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Irene Cara Escalera (March 18, 1959 – November 25, 2022) was an American singer and actress. Cara sang and co-wrote the song “Flashdance… What a Feeling” (from the film Flashdance), for which she won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and a Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance in 1984.
Cara is also known for playing the role of Coco Hernandez in the 1980 film Fame, and for recording the film’s title song “Fame”. Prior to her success with Fame, Cara portrayed the title character Sparkle Williams in the original 1976 musical drama film Sparkle.
Cara was born in The Bronx, New York City, the youngest of five children. Her father, Gaspar Escalera, a factory worker and retired saxophonist, was Puerto Rican, and her mother, Louise, a movie theater usher, was Cuban-American.
Cara has two sisters and two brothers. At the age of three, Irene Cara was one of five finalists for the “Little Miss America” pageant. She began to play the piano by ear, then studied music, acting, and dance seriously, first having dance lessons, aged five.
Her performing career started on Spanish-language television, professionally singing and dancing. She made early TV appearances on The Original Amateur Hour (singing in Spanish) and Johnny Carson’s The Tonight Show. In 1971–1972, she was a regular on PBS’s educational program The Electric Company, as a member of the show’s band, The Short Circus.
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As a child, Cara recorded a Latin-market Spanish-language record and an English Christmas album. She appeared in a major concert tribute to Duke Ellington that featured Stevie Wonder, Sammy Davis Jr., and Roberta Flack.
Cara appeared in on-and off-Broadway theatrical shows including the musicals Ain’t Misbehavin’, The Me Nobody Knows (which won an Obie Award), Maggie Flynn opposite Shirley Jones and Jack Cassidy, and Via Galactica with Raúl Juliá. Cara was the original Daisy Allen on the 1970s daytime serial Love of Life.
Next came her role as Angela in romance/thriller Aaron Loves Angela, followed by her portrayal of the title character in Sparkle.
Television brought Cara international acclaim for serious dramatic roles in two outstanding mini-series, Roots: The Next Generations and Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones.
John Willis’ Screen World, Vol. 28, named her one of twelve “Promising New Actors of 1976”; that same year, a readers’ poll in Right On! magazine named her Top Actress. Cara graduated from the Professional Children’s School in Manhattan … read more.
[An earlier version of this story showed an incorrect picture of Irene Cara.]
