Actor Tracee Ellis Ross has spoken candidly about her unconventional childhood as the daughter of singer Diana Ross, recalling encounters with Andy Warhol and Marvin Gaye during an appearance on NBC’s Sunday Sitdown with Willie Geist on August 16, per today.com.
Ross revisited her old neighbourhood near Central Park in New York, where she once lived at the five-star Sherry Netherland Hotel. Reflecting on the experience, she acknowledged that her upbringing was far from typical, noting that Andy Warhol had painted her and Marvin Gaye used to call the family home.
Despite the extraordinary circumstances, Ross said her mother worked to maintain a sense of normalcy for her children. She recalled that Diana Ross treated her singing career as a job, waking the children for school, sitting with them at breakfast, and recording music only after they had gone to sleep.
Ross went on to build her own acting career, starring in the sitcoms Black-ish and Girlfriends before making her Broadway debut in the solo play Every Brilliant Thing. She is currently promoting the second season of her Roku travel series, Solo Traveling With Tracee Ellis Ross, which premiered in July.
The new season features a return to Gstaad and Rolle in Switzerland, where Ross attended boarding school from the age of 13. Visiting the school for the first time in four decades, she described the experience as akin to “walking into a time machine,” saying she was moved to tears by memories of the anxiety she felt being away from home, alongside gratitude for the opportunity her mother had given her and her sisters.
Asked whether the trip prompted reflection on her younger self, Ross said it felt like looking in both directions at once, comparing it to a moment where “the little girl” was looking at her present self, and she was looking back at the little girl, caught between pride in what she has achieved and memory of how frightened she once was.
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