The Legs Are the Last to Go (25 page)

Well, I was never anything like a “Mommie Dearest.”

I had, however, become Norma Desmond in Toronto. And in 1997, Suzanne flew up to see me with a very specific purpose. She wanted me to meet her intended. I have to laugh when I think of his first glimpse of me onstage, playing a conniving, demented, facial-obsessed diva preying on a younger man. He was lovely, but I had never met him before. The prob
lem was Suzanne just sprang the news of their marriage plans on me at dinner without warning. My shock was apparent. Why couldn't she have waited a while? If I knew then what I know now—from the golden throne of my golden years—I would have calmly listened to her and approved. Young people interested in getting married aren't really open to anyone else's opinions, just blessings and congratulations. What did I do instead? I ran into the ladies' room and broke into tears. Why couldn't I just get over myself and show my daughter I supported her?

Not long after that, a letter came to me in Toronto. It was beautiful and poignant, not angry or spiteful, explaining she was now married. I didn't take it like a mature sixty-two-year-old woman. Why should I? In the kind of melodramatic style one associates with starlets with entitlement issues, I fell to my dressing-room floor and started crawling around on my hands and knees. Eventually my assistant suggested I stop making a scene. I had just had my nightly meltdown onstage, and that was enough strain on my vocal cords for one evening.

The thing is, Suzanne knew exactly what she was doing. She had figured out how to have a simple wedding that removed the need for family and family drama, keeping me and my scene-stealing ways and wardrobe out of it. When I look back on it now, I was a fool for not trusting Suzanne's instincts for building a great new life.

It was wonderful to watch her hold my little grandson for the first time. She took to mothering with such devotion. Suddenly she had a chance to do everything right that I did wrong, and I was overjoyed to see her sense of purpose and focus. And
it changed the way I saw her, too. In fact, the healing effect it had on our relationship was huge. Someone had finally come along who was going to be a bigger star in the family than I was: this sweet little baby.

But, oh, did it hurt when she moved her family overseas in 2003, and then had her second child, a daughter. I went to visit several times, and as impressive as her surroundings were, more impressive was how delightful it was to walk around with her family through markets and gardens and along the beaches, and not have anyone interfere in our private moments.

Once again, Suzanne knew what she wanted. She had been so inspired by their surroundings that she and her husband wrote and directed their first film about the culture. It had its American premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival, and the event brought Sidney Poitier, his two daughters, and me together. It was a wonderful night to be in Suzanne's shadow as I watched her with Sidney's two daughters, all of them so composed, articulate, and beautiful. They were three successful, self-assured, and statuesque women, doing what they wanted to do with their lives. And despite their tumultuous upbringings, with show-business parents who didn't know what to do with themselves or their overwrought love affair, they had grown up and come through beautifully. Everything had worked out for them just fine.

“We must have done something right,” I told Sidney later.

Now Suzanne and her family live in Europe. Of course I long for them to live closer. But if I know anything now, it's that when things can't be perfect, good can be plenty good enough. Suzanne knows I enjoy our holidays together immensely. And
having grandchildren has given me a whole new lease on life. One of the first things I learned from these two little ones is that it's important for people to actually be able to touch and hug you. So I now own play clothes that are expressly for my visits with them. They're made of these wonderful fabrics that you can just throw into the washing machine. Isn't that remarkable? When they get dirty, they don't have to go to the dry cleaners! Imagine!

To play with children properly, you have to be able to get right down on the floor with them. And that's what I do. We play with trains and dollhouses and Suzanne cannot believe what she is seeing. I observe the look on her face when she sees Diahann Carroll letting two little children climb all over her. She must be thinking, “Who is this woman playing on the floor with my children?” She is a stunning mother who understands full well how important it is to give yourself over to your children. Yet she manages to find time to work on her film projects. The other day I had to laugh because when I called her, she was much too busy writing a screenplay to talk to me. I hung up the phone and remembered all the years I hardly had a moment for her because of work, and I thought, “My how the tables have turned! Good for her!”

