Danielle Spencer, the actress beloved for her role as Dee Thomas on the 1970s sitcom “What’s Happening!!,” has died at the age of 60 after a long battle with cancer. The news was confirmed by her former co-star, Haywood Nelson, who shared a tribute to her on social media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Spencer, who also reprised her role in the spin-off “What’s Happening Now!!,” had a remarkable second career as a veterinarian. After leaving acting, she pursued her passion for animal care, earning a doctorate in veterinary medicine from Tuskegee University in 1993. Her life was marked by both professional success and significant personal health challenges. In a severe car accident in 1977, her stepfather died, and she was left in a coma for three weeks, an event that led to lifelong spinal and neurological issues. She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014 and underwent a double mastectomy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In his online tribute, Haywood Nelson, who played Dwayne Nelson on the show, remembered Spencer as “Dr. Dee, our brilliant, loving, positive, pragmatic warrior.” He highlighted her contributions not only as a cast member but also as a “veterinarian, animal rights proponent and healer, and cancer heroine.” Spencer’s death leaves only two of the original cast members of “What’s Happening!!” still alive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Danielle Spencer, the actress beloved for her role as Dee Thomas on the 1970s sitcom “What’s Happening!!,” has died at the age of 60 after a long battle with cancer. The news was confirmed by her former co-star, Haywood Nelson, who shared a tribute to her…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":204,"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203\/revisions\/204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morelinks.top\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}