Stage and screen performer Olga James passed away January 25, at the age of 95. News of Ms. James' passing to The Hollywood Reporter.
A graduate of Juilliard, Ms. James was an accomplished opera singer, specializing in Mozart's various art songs, German lieder, and French chansons. Performing throughout the United States and Europe, her silvery soprano was preserved for all time in Otto Preminger's 1954 film adaptation of 1943 Broadway musical Carmen Jones.
Based on Georges Bizet's opera Carmen, the film starred Dorothy Dandridge as the irrepressible vixen Carmen, Harry Belafonte as the handsome Corporeal Joe, and Ms. James as Joe's abandoned fianc茅e Cindy Lou. Ms. James' despondent performance of "He Got His Self Another Woman" was a highlight of the adaptation, leading to a new era of her career as a marquee nightclub entertainer. In 1956, Ms. James made her Broadway debut opposite Sammy Davis Jr. in Mr. Wonderful.
Ms. James was predeceased by her first husband, saxophonist Julian "Cannonball" Adderley, in 1975, and by her second husband, folk musician Len Chandler, in 2023.