These days, I am more preoccupied with the lives of my grandchildren than with my own. It's shocking to me, but there it is. One of the nicest moments as a grandmother came not long ago, when Suzanne let her children have their first sleepover in my home. Bath time is absolute heaven with those two. My grandson can be very commanding. “I need some toys in here, Nana,” he has told me. “But no ducks please. I really don't want
any ducks!” There is nothing better than the rhythmic sound of two little ones breathing softly as they sleep in your bed.

Last Christmas I went to visit them in Europe with my suitcases so full of presents I couldn't get them up the stairs. Immediately after dinner, my granddaughter excused herself from the table and reappeared moments later in a completely different outfit. She said, “Nana, Mommy told me you sent this for me.” Then a few minutes later, she went and changed into something else I'd brought her. She must have changed outfits five times. I had been shopping for her all year, sending clothes from New York and Los Angeles, and although Suzanne had originally requested nothing that had to be dry-cleaned, it wasn't long before I was realizing that wash-and-wear clothes, even for children, just don't have the look I love. I love those little pleated kilts and wool overcoats of the John John and Caroline school of dressing. I like starched-collar dresses on girls and blazers on little boys. Darling, and totally impractical! As my granddaughter kept changing into one high-maintenance ensemble after the next (my favorite was a navy-blue taffeta number suitable for a debutante ball) Suzanne and I exchanged loving looks. Then we laughed at each other. Nothing had to be said. In her adult years, she has come to accept that Diahann Carroll is Diahann Carroll. None of these clothes were going into the washing machine. And if her little girl was becoming a clotheshorse under my tutelage, why fight the force of human nature?

“God is punishing you, Suzanne,” I said. “This time with the reincarnation of me. It won't be long before she's wearing couture.”

We played with games, made drawings, and measured one another's height, back-to-back. “Look how big you are,” I told my grandson. “Yes,” he said with all seriousness. “I'm a very big boy.” When we were going over to see some of their friends for lunch one day and it started to drizzle, I didn't balk when Suzanne suggested we hop onto a crowded old bus. The last time I was on a bus, I can't even remember. High school, maybe? I sat down next to a woman who clearly was not in her right mind. She was holding a little dog to her chest that had fur quite similar to that of my sable coat. Suzanne looked anxious that I would be put off and annoyed. But I just patted the dog's head and said, “Nice doggy,” and left it at that. Later, Suzanne wrote to friends and family that on a bus, in the rain, and wherever we went that holiday week, “Mom was a trouper.” I have spent my life charming big audiences of strangers. This was the best review I could ever hope to receive.

I did not stay at Suzanne and her husband's house. Even a trouper can only take so much activity when she's jet-lagged. Besides, the children loved visiting me at my nearby hotel. One day they came to pick me up, all looking absolutely divine. My granddaughter was in a kilt with a little black velvet jacket. My grandson was in a sports jacket and tie. We were going to the ballet.

“These children have been entirely dressed by Diahann Carroll,” Suzanne said playfully.

A woman nearby was impressed by how adorable they looked.

“Are those your grandchildren?” she asked.

“Yes, and I'm in charge of wardrobe,” I said.

It was a wonderful holiday. I can't remember a time since those children were born that our visits haven't been wonderful. And when it was time for me to fly home, they didn't want me to go. I hugged Suzanne good-bye, and she told me she loved me.

Are there any words a mother wants to hear more than those?

I don't think so. My mother must be very happy for us.

These days, I acknowledge the cost of my successes. Suzanne and I are finally at a place of love and laughter…and the place is often on the floor playing with her children.

I still remember the day I was at a playground with my granddaughter, who I think of as Miss Bossy. She wanted to go down a slide.

“Nana, come here,” she said.

“Okay, darling, here I am,” I said as I stood beside her.

“No, not there, Nana, up here with me!”

“It's okay, honey,” I said. “I'll just stand here and help you down.”

“No, Nana, you have to slide down with me!”

I didn't want to do it. The old bones are not what they once were.

But she was not taking no for an answer. So in a crowded playground, I found myself climbing up a ladder and sitting next to my tiny granddaughter, then wrapping my arm around her and pushing off.

