Death of Irene Cara, singer of “Fame” and “Flashdance”

There are the “one-hit wonders”, these short-lived successes that performers have been able to experience forever associated with a single and unique song. Died on November 25 in Miami (Florida) at the age of 63, the American singer Irene Cara will have at least doubled the bet, since her name is attached to two huge hits, linked to films telling more or less the same story. : the artistic aspirations and dreams of glory of American youth in the post-disco years.

In Famous (1980), directed by Alan Parker, starred Irene Cara as Coco Hernandez, a student so gifted that she was accepted into all three departments (drama, music and dance) of the High School of Performing Arts in New York. And she performed the title song. She was content only to sing for flash dance (1983), by Adrian Lyne, evocation of a worker in the steelworks of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania), an evening dancer, embodied this time on screen by Jennifer Beals. Composed by the famous Italian producer Giorgio Moroder, Flashdance… What a Feeling was a hit all over the world, number 1 in the United States, France, Italy, Spain, Australia and Japan.

Born on March 18, 1959, this native of the Bronx district, in New York, was in any case quite credible in the skin of Coco Hernandez for Famous. Of Puerto Rican origin on her father’s side and Cuban on her mother’s, Irene Cara spoke and sang in Spanish, and was trained in comedy and dance. She tried everything from an early age, songs from the age of 8 for the Latino market, musicals with small roles on Broadway, but also television (the educational program The Electric Company then the series Roots: The Next Generations and Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones). In 1976, here she is already at the top of the bill for the musical film sparkles, by Sam O’Steen, more or less inspired by the history of the vocal group The Supremes. It will be a resounding failure despite an original soundtrack entrusted to the great Curtis Mayfield.

Oscars and Golden Globes

She takes revenge with Famous. More than her talent as an actress, we remember her interpretations of two songs from the soundtrack which will, rare fact, both be in the running for the Oscars for best original song. Famous, the song, will unsurprisingly win the bet to the detriment of Out Here on My Own. The music for the film was composed by Michael Gore, little brother of successful singer Lesley Gore, asked by Alan Parker after the refusals of Giorgio Moroder (who had worked with him for Midnight Express) and Jeff Lynne, the demiurge of the Electric Light Orchestra. Gore himself was largely inspired by Moroder’s disco designs for Donna Summer. And it’s probably no coincidence that the dancers’ rehearsals for the film took place to the rhythm of HotStuff.

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