Zara's younger brother, jazz trumpeter Wendell Cully, played with Cab Calloway and Duke Ellington.

Upset by the racism she experienced in the Jim Crow-era South, Cully decided to move to Hollywood, where she became a regular performer at the Ebony Showcase Theatre.

[1][2] By the time she acquired the role of 'Mother' Jefferson, Cully had accumulated a long list of acting credentials spanning a half-century, including such movies as The Liberation of L.B.

Her TV career went back to what critics call 'the Golden Age of Television', including appearances on the highly acclaimed Playhouse 90 series.

[6] Her last credited performance was an appearance in the ninth episode of the fourth season entitled "The Last Leaf", which aired November 12, 1977, three months before her death.

[4][7][8] Cully died at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles on February 28, 1978, from lung cancer, aged 86.