“Whee!” we said as we slid down. She thought this was the funniest thing she had ever done. We were both laughing
hysterically. And while we were doing so, a smiling woman I didn't know approached us.

“Isn't it wonderful?” she said. “She doesn't even know you're Diahann Carroll!”

“I can't even begin to tell you,” I replied. “It's magnificent.”

Diahann Carroll, 22nd Annual Publicists Guild Awards, Beverly Hills, March 22, 1985. (Photograph by Ron Galella/WireImage)

IT WAS THE NIGHT BEFORE MY PLASTIC SURGERY AND
I was very nervous. I paced around my apartment, frustrated that I couldn't have a drink to calm down, and didn't even want to take a sleeping pill. I wanted to go into my surgery as healthy as I could be. I had been eating very carefully and exercising rigorously in the months before the procedure in order to have my body in its best fighting shape.

I'm used to having my face scrutinized and fussed over. But the idea of going under the knife was very frightening to me. And you hear of occasional botched procedures, and of course you can't help but worry. Can you imagine a more vacuous reason for a medical emergency? Please! Is plastic surgery really worth the risk and the immense expense? Besides, why not respect every wrinkle on your face? Isn't that the most positive way to greet the aging process, rather than taking desperate measures to reverse it? Yes, I paid for my wrinkles by living through everything I have lived through in
my life. But that doesn't mean I want to look at them in the mirror.

I know this sounds like rampant vanity and artificiality. Well, what can I say?

I'm a performer who still really enjoys make-believe. I remember being in a dressing room on the set of
Grey's Anatomy
a couple years ago with the little daughter of one of the actresses. She must have been four or five years old, and she was fascinated by my false eyelashes. Clearly they were not something her mother appreciated. But I couldn't help myself. “Would you like to try them on?” I asked the little girl.

She did, and was smitten. Her mother didn't look convinced.

But why not give them a try? I'm for whatever makes you happy.

High heels, makeup, sable coats, and beautiful jewelry. That's my platform.

The other day a woman came up to me at a party and told me she still remembered my entrance in
No Strings.
I told her how wonderful it was to hear that.

“You were carrying the most beautiful handbag I'd ever seen,” she said, gushing.

She didn't remember my entrance. But she will never forget my handbag.

And Harry Belafonte will never forget coming over on one of my at-home maintenance days in the early 1960s. I had warned him in advance that I would not be a pretty sight, but he really needed to speak to me about a recording he was working on. I had refused to run out of the house at a moment's notice for the meeting.

“I can't jump in the shower and be ready in twenty minutes, Harry,” I told him. “I'm just not one of those people.”

So he came over, and when I opened my door, he nearly had a heart attack. I had avocado in my hair and maybe mayonnaise as well, and egg white all over my face. Delicious. And I was also wearing a rubber suit to take the excess water out of my body. On my feet were clown-size terry-cloth slippers to absorb all the perspiration. So one of the most beautiful men in the world, a man whom every woman desired, with his beautiful face and broad shoulders and slim hips, was looking at me in this awful state, and if there had been any misguided feelings of attraction between us, they were instantly gone.

“Oh my God,” he said as he stumbled back at the sight of me. “I can't believe you actually let me come by here to see you like this. You have no interest in me at all!”

That was the last time I allowed anyone to see me at home in this condition. In fact, for years, when I was doing my big shows on the road, I would not allow room service to deliver my breakfast. It had to be brought in by someone I employed, someone I trusted.

Makeup? Don't bother telling me you want to see me without it. The last time friends did that, I listened to them, and appeared without anything on my face. They asked, “Are you okay, Diahann? You don't look well.” Like I've said before, I don't know who I am until I put on my makeup. But give me a little time and I'm good to go!

I once read somewhere—some philosopher said this—that human identity is nothing but a series of masks. You take one away and there's another mask below it. I totally relate to that idea. At the core of me is a woman who revels in arti
fice. Artifice isn't just fun: it's my “architecture.” So when friends tell me they want to see me with my makeup off, I figure they really don't know me that well. I mean, I was raised by a mother who put me in Shirley Temple curls! Why should I accept what I'm given when I can have it made to look like anything I want?

