American comedian, actress, and producer Whoopi Goldberg was born Caryn Elaine Johnson in 1955 in New York.
Goldberg began performing with a children’s theater group at age eight and spent her childhood in a Manhattan housing project.
At the age of seventeen, Goldberg entered a rehabilitation facility after a number of friends lost their lives to overdoses.
Alvin Martin, the counselor who helped her through her recovery, married her shortly after surviving that experience, and she gave birth to a daughter, Alexandrea.
After breaking with her husband, she and Alexandrea moved to California in 1974 and began building a presence in the theater community there, while also working as a stand-up comedian.
Her harsh experiences as an adult became material for her solo show, The Spook Show in the early ’80s, which she performed throughout the United States and Europe.
That performance led to the Broadway show Whoopi Goldberg, which opened in 1984, and a year later won Goldberg a Grammy Award.
In 1985, Goldberg was cast as the lead character, Celie, in director Steven Spielberg’s film adaptation of Alice Walker’s novel The Color Purple.
After The Color Purple, Goldberg became more active in film and television, landing roles in many successful comedies.
“The truth of the matter is, very few times has anybody said, “Do you want to be in this movie?” I know and you know that I’m Black. Apparently, this comes as a surprise to people. So I would say, “Gee, I’d love to read for that.” And they’d go, “Oh, no, there’s not a part for you.” Most of the movies I have made, I got the job because some bigger star said they didn’t want to do it. Jumpin’ Jack Flash was for Shelley Long. Sister Act was for Bette Midler. Burglar was for Bruce Willis. I know all the names,” she once said.
Goldberg also used her voice and fame to raise awareness of homelessness in the United States through her work with the series Comic Relief.
Since 2007, she’s been working as co-host of ABC’s morning talk show The View. While also been active in acting.
“That’s really what it is. I’m well-paid, and I do a good job. I earn my dough, and sometimes people like it, sometimes they don’t. No one is going to pay me guy money to be in a movie. I get what I can, have as good a time as I can, and I don’t really worry about it too much,” she said.
She has written several memoirs, non-fiction books, children’s books, and a fiction novel. In 2010, she published a book of humorous observations on contemporary manners, Is It Just Me?: Or Is It Nuts Out There?
Goldberg is currently filming a Netflix original, Women Like Us, directed by Tasha Smith and produced by Michelle Obama and Higher Ground Productions.
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