A report by Victoria Bisset for The Washington Put up.
Irene Cara, the American singer and actress finest recognized for the title tracks of the films “Fame” and “Flashdance,” has died, her publicist introduced Saturday.
“I can’t imagine I’ve needed to write this, not to mention launch the information,” publicist Judith A. Moose wrote on the performer’s Twitter account.
Cara died at her house in Florida, her publicist mentioned in a press release, including that the reason for demise was at the moment unknown. “She was a fantastically gifted soul whose legacy will dwell ceaselessly by means of her music and movies,” she added.
Born in New York Metropolis, Cara started her profession as a toddler acting on Spanish-language tv. She appeared alongside Rita Moreno, Invoice Cosby and Morgan Freeman on the PBS youngsters’s program “The Electrical Firm” from 1971 to 1972, as a member of the present’s band, the Brief Circus.
As a teen, she performed Sparkle Williams within the 1976 musical “Sparkle.” Though the movie, a couple of rising woman group in mid-century Harlem, was a field workplace disappointment, it developed a cult following amongst Black audiences and impressed a 2012 remake starring Jordin Sparks and Whitney Houston.
Cara’s mainstream breakthrough got here with the position of Coco Hernandez within the 1980 musical “Fame” — a film about college students auditioning for New York’s public highschool of performing arts, now referred to as Fiorello H. LaGuardia Excessive College of Music & Artwork and Performing Arts — for which she additionally sang the Grammy-nominated title music.
A number of years later, she co-wrote and carried out the music “Flashdance … What a Feeling,” which earned an Oscar for finest unique music and two Grammys, for finest feminine pop vocal efficiency and unique rating for a movement image.
She additionally appeared in movies together with “Metropolis Warmth,” alongside Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds, and “Sure Fury,” with Tatum O’Neal.
Officers in Largo, Fla., the place Cara’s house is listed in public data, didn’t instantly present particulars about her demise.