So if there's a medical procedure to take some wrinkles away and bring everything up, sign me on! Some people just don't have fun unless they're looking their best. And I'm one of them. To me, owning who you are means asking yourself “What do I have to do today to make myself happy?” Yet there's still such shame around plastic surgery. I know people who finish one procedure and say, “Phew! That's over!” But I know that in a year they'll go back for more, and won't admit it. We know who we are. We're the ones wearing big sunglasses in restaurants.

I guess I'm lucky it took until my late sixties for me to break down and agree that it was time to address the situation. It started when I was aghast seeing a picture of myself on the cover of a magazine. My press agent told me I was crazy.

“You look wonderful,” he told me.

“If you can't see I need plastic surgery, you're fired,” I replied.

I consulted with a famous surgeon in New York, who is so private that he has a special side door for patients who don't want to run into anyone else in the waiting area. I told him my face needed a little help, that things were falling down and we had to get them up again. He showed me some photos and then we decided it would be better for me to get the work done in Los
Angeles, where I'd be close to home. So I went to visit a surgeon not far from where I live who came highly recommended. He felt good about my prospects and fine with my preference for a gentle job. I didn't feel I wanted him to do anything at all near my eyes; it just worried me too much and I didn't want that pulled-up look. He persuaded me to trust him and said that I'd be very satisfied with the results.

“And because you're doing this now,” he said, “you should be able to wait years before doing anything again. You're the perfect patient.”

This surgeon was very serious and had a stellar reputation. The people I knew who had had work done by him told me that the only thing I was going to dislike was that I'd end up wishing I'd been pulled a little tighter. But I didn't want that. I don't need to look as smooth as a plum. I don't need automaton eyes that are in a permanent look of surprise. I can live with a wrinkle or two. Human works for me.

So I went in for the procedure and don't remember a thing except that when I woke up, I was not in any pain, and I stayed right there in a room near the office for a few days, healing in a spalike environment, a very nice option I was offered. When the bandages came off after a few days, I was still puffy. But then, a week later, I began to look more like myself. And I thought, “Isn't this nice? I don't look like I've been yanked like a mannequin. I just look like a better and more rested version of myself.” People noticed when I started going out and about. They'd tell me, “You look wonderful.”

Not long after that, I was the oldest guest on an
Oprah Winfrey Show
about “Aging Brilliantly.” Nora Ephron was on
the show, too. Her baleful, funny book about aging as a woman,
I Feel Bad About My Neck,
was hitting the bestseller list that season. She was forthright and funny about the havoc that aging has wreaked on her self-image. “Do you know what you get as a present for your sixty-second birthday?” she asked. “A mustache!…Which is why we have waxing, darling!” At some point, Oprah looked at me and asked, “Is this what seventy-one looks like?” I told her it was. And the audience broke into spontaneous and thunderous applause.

I should have added, “But it's with a little help from my plastic surgeon” right away. But later in the show, I did find myself yelling, “I believe in plastic surgery! I want the world to know! Oh God, yes! Absolutely, I would not be without it!”

Okay, maybe I was a little too zealous. But I've seen how getting older torments my friends and colleagues. And in my business, there's only one response to an actress who turns forty.
Don't!
The aging process is always harder for women than for men. I've heard people say that getting older is beautiful. I think it is, but inside, not out. Women are not happy about aging. I look into the eyes of some of my friends and I see worry and sadness because they don't know whether to give up or fight. It's hard to live in a society so hung up on age. Even for the most beautiful women, things fall apart. I sympathize and I commiserate. But I also like making suggestions that will help.

I let it slip that I've had plastic surgery if I know it'll open the door for a woman who would be happier with it than without it. I push acupuncture and all kinds of facials and spa treatments, too. And there's nothing I love more than taking someone
in need along for a little maintenance outing. I have gone with friends for all kinds of treatments with such peculiar-sounding names that I don't always understand what they are. The other day I took a neighbor I adore to get our faces ironed.

