That career stated for him at a very young age. “I wanted to become an actor at the age of four in church. I was asked to learn a little poem for the Christmas pageant and when I did and finished it, people stood up and applauded and I said ‘woo, I like that.’ Then in the same play, my mother played the virgin Mary. But when she passed me, she didn’t look at me, didn’t say anything to me. At that moment, I saw that she wasn’t my mother anymore, she was ‘Mary’ in the play. That’s when I began to see the magic of acting.”
But it was when his parents moved him to Brooklyn was when his love for acting really took off. Earle’s mother was a teacher and his father was a principal. They moved from North Carolina to New York for better educational opportunities for African Americans.
Hyman is survived by his nieces Cassandra, Yvette and Monica and nephew Derryl.