Ellen Holly, the barrier-breaking actress best known for her role in One Life to Live, has died. She was 92.
Holly passed away in her sleep on Wednesday (Dec. 6) at Calvary Hospital in the Bronx, according to her publicist, Cheryl L. Duncan, who confirmed the sad news to People.
Born in 1931, Holly began her career in stage theater starring in the Broadway productions of Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright and A Hand Is on the Gate.
In 1968, she wrote an op-ed titled “How Black Do You Have To Be?” which was published in the New York Times. The essay called out the entertainment industry for its narrow-minded view of what Black actors should look like. Holly wrote that it was “virtually impossible” for light-skinned Black performers like herself to find work, per Entertainment Weekly.
When Agnes Nixon — the creator of One Life to Live — came across the piece, she decided to cast Holly on the soap opera as Carla Gray, making her the first Black American to star in a leading role on daytime television. The actress appeared on the hit series from 1968 to 1980 and again from 1983 to 1985.
Holly’s storyline, which saw her character’s “attempt to come to terms with her racial identity” and her involvement in a love triangle with one white doctor and one Black doctor, launched the show’s ratings “into the stratosphere,” according to her obituary, per the New York Post.
The star also had roles in other television shows like The Nurses (1963), Sam Benedict (1963) and In the Heat of the Night (1989). Her most recent acting credit was for the 2002 television movie 10,000 Black Men Named George.
Aside from advocating for Black representation in television throughout her career, Holly — who later became a librarian at White Plains Public Library — also spoke out about being underpaid as an actress and detailed the mistreatment she and other Black actors faced.
“I feel as if I was hired as a temporary gimmick to rocket-boost a payload of white stars into orbit,” she told The Root in 2012 while looking back on her career. “Basically, that’s what I was used as. And that’s how it worked out.”
Holly is survived by her grand-nieces, Alexa and Ashley Jones; their father, Xavier Jones; and cousins, Wanda Parsons Harris, Julie Adams Strandberg, Carolyn Adams-Kahn and Clinton Arnold. Donations can be made in her name to The Obama Presidential Center or St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
