twelve years, when my kid is grown, I’ll check back in with you.”
It doesn’t happen like that. I knew my opportunities wouldn’t hang around and wait on me. I knew they wouldn’t come my way ever again.
In the larger view, what I wanted most was to be a “genie in a bottle” for my mom, my brother, and my kid. I wanted to give my mom a chance to live with a whole lot less worry. I wanted my brother to be with us and enjoy his life, too. I wanted Alex to have the ability to do more, live in a good house with her own bedroom, and have more options than we had before Broadway came calling for me.
I’d say to Alex, “Do you remember when you were six and I could only get you one pair of shoes? And now you have seven or eight pairs. You have the toys you want and we get to go to Disneyland and other stuff you like a lot.”
I knew that didn’t make it okay in her mind because little kids don’t think about what it takes to make money, but it mattered to me. I didn’t want to let the chance to upgrade our lives pass by. So, I asked the best person in the world to help me raise my kid, my own mother. I knew Alex was always safe and loved and heard. And I took the opportunities as they came while I was still in the circle of actors with that kind of attention. I already knew that post-Oscar-nomination buzz doesn’t last long in Hollywood. At the same time, I still understood that kids want their own mom.
My mom got it. She told me, “You go do what you need to do. I’m here with Alex. I’ve got this.”
So, my mom, once again, made it all possible for me.
I was able to look into lots of opportunities being handed to me right and left. As soon as Oscar night for The Color Purple was over, I started hearing people, at all levels in film, saying things like, “Well, you know, you are black. So, there’s not a lot of stuff producers are going to hire you for.”
Or I’d go to a studio to read for a movie, and they’d say, “Well, you’re not exactly what we were looking for.”
I don’t think I really understood for a long time what that actually meant, and I really thought that if I got a part, that might change minds. I once told someone that I wanted to play Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of the greatest parts ever written for an actor, because that’s what actors do. Another time I said I would have loved to play the Princess Bride, another great part for an actor. People started explaining that the whole black thing could be a problem if those were the kinds of parts I thought I would be going after. I said, “But that’s what actors do . . . right?” I knew I was black, had been black my whole life, but people kept mentioning it like they were surprised.
Producers, agents, and directors would try to break it down to their reasons. “Well, visually, the viewers or audience has to believe that you can do what you’re doing on-screen or on the stage.”
I’d say, “But people go through stuff all the time. Black people do, too. It wasn’t like I woke up as somebody else and then said, ‘Oh, I think I will go back to being black now.’ I’ve been black the whole time. So I feel like you’re trying to tell me that black people could not, or did not, or cannot possibly go through this experience, because I’m telling you, I know all about this. That’s just not true.”
They weren’t writing major movies for black people in the 1980s either. That’s why Spielberg taking a chance on The Color Purple was a big deal. You know, before my nomination in 1985, there were only fifteen black nominees in the history of the Academy Awards, and only three black winners: Hattie McDaniel, Sidney Poitier, and Lou Gossett Jr. That’s it. And that didn’t bother a whole lot of folks in Hollywood.
One day I was sitting next to my mother at an event, and she leaned over and said, “How can they not know that you can do anything? How can they doubt what you are able to do after they look at what you’ve done already?”
She got that I was feeling panicked about the future. I knew I was lucky to have started out with a role as good as Celie in The Color Purple. It was clear that parts for black actors weren’t coming up and available twice a year. But being in a Spielberg movie and working with Mike Nichols made me believe that I could play any role, whatever was up. I knew I could. It didn’t matter if they wanted me to play a monkey or a monster. It didn’t matter if they wanted me to play a white lady, a black lady, a yellow or brown lady. I could do them all. So, I was boisterous about that. I spoke up for myself.
Most of the movie roles I played in the ’80s and ’90s were intended for other people. My lead role in Burglar in 1987 was supposed to be for Bruce Willis. I was being considered for a supporting role as his neighbor. When he turned the lead down, I asked, “How about me?” It took a while for the producers to believe in me.