Hey, if I can do it for my hair, why not my face?

 

Hair. It isn't only on our heads. It's on our minds, constantly.

I'm sure there are people who think the nicest hair is the most natural hair. I'm not one of them. I have been a friend of the press-and-curl ever since my Shirley Temple–curl days. And blond is in these days, no matter what your ethnicity. There's one hair salon in Beverly Hills where black women come out with hair as straight and blond as Donatella Versace's. What really amazes me is that there are plenty of men out there who believe it's natural, bless them. A couple years ago, I was fortunate enough to be invited to a luncheon for an influential, successful group of black women in Hollywood. We were twenty-five of the most successful black women in show business, young and old, many of us young stars, and it was just so inspiring to be part of the group, all of us doing so well. The outfits were wonderful, and all were clearly as carefully considered as they'd be for a red-carpet event. When you are in show business, you can never forget that you are a product, and you must always be aware of your packaging. Anyway, I have to say, superficial as it sounds, I was fascinated by the hair I was seeing at this luncheon. So many of these young stars were wearing
long blond hair and obviously enjoying tossing it around with the insouciance of cheerleaders. There was not the least bit of self-consciousness in the room. Happily, I felt right at home among them. In fact, I do believe I was one of the forerunners of black women lightening their hair. I learned from my stylist that lightening your hair—as long as it's complimentary to your skin tone—can take years off your appearance.

It's no news flash. Hair is a big deal, especially for blacks. And I've done it all, from hair to eternity. As a professional performer, nobody knows better that I do that time is money and so is hair. In fact, my hair once cost the movie
Hurry Sundown
a very handsome sum.

It was 1966, and the great Otto Preminger was once again my director.

When I heard the filming would be in humid New Orleans, and that much of it would be shot on location, I knew the weather would be troublesome for everyone, particularly the black actors, when it came to hair. So I made an appointment with Mr. Preminger in his New York office. It was on Fifth Avenue, right across the street from the Plaza, where I was living with my daughter while doing my show there.

His office was huge and imposing, modern, high up, and hushed, looking down over midtown Manhattan. Preminger was a small Austrian man, elegant but not formal.

“Mr. Preminger, thank you for taking the time to see me,” I said across his desk.

“Yes, of course, but what is it?” he asked.

“Well, I was wondering who you've hired to do hair for the film.”

“I've hired my wife's hairdresser, who has the best salon in New York.”

My heart sank. Any other young actress would have stopped right there. I don't even know what gave me the nerve to request this meeting in the first place. This was a very important director. But since I've never been one to hold my tongue, I went on.

“I understand the weather can be very humid in New Orleans.”

“Yes? So?” He was tapping a pen on his desk, and I was getting more nervous.

“Well, humidity can have a strong effect on hair. So I'd just like to make this suggestion because I'm not sure you've ever had to deal with this before.”

“What is the suggestion, Miss Carroll?”

“Well, it would be wonderful if someone was on the set who could straighten out frizzy hair. Does this man who does your wife's hair know anything about straightening hair? Because he might need to have some understanding of curling irons, pressing combs, and hair relaxants.”

With that, the great director, whose temper had earned him the nickname “Otto the Terrible,” jumped out of his seat. He was shorter than I was, and it seemed to me that sparks were shooting out of his eyes. I could see at that moment why he'd been cast as a Nazi officer in a Broadway play and two films. I leaned back from his anger.

“Are you telling me who to hire for this film?” he said. “I never allow any actor to dictate how I should direct a film. I wouldn't allow Elizabeth Taylor to tell me how to do her hair in a film, and I won't allow it from you!”

Outside his office, phones had been ringing nonstop. He was a very busy man with too much on his plate.

“Whatever you say, sir,” I said as I stood with bowed head. “Whatever you say.”

I had to laugh as I left his office. He and I had been in a hair situation years before, over my bandanna in
Porgy and Bess
. I suspected, though, fond as I was of him, that he was going to eat his words on the set of
Hurry Sundown.