Biography

Twice nominated for Tony Awards as Best Actress (Dramatic): first in 1960 for "A Raisin in the Sun" (she recreated her performance for the subsequent film version) and again in 1963 for the drama "Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright".

McNeil, a former librarian who came to show business relatively late in life after appearing in radio, vaudeville and clubs as a singer, was an enduring, strong-willed, maternal presence in the same tradition as actresses such as Ethel Waters, Juanita Moore, Theresa Merritt, Mabel King, Esther Rolle, and Virginia Capers, the last of whom won the Tony in 1974 playing McNeil's role in the Broadway musical "Raisin", based on "A Raisin in the Sun".

She was nominated for a 1975 Joseph Jefferson Award for Best Guest Artist for her performance in "A Raisin in the Sun" at the Candlelight Forum Theatre in Chicago, Illinois.

McNeil married at age 19. Her husband was killed in the Second World War and her son died in the Korean War. Her first husband's name and her son's name are not known. After training as a librarian, she drifted into vaudeville and nightclubs, eventually making her Broadway debut in 1953 as Tituba in Arthur Miller's "The Crucible". Married secondly, briefly, and unhappily to Herman McCoy, whom she divorced after two years.

Claudia Mae McNeil was the daughter of Marvin Spencer McNeil, an African-American, and Annie Mae Anderson, an American of Native Apache descent. The family moved to New York City soon after her birth. Shortly thereafter, her parents separated and then divorced. To support the family, Annie McNeil owned a grocery store. Claudia was raised by her mother after her father abandoned the family. When she was eight years old, she wrote to composer Eubie Blake, expressing her desire to study under his tutelage after seeing his name in a newspaper article. Blake secured her mother's consent and gave her free voice lessons; twice a week for ten years. According to an associate, while in her teens, McNeil appeared at the Apollo Theater's Amateur Night where she sang "Pennies from Heaven". The audience threw pennies on stage as she sang. Bandleader and drummer Chick Webb also took notice.

McNeil was known as the "Marian Anderson of Night Clubs" owing to her contralto, she specialized in songs sung by Ethel Waters, until bronchial asthma, throat problems, and her acting career overshadowed her singing career.