Jumpin’ Jack Flash was written for Cheers sitcom star Shelley Long. It was Penny Marshall’s first directing gig. Not sure what happened with Shelley, but I had a really good time playing that part. I wish people had shown up at the movie theater for it.
Lots of folks tell me they loved that movie, but they saw it years later when it was released for television.
I was never the first choice for the role of Rita, the tough narcotics officer in Fatal Beauty. That role was written specifically for Cher. And Sister Act was supposed to be for Bette Midler.
Some of the movies were good, some were okay, and some flatlined altogether.
I started hearing the press say stuff like, “She’s not living up to her Oscar potential.” People seemed to feel that I was disappointing them.
And for about ten minutes, I took it to heart.
I asked my mother, “Are you unhappy with me?”
She said, “In what way?”
“Well, do you think I’m making bad choices in my movies?”
She didn’t hesitate at all. “Caryn, you are making the choices you make. Have you had a good time making the movies you made?”
“Yeah, I have. But they haven’t made much money for the studios.”
She said, “If it’s about the money, then, you know, you probably will disappoint people all the time because you can’t always get those films like Color Purple. Nobody does.”
She saw where I was coming from. She told me, “You’re a working actor; I don’t see where that’s an issue. Because you’re a character actor working as a lead actor.”
Mike Nichols said the same thing to me. “Listen, you’re working as an actor. Making money for them is great, but there’s no guarantee. There’s no guarantee ever about what a movie is going to do. You never know. So it’s not up to you.”
During the ’80s, I was making some other types of choices, and I knew they weren’t good. I kept those to myself or hid them, for the most part. I had stayed pretty far away from drugs, except for pot, after getting cleaned up in the early ’70s. But Los Angeles and New York started to redefine what “recreational drug use” meant in the ’80s. I was invited to parties where I was greeted at the door with a bowl of Quaaludes from which I could pick what I wanted. Lines of cocaine were laid across tables and bathroom counters for the taking. Everybody knew the cops weren’t going to raid the Beverly Hills, Bel Air, or Hollywood Hills house of a big-time producer or actor, so the attitude was very relaxed. Everyone partook. You knew you were going to get high for a couple hours and then get laid before the night was over.
Since my previous problem had been other kinds of drugs, I thought I could handle the cocaine thing. It didn’t seem dangerous. Everybody seemed to have access to it, even on TV and movie sets. The cops were never going to raid a studio either.
It was a really good time for about a year. Then I fell into the deep well of cocaine and sank to a new low. Nobody around me caught on to where I was at with it. At least, that’s what I wanted to believe. I would have called myself “a very high-functioning addict.” I’d still show up on the set on time, do my job, and keep pace with the production. I knew people wouldn’t get a paycheck if I didn’t show up. Whatever had to happen, I could still make it happen.
Then cocaine started to kick my ass. I’d go to work and realize I was getting sloppy. I didn’t like it. I knew it wasn’t good. At one point, I hallucinated that something was under my bed and I’d be attacked if I got up. So I didn’t move out of bed for twenty-four hours. That kind of shit doesn’t end pretty. There’s only so long a person can hold their bladder.
Finally, I had one of those slap-in-the-face moments that make you see pretty fucking clearly that you’ve hit bottom. I was staying in a very upscale hotel in Manhattan for my birthday. Somebody had given me an ounce of cocaine. I was sitting on the closet floor, just putting it up my nose. All by myself. I didn’t hear the housekeeper knock or let herself in the room to clean it up.
She opened the closet door.
I screamed.
She screamed and backed up and looked like she was going to run.
I had to get to her quickly and try to calm her down. She was staring at my face as I talked. Once she understood it was my room, she calmed down and left. I looked at myself in the mirror near the door and saw cocaine all over my face.
I’d have been so embarrassed if my mother knew the extent the coke had me in its clutches. It’s not like she didn’t have recreational habits that she enjoyed. She was a smoker most of her life and wasn’t at all opposed to smoking some weed, or even growing some between her rosebushes in the backyard in Berkeley.
But what I was doing was different. I was letting something else run my life and take me over. I didn’t need my mom to be disappointed or pissed at me—I was pissed enough at myself. Is this the version of yourself you’re okay showing your daughter? WTF are you doing? Get up, get out, and fix your life. You’ve been sitting in a closet for two days. It’s not good. Not good at all.
