Actor Ted Lange still has fond memories of the time thatDiahann Carrollappeared on a 1977 episode of his show,The Love Boat.
Lange played bartender Isaac Watson on all nine seasons of the ABC dramedy, which aired until 1986, and was he ever excited — perhaps too excited — to share a moment with his leading lady.
"I kissed Diahann Carroll about 15 times before she realized I was messing up on purpose," Lange said on theStill Here Hollywoodpodcasthosted by Steve Kmetko. "So then she said, 'Hey, hey, cut that out!'"
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Lange said that he immediately apologized for his behavior.
"You're just so beautiful," he recalled telling Carroll.
"And she could kiss." Lange said, before laughing. "That's my claim to fame!"
More seriously, he said that the Oscar nominee, who later appeared on series includingA Different World,Grey's Anatomy, andWhite Collar, had been "a delight."
The kissing took place when the long-running show was still a freshman. He and Carroll shared the screen in only the fifth episode of season 1, in which Isaac finds himself romancing his favorite singer, Roxy Blue, who was played by the actress.
Carroll, was already familiar to TV audiences by the time she appeared onThe Love Boat. Most significantly, she had starred on the groundbreaking sitcomJulia, which depicted a Black, widowed nurse raising her son alone, from 1968 to 1971. (She received her second Emmy nomination for the part; her first was for a 1962 episode of police proceduralNaked City.)
The veteran actressdied in 2019of cancer. She was 84.
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AfterThe Love Boat, Lange continued acting in projects such asIn the Heat of the Night,General Hospital,The Cleveland Show, andAre We There Yet?.
Ahead of his conversation about Carroll, the actor had wisely made a point to say he was sorry for talking about it to his wife off-camera.
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