Olga James, a Star of ‘Carmen Jones' and ‘Mr. Wonderful,' Dies at 95
Olga James, an actress and operatic soprano whose career highlights occurred nearly back to back in the mid-1950s — as Harry Belafonte's jilted girlfriend in the all-Black musical film 'Carmen Jones' and as Sammy Davis Jr.'s love interest in the Broadway show 'Mr. Wonderful' — died on Jan. 25 in Los Angeles. She was 95.
Her death, in an assisted living facility, was confirmed by her niece Janet Adderley.
Ms. James had performed with an opera company in France and in a popular musical revue in Atlantic City, N.J., when her manager, Abe Saperstein — the basketball impresario behind the Harlem Globetrotters — landed her an audition in 1954 for 'Carmen Jones,' the movie version of Oscar Hammerstein II's hit 1943 Broadway update of Georges Bizet's opera 'Carmen.' The opera is set in 1820s Spain; the setting of the film, like that of the Broadway musical, is the American South during World War II.
Auditioning for the role of Cindy Lou, whose boyfriend, Joe (played by Mr. Belafonte), a soldier headed for flight school, is seduced by Carmen (Dorothy Dandridge), a worker in a parachute factory, Ms. James sang an aria at the Alvin Theater (now the Neil Simon Theater) for Otto Preminger, the film's imperious director.
'It wasn't a stretch for me,' she was quoted as saying in 'Otto Preminger: The Man Who Would Be King' (2007), by Foster Hirsch. 'I was that character, a country-looking girl. I was just a little ingénue.' Ms. James with Harry Belafonte in a publicity photo for 'Carmen Jones.' She did her own singing; his singing voice and Dorothy Dandridge's were dubbed because they could not sing in an operatic range. Credit... 20th Century Fox, via MichaelShe won the role. 'Carmen Jones' would be her first movie — and her last.
Of the film's three lead performers, only Ms. James did her own singing; Mr. Belafonte's and Ms. Dandridge's songs were dubbed because they could not sing in an operatic range.
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