Again, I am the luckiest woman in the world. I was able to stop using drugs quickly. Not everyone can. I certainly know a lot of people who have different brains, and they can’t decide to quit. It’s not a choice for them.
I accepted that I was probably going to gain weight and it wasn’t going to be easy for a long time. I knew I’d have to change out my friends and turn down invitations, but I could do that. I didn’t want to die. And I didn’t want my kid to think her mom was an addict. I didn’t want my mom to think her daughter was an addict. So, I got myself as straight as an arrow—an arrow that gained twenty pounds in the next year. I thought, Okay, this is the exchange. This is what it’s going to look like. If you want to stay alive, you gotta be okay with this.
I had already decided that I was willing and ready to stop, so I was going to do whatever I needed to stop putting drugs up my nose. Just like the confines of the projects weren’t going to be the confines of my future, neither was doing drugs.
My mom’s lifelong belief in me turned into my mantra: “I can do anything I want if I put my mind to it.” I mostly applied it to my flexibility as an actor, but it also kept me going so that I could have this career I had always wanted since I could speak.
Because the cast of The Color Purple was primarily black actors, the crew knew how to work with us, from the lighting to the makeup to the hair. When I started making movies after that, I had to give people time to get used to me. I asked a million questions. I stayed on the set because there’s nothing better than watching the how-to of movie making. Everyone has their job. I loved being part of it. But I didn’t see a lot of people of color, nor did I see a lot of women.
People would continue to say things to me like, “Oh, you’re so articulate,” as if that was a pleasant surprise. Or the producers or stylists would look at my hair, which I had been wearing in dreads since the late ’70s, and say, “What are we supposed to do with this shit?”
I guess that every black actress they had worked with before me had either straightened her hair or worn it very short or worn a wig because that’s what made the film people comfortable. I wasn’t about to change my hair. Even my mom wore her hair in short locs after moving to California. We’d both rather read a book or watch a movie than pull a hot comb through our hair.
I finally said to my friend Julia Walker, who became my hair stylist on many of my films, “What don’t they get? Why are they saying these stupid things to me?”
And Julia said, “They don’t know any better. They don’t know anyone like you. So to them, you are this kind of unicorn, somebody they’ve never come across. You don’t quiet your mouth when you have something to say. I think you are very hard for them to understand. They thought you should be a lot easier to deal with than you are.”
I came to understand that Julia was also a first for many people because she was a black woman who could do any actor’s hair. Rarely did they ever let her, though. The stylist was usually someone white who was limited in what they could do because they couldn’t do black hair. Often folks would say they could, but as soon as they started to spray your hair with water, you knew it was game over and that you would have to make a stink. And I did.
“I am easy to deal with, and I try to be polite,” I told Julia, “unless they say or do something stupid like that.”
“Well, that’s the point. They don’t know they’re saying something stupid. But by the time it filters to your ear, you’re like, ‘That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. And here’s why.’”
Julia would tell me to adjust my attitude and not to give it so much attention by getting pissed about it. “They can’t really get to you because you’re the talent,” she continued. “They can’t question your right to be where you are. Instead, they’ll just fuck with you in a way that they think will make you uncomfortable.”
“I’m not uncomfortable. It’s just stupid.”
“They aren’t thinking about how you’re from New York and how all of those things don’t matter to you.” My makeup man, who came from makeup royalty, was Mike Germain, and he agreed with Julia. We spent many great years together, and I watched the two of them teach an industry that really didn’t have much of a clue about black skin or hair to help move the needle forward. This was in the 1980s and 1990s, a long time ago, it seems, but Julia was right about a few things in all of this. Did they really think I would freak out because they were talking like that? There was nothing anyone could do to me or say about me that hadn’t been done or said already.
There were times when I should have freaked out. Sometimes race was not the issue; sometimes it was something else. When I first heard about the movie Ghost, apparently every actress of color had auditioned for it.
I called my agent, Ron Meyer, and said, “Can I get an audition for this?”
