Irene Cara’s “Flashdance…What A Feeling” is from the 1983 movie Flashdance, and it also appeared on her sophomore album, What A Feelin’, released in the same year. Giorgio Moroder wrote the music, and Cara co-authored the lyrics with Keith Forsey. Cara and Forsey used the scene in the film where the main character, played by Jennifer Beals, does a dance audition in front of judges. The song became an inspirational pop hit and kept the number one spot for six weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. It also held that spot in 10 other countries and sold a million copies within 90 days. Cara received a Grammy, Golden Globe Award, and American Music Award and was the youngest person to get an Oscar for songwriting thanks to “Flashdance…What a Feeling.”

The biggest song of her career made her a household name, but it was bittersweet because she had to file a lawsuit in 1985 against an executive and the record company because she did not receive royalties from the soundtrack and her first two albums. “Flashdance…What a Feeling” is considered by several critics to be one of the top soundtrack songs ever, and it was picked by the Library of Congress to be entered into the National Recording Registry in 2023. Irene Cara released five albums, appeared on more than a dozen soundtracks, acted in nine stage shows, eleven television shows, and eighteen movies during her career. She passed away in 2022 at the age of 63. 

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Singer and actress Irene Cara has died at age 63. Cara became famous in the ’80s for her role as Coco on the show Fame and for singing the theme song “What A Feeling” from the Flashdance soundtrack. Cara was a New York City native who started her career as a child by competing in the Little Miss America pageant. As a seven-year-old, she sang in a mambo band where her father Gaspar Escalera was a saxophone player. She started her acting career with television appearances on The Electric Company with co-stars Morgan Freeman, Bill Cosby and Rita Moreno and Johnny Carson’s The Tonight Show during the ’70s. Her acting chops were also formed by her work on Broadway and off-Broadway plays like Ain’t Misbehavin’ and The Me Nobody Knows. She and Stephanie Mills worked together on the Broadway play Maggie Flynn as children.I n 1976, she starred in the Black cult classic Sparkle which was scored by Curtis Mayfield. Phillip Michael Thomas, Lonette McKee and Dorian Harewood were her co-stars and the 2012 remake would feature Whitney Houston’s last acting role.  By the late ’70s,  Cara’s name was growing internationally and she was recognized for her work on Roots: The Next Generations and Guyana Tragedy: The Story Of Jim Jones.

Her 1980 role as Coco in the movie Fame is what made her famous. She sang the title track “Fame” and the film’s other song “Out Here On My Own.” Both songs had Academy Award nominations and “Fame” was the winner. In 1982 she would win another Academy Award, a Grammy, an American Music Award and a Golden Globe for co-writing “What A Feeling” for Flashdance which was one of the biggest movies of the decade. Her time in the limelight ended after a 1985 lawsuit against music executive Al Coury for royalties which was resolved with her winning $1.5 million in 1993. She had a role in the 1983 film D.C. Cab but she never gained the same previous momentum. Her recording career produced four studio albums including one with her all-woman band Hot Caramel. She sang the title song for the American television drama Downtown: A Street Tale in 2004. At the time of her passing, there were plans for new projects that her publicist said would still be done.