Fashion model Gail O’Neill, who helped to improve diversity on runways, in campaigns and in advertising in the ’80s and ’90s before building a second career in broadcast journalism, died on Tuesday.
O’Neill, 61, is believed to have been in her Atlanta home at the time of her death, according to Click Model agent Stephanie Grill, who represented O’Neill for decades. The cause of death was not immediately known, Grill said. Her family is planning a celebration of her life for a later time.
After establishing herself as a leading fashion model, O’Neill switched professions and mediums, as an on-air personality for CBS’ “The Early Show,” CNN and HGTV.
Born and raised in leafy Westchester County, N.Y., O’Neill attended Wesleyan University. Her first post-college job in marketing for Xerox unexpectedly turned out to be the gateway to high fashion. Flying for business, the photographer Chuck Baker and his stylist wife Martha spotted her on the airplane and asked for her phone number. They later rang up Click Model’s founder Frances Grill to say they found “this great girl” and after meeting O’Neill, she was immediately sent out for castings, Grill’s daughter Stephanie said.
Gail O’Neill in DKNY’s soft white sportswear separates. Shot on location at DKNY headquarters in New York.
Kyle Ericksen/WWD
From there, her career took off, and she landed leading jobs with top-notch photographers like Steven Meisel, Annie Leibovitz, Albert Watson, Arthur Elgort, Fabrizio Ferri, Gilles Bensimo, Alex Chatelain and Patrick Demarchelier and covers for British Vogue, Italian Vogue, American Vogue, Mademoiselle, Elle and Glamour.
“People just loved her. They would re-book her and re-book her. She was a major beauty with this beautiful personality — so authentic and kind. And she really had so much integrity,” Grill said. “She would have had five or six jobs a day, if she could. She had so many options. Everybody wanted to work with Gail O’Neill.”
“She did it all and at a time when it was difficult to get Black girls on anything,” said Grill. “Clients would badger me with calls [laughs], hoping for a cancellation. I would tell them, ‘No, you have to get someone else.’”
Multitalented as a model, the 5-foot, 9-inch New Yorker bridged editorial, advertising and runway work. O’Neill also held fast to her beliefs, refusing to appear in ads for companies that made cigarettes.
She rose to fame in an era when white models dominated the field. O’Neill was an early supporter of the Black Girls Coalition, the advocacy and support group that was founded by Bethann Hardison in 1988 for Black models, and remains active today. O’Neill was known for always helping and advocating for other people, often behind the scenes, Grill said.
Gail O’Neill. Designers Patricia Pastor and Jed Krascella first solo show for Perry Ellis.
Fairchild Archive
Fun, smart, selfless and family-oriented, O’Neill was not blinded by the glamour of modeling. (Her sister Denise was also a much sought-after Click model.)
She was known for her punctuality and professionalism, Grill said, and rarely talked about her career, preferring to talk about all of her other interests. “Modeling was just a job for her. You don’t meet a lot of Gail O’Neills. She always popping in to say ‘hi’ and doing things for other people,” Grill said.
Eloquent and free from any pretenses, O’Neill was more inclined to look outward than inward. She once explained that beauty, or a lack of it, was not something she ever thought about as a young child in a 2013 online interview with the American Museum of Natural History. She said, “I think children are far more adept at perceiving true beauty, because they haven’t been corrupted by outside forces. Likewise, the older we get, and the more we buy into mass media’s definition of beauty, the more likely we are to find fault with ourselves and others.”
Making the point that she was “no exception” to that ideology, O’Neill said that at the age of 11 or 12 she considered her tall, skinny frame to be “some kind of cosmic joke” with her being “the punchline.” She continued, “But show me a child who looks like that today, and I see how beautiful they are — like a little gazelle or a baby giraffe.”
Years later, O’Neill was consistently featured in editorial spreads and covers of fashion magazines. In 1994, she appeared on the much-coveted Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue wearing a star-spangled one-piece with Ashley Richardson and Roshumba Williams. While modeling for major designers and brands including Ralph Lauren, Donna Karan, Willi Smith, Perry Ellis, Calvin Klein fragrance, J. Crew, Liz Claiborne and Nordstrom, O’Neill helped to dispel stereotypes about what defined American beauty.
One of her first TV assignments was working as a correspondent on CBS’ “The Early Show,” when it debuted in 1999. Her television career later extended to CNN and HGTV. In recent years, as an editor-at-large and a books-focused columnist, O’Neill covered arts and culture for ArtsAtl, an Atlanta nonprofit. She also hosted and coproduced “Collective Knowledge,” a conversational series broadcast on TheA network. Even after relocating to Atlanta and venturing into other areas professionally, modeling requests for O’Neill were still being made earlier this year, Grill said.
Model Gail O’Neill wears DKNY’s nautical inspired sportswear separates. Shot on location at DKNY headquarters in New York.
WWD
O’Neill also developed an interest in photography. She discussed moving from in front of the camera to behind the camera in the 2013 interview, saying at the time: “There is nothing more beautiful to me than authenticity. When a subject trusts me enough to drop their mask and show me who they really are, magic happens. My Aunt Rosie is my favorite model for this reason. Her child-like nature, playfulness, and big, exuberant personality always come through in my pictures.”
In addition to her sister Denise, O’Neill is survived by her husband Paul, whose surname was not immediately known, her mother Elaine and her brother Randy.