My agent told me that they weren’t going to consider me for the role of Oda Mae, the psychic medium scammer, because I was “too well known.”
I said, “But every black woman, alive or dead, has auditioned for this.”
He said, “I know, and we called about it, and they don’t want you.”
Patrick Swayze read the script and got the part of Sam, and he asked if I had turned the role of Oda Mae down. Bonnie Timmermann, the casting director, told him, “I’ve been pushing for her, but the writer doesn’t feel she is right for it.”
I don’t know what Patrick said, but the next thing I knew, Ron called me in Alabama, where I was shooting another movie. He said to me, “Remember that part you wanted to read for? The director and lead actor want to come down to where you are and see if there is any chemistry between you and the lead actor.”
And I said, “Who’s that going to be?”
“Well, they said Patrick.”
So I knew one of my favorite actors was coming to see me in ’Bama, which is exactly what happened, and the rest is history. Once he had the part, Patrick became my advocate to play the role of Oda Mae. It was a big deal for me that they came to Alabama, and it turned out that Patrick and I had a really good connection in the scenes. We had fun together. There was an energy zapping back and forth between us. It was impossible to ignore that it worked. I think Jerry Zucker still might have had to convince some people, but between Bonnie and Patrick and Jerry wanting me, I got the job. Jerry said I could bring my best, and he gave me some freedom to see where my comedic mind would take Oda Mae.
Patrick gave me a gift I never got to repay and never could. Because of him, I got my second Oscar nomination. I never expected to have that opportunity again. I thought being nominated for The Color Purple was a great experience and that was that. It wouldn’t happen again. And then to find out that I got another nomination . . . I was like, Okay, here we go.
I was especially honored to be nominated in the company of the other women who were up for Best Supporting Actress: Lorraine Bracco, Diane Ladd, Mary McDonnell, and Annette Bening. For some reason, the five of us formed a bond and made a pact together. We decided that whoever won had to take the other four out on the town. Winner pays all. I think everyone expected that Annette Bening would win that year, so I was incredibly blown over when Denzel Washington announced my name.
My mother wasn’t at the ceremony because she didn’t want to show disappointment if I lost. My daughter, Alex, and my brother, Clyde, came with me, everyone looking like two million bucks. I spotted the other women seated in their respective seats, and we gave thumbs-ups to each other. Denzel Washington was announcing the supporting actress award. It seemed everyone jumped up almost faster than I did when he called my name.
From the podium, I could see the other four women all hooting and hollering for me. And for the first time, I felt like I was in with my peers. It was a good feeling.
That night, following the ceremony, I was at a party at Spago hosted by superagent Swifty Lazar and his wife, Mary, surrounded by all the famous people who made all the movies I had watched for most of my life. They were all the reasons I wanted to be an actor. There I was, in the same room with all these people whom I had just been enamored with most of my life.
I met all of these actors and directors who said, “Listen, anytime you want to talk, give us a call.” And they gave me their phone numbers.
Billy Wilder, the famous director of movies like Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, and Sabrina, was there with his wife, and they were like, “Come sit with us. Tell us about you.” Billy and I talked about movies for an hour. I kept thinking about all the stars I had met between The Color Purple and Ghost—Gregory Peck, Jack Lemmon, Sophia Loren, and Elizabeth Taylor.
Now here is one of those crazy things where I could really use my mother’s memory. For some reason, I think I first met Elizabeth Taylor at some fundraiser, where we were seated at the same table with our mothers. I think that was when ET asked if I could be part of a fundraiser she was doing. She said, “Before you say anything, just know that many, many people have turned me down. It’s to raise money for people with AIDS.” She had me at “fundraiser,” so I just kept saying yes until she heard me say, “yes.” I explained that I’d been living in Berkeley when the AIDS plague hit and that I had no problem doing whatever I could to combat it.
But I have another ET memory, which starts crazy mostly because I still can’t remember why I got invited. I was at Tiffany’s, one of my favorite places, for a book launch for Carole Bayer Sager, who I didn’t really know. But I went because, come on, I’m from the projects and Tiffany’s is not a place I ever thought I would be hanging out in, eating little hors d’oeuvres while waiting for someone to say, “empty your pockets!” Anyway, I was standing around looking lost, trying to figure out WTF I was really doing there, when I heard, “Psst.”
