Born the middle of three children in Houston, Texas to Marshall and Willie Graves, Graves began her career singing with The Doodletown Pipers after graduating high school in 1966. She soon turned to acting and became a regular in the two variety shows: Our Place and the infamous single episode of Turn-On. In 1969, Graves toured with Bob Hope's USO tour in Southeast Asia. Graves later landed more acting roles, becoming a regular on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In during its third season. Graves appeared in a number of films. In the 1973 filmThat Man Bolt, in which she played Samantha Nightingale, Graves' character is shot to death when she is in bed during a nude love scene with Fred Williamson, who plays the leading role of Jefferson Bolt. Graves pivotal role in the 1974 ABC crime dramatelevision movie and later series Get Christie Love! featured Charles Cioffi and Jack Kelly as Lieutenants Reardon and Ryan, respectively, Love's supervisors. At the time of the series creation, Graves' was noted as the second African-American woman to star in her own hour–long television series, after Diahann Carroll in Julia which aired six years prior. In a November 1974 issue of Jet, The magazine described Graves as "television's most delightful detective, the epitome of a tough lady cop with more feminine features than Venus".In 1983, Graves retired from show business to devote her time to the religion.
Graves was married once and had no children. On June 25, 1977, Graves married William D. Reddick in Los Angeles, California. The marriage later ended in divorce by 1983. Graves was baptized as a Jehovah's Witness in 1974, and almost immediately began using her celebrity to bring international awareness to the persecution of Witnesses in Malawi under then-leader Hastings Kamuzu Banda's "one-party rule".
Death
For the rest of her life, Graves resided at 3437 West 78th Place in the Hyde Park neighborhood in Los Angeles, California where she cared for her mother. On October 10, 2002, Graves' home caught fire due to a space heater. Graves was found unconscious in a bedroom before being rushed to the hospital where she later died. She was 54 years old.
