Ethyl Ayler (Carrie Hanks) 1930-2018

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Born May 1, 1930 in Whistler, Alabama Passed November 18, 2018, Loma Linda California a veteran African-American character actress with a career spanning over five decades. Ayler had a recurring role as Carrie Hanks, Huxtable's mother on The Cosby Show has come home to rest.

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Five Great Ethel Ayler Guest Appearances

In a feature spotlighting character actors who routinely do strong guest appearances on TV series, Brian spotlights five fine TV performances by Ethel Ayler.

Today, we look at five great guest appearances by Ethel Ayler.

This is “Following a Star,” a new feature where I spotlight five great guest spots by an actor who frequently did/does guest spots on TV series in their careers. It doesn’t mean that they’ve NEVER been regulars on shows, but obviously I’m not looking to spotlight people who are best known for their regular TV roles (like no Jason Alexander or Florence Henderson, for instance).

Since this is Black History Month, I’ll specifically spotlight Black character actors this month.

Like a lot of the actors you’ll see in this feature this month, Ethel Ayler had an accomplished stage career, but had trouble making the move to TV and film. Things were so aggravating that after Beah Richards received a Tony Award nomination for Best Leading Actress in a Play and then didn’t get any real job offers from it, the director of the play, the great Frank Silvera, took out a full page ad to shame Hollywood for it.

So Ayler’s success on stage, much of which came with the Negro Ensemble Company, didn’t really lead to notable TV roles until she was in her 50s in the 1980s. Once she started, though, she kept working right up until her death in 2018. Here are five great TV guest spots by her.

The Cosby Show (Carrie Hanks)



On The Cosby Show, Ayler played Claire Huxtable’s mother, Carrie. Unlike Cliff’s parents, though, Carrie was barely on the series, just a half dozen episodes over eight seasons, but she made the most of her time on the show. A fun example was an early episode where she and Claire give Claire’s sister grief over what she is expecting with her upcoming marriage (the image here is her reacting to a passage from a book about marriages that suggests that when couples argue, they should go to separate rooms to make lists of their concerns to then calmly discuss).