I looked around and saw ET. She waved, and I looked away because I was trying (a) not to stare and (b) not to freak out because it was ET.
Again, I heard, “Psst.”
I turned, and she was waving me over to her. She said something like, “Didn’t you hear me psst-ing at you?”
And I was like, “Yeah.”
“Did you not see me waving at you?”
I said, “Yes, but I didn’t think you actually were waving at me.”
For some reason, she said, “Why not?”
I said, “Because you are a big-ass movie star.”
And she said, “Well, hell, so are you!”
Yeah, she made me feel really great. Then she said, “You did the benefit for me. By the way, how’s your mother?”
“She’s great,” I said. “I’ll tell her you asked for her.” I did the same, asking about her mom. She asked me about my life, who was managing me, and I told her.
Then she gave me some sage advice. “You want to get a gift from the studio every time you work,” she told me.
“What do you mean?”
“Listen, I ask for a present for every film I do, something I can remember my career by,” she told me. “You’re going to put all these agents’ and managers’ kids through private high schools and the best colleges. You’re going to pay for the plastic surgery for the different faces of their various wives. Because of your career, you are going to take care of a lot of people. So ask for a nice gift in return. Don’t be piggy about it, but it’s okay to ask for it.”
I listened to her, especially when she said, “A career goes up and down like this.” She waved her hand like the dips and peaks of a roller coaster. “Your career is going to be a little different because you are black. You should have something that will remind you in the hard times that you were an actor in films. Something that you can look over at and say in ten or fifteen years, ‘Yeah, I was here. I know because these guys gave me this piece of art, or this jewelry, for doing this movie.’ It doesn’t have to be something ridiculous in price. Just enough. It doesn’t hurt anybody. It comes out of their budget.” I pointed out that that might work if you’re Elizabeth Taylor. But she was right, and she fought for everything she ever got her whole career. She made it part of her contract. She gave a lot and expected something to keep.
So that’s what my agents and managers did for me. I currently have my art collection and a lot of the things I have because ET told me they would be a chronicle of my career. I can now look at a painting and remember that it was given to me for doing a specific movie. I still think she had something to do with the studios all saying yes.
Elizabeth Taylor was an inspiration to me, not only as an actor but as a humanitarian and as a woman. She took many slings and arrows from people about her weight, her marriages, and her illnesses, even her name. She did not like it when people called her Liz. She never let that crap get in the way. And that Dame—you know she was dame Elizabeth Taylor. But she didn’t rub it in your face.
She was smart. I looked at her political influence when she showed up for something. She was the best example of what fame could do to help people. Long before they were even certain how AIDS was contracted, when it was still being called “the gay plague,” ET had the balls to get involved and, in essence, forced President Ronald Reagan to take notice and take action. Unlike today, when many celebs sign on to be spokespersons for LGBTQ+ issues, back then people were scared for the most part. Certainly, no one of ET’s caliber was in that arena in the early days of the AIDS battle in the 1980s. I’m sure her agents and advisers told her to choose a different cause than HIV and AIDS, to let someone else do it. She said, “I’m doing this because I am watching as people I love and have worked with in over fifty films—friends, actors, hair and makeup people, musicians, dancers, some of the most important and influential people—are being alienated and tossed out of their families and communities, being left alone to die on their own. Who gives a goddamn about careers,” she told them, “when the people without whom we wouldn’t have a career are dying?”
I respected the hell out of that.
Elizabeth Taylor made me feel like I belonged.
The other time I felt that way was my second Oscar nom, especially after meeting the other four women nominated in the Best Supporting Actress category that year.
We all met at the Oscar Nominees Luncheon. We were seated at the same table, and it turned out that we were all a bunch of great dames—Annette, Mary, Diane, Lorraine, and me. We all made a pact that whoever won owed everyone else at the table an elaborate lunch. I won that year, and I was off to the races. No one is allowed to replicate the image of the Oscar statue, but I called somebody on the committee and explained that I needed to make four Oscars out of chocolate, covered in gold foil, to give to the other actresses, and why. They agreed to this one-time thing. So when I took the women out, a chocolate Oscar was at each of their places at the table.
I felt like the five of us women had our arms around each other. I loved meeting them and spending time with them. We all felt the same. We wanted to be there for each other, celebrate when any of us were succeeding, and hold our arms out to catch each other when we fell.
In the early 1980s, Helen Gurley Brown, an editor at Cosmopolitan magazine, launched the idea that women could “have it all”: an important job, success, great sex, a meaningful marriage, children, and self-care to look great and feel great. Women have been trying to make that happen ever since.
I say, you can have it all. But you’ve got to walk away from the idea that it’s going to look like some movie. Having it all is as messy as you can get. You’re going to have consequences for your choices. Not everybody is going to think you’ve got it together. That’s the hard part of that kind of goal. You’re going to spend your life trying to figure it out. There are going to be really great times when you feel like what you do matters. And then there will be times when you have to accept that you aren’t all that and you have to rely on other people for help, like I did with my mother when I asked for her help raising my daughter.
One time, I was at my home in Berkeley for a while. My mom and Alex lived in the house at the front of the property. Because I get up and down for half the night, I’d usually spend the night in the back house when I was there. One night, when Alex was close to fourteen, I looked out the window and saw her sneaking out of the front house to go hang out with friends after 10:00 p.m.
I decided to lock all the doors so she couldn’t get back in, so she’d understand that she had been caught and there would be consequences. I kept a watch for her. A couple hours later, she was out on the porch, knowing she couldn’t knock on the door and give herself up. She sat there, waiting.
My mother opened the front door and said to Alex, “What are you doing out here?”
By this time, I had come around to the front, and I said, “Ask her again. Ask her why she’s out here instead of in her bedroom.”
Ma said, “What happened?”
Alex was completely silent, looking at me like only a pissed-off teenager can.
Since she wasn’t talking, I got a bit puffed up. “Well, she snuck out of the house. That’s what happened. That’s why she’s sitting out here. She couldn’t get back in.”
I thought my mother was going to speak to Alex about her choices. Instead, she turned to me, crossing her arms, and said, “And this is what you’re all giddy about?”
Alex hid her smile with her hand.
I said, “You know what? I’m just gonna keep my mouth shut now. I’m going back to the other house. I’ll be there. Then I’m going off to do what I need to do.”
I wasn’t mad. I think my mom was putting it in order. She knew Alex wasn’t going to respond to my approach.
Later on, Alex said that her granny had sat her down in the house after I left and said, “Listen, I can tell you not to do this a million times. But it’s not until it’s going to be unfortunate for you, and something happens, that you’ll hear me. Be smarter than that.”
I guess it worked . . . for a while.
My mom had a point. That’s what it is with teenagers. I thought I knew it all, too, when I was fourteen. I didn’t change certain things until it became unfortunate for me. And I was over thirty. You’d think I would have been smarter than that. But we get there when we get there. Hopefully alive.
Yeah, I would never win a mother award. Alex knows now why it was the way it was, especially since she’s raised three kids of her own. Because “having it all” is fucking messy, and you’ve got to own it.
I had to say to Alex, “Look, this is what I’m going to do. I’m going to go to work. And I’m doing it so that you, me, Granny, and Uncle Clyde can have a different life.”
I still know that explanations don’t really fly when you’re a kid. You want your mom. I haven’t been a kid for a long, long time, and I still want my mom.
Often I’ll hear from another performer or an actor like Jennifer Hudson or a comedian like Jo Koy that I influenced them as kids. Sometimes people will tell me that they saw my Broadway show on HBO or saw me on Comic Relief or in a movie when they were kids. Younger people will come up to me at events or even on the street and tell me that seeing me do my thing made them feel like there was a place for them, too. That makes me feel good, of course. I never set out to be a role model, but I’m grateful that I somehow helped to raise a whole lot of young folks to be true to themselves, to who they are and what they wanted to become.