Dawn Robinson, a founding member of Oakland’s wildly popular ’90s R&B girl group En Vogue, stoked lots of dire “Hollywood True Story”-type headlines Thursday by revealing that she’s been living out of her “older car” for nearly three years.
But in a video loaded to her YouTube channel, the 58-year-old “Funky Diva” insisted that her situation isn’t as grim as people might want to believe. Yes, she revealed, she initially moved into her vehicle due to family drama during the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by a conflict with her manager, who, she said, failed to properly assist her in finding an apartment in Los Angeles. But Robinson explained that she herself was motivated to consider “car life.”
“This is not like, ‘Oh my God, poor Dawn. She’s living in her car. It’s terrible. Oh, woe is me,’” a make-up free Robinson said in the nearly 20-minute video that appeared to be recorded from the seat of her car. She said: “I’m learning about who I am. I’m learning about myself as a person, as a woman.”
Also known as “van life,” “car life” is an increasingly popular trend for certain people, including single women, who either can’t afford housing in expensive cities or who want to purposely live off the grid and find adventure, traveling from place to place.
There’s a legion of YouTubers and TikTokers, who chronicle their day-to-day challenges and escapades while living out of their cars and vans. Van life culture also was the topic of a non-fiction book and the 2020, Oscar-winning film “Nomadland.” In the movie, Frances McDormand played a widow who moves into her van and drifts around the country after losing her job.
But this film and other accounts show there’s a dark side to the van life trend, especially for older adults. A growing number of single adults, 55 and older, are losing their homes and may be forced to live in their vehicles after experiencing a variety of work and personal setbacks, according to the American Society on Aging.
While the Oakland-reared Robinson said she wasn’t releasing her video “for publicity,” she hinted that she, too, might soon share her car life adventures on YouTube, as she described how car life turned out to be right for her at this moment in her life.
“Sometimes in life, we end up in situations that we weren’t expecting,” Robinson wrote in the caption of her video. “There’s something we need to learn or teach but we’re too afraid to push ourselves out of our comfort zones to do it so the universe does it for us!”
“I took a risk and jumped head first into car life,” she added, “and WOW, what a crazy, fun, sometimes scary ride it’s been lol!”
The San Leandro High School graduate admitted in her video that her first night alone in her vehicle was “scary,” but she said she soon learned how to make herself feel safe by covering the windows at night and guarding her interactions with people. She also described the first time she watched a sunset from her vehicle as “beautiful.”
Robinson furthermore shared that she has spent some time amongst a “car life” community in Malibu and that she joined a gym so she can take showers. “I’m a funky diva but I’m not funky!” she said in the video.
Robinson is certainly trying to put a positive spin on effectively being homeless as a 58-year-old woman. Like others living in their vehicles, she’s had to find safe places to park and sleep overnight and has to rely on public restrooms in parks or restaurants to brush teeth or go to the bathroom. But she takes pride in how she’s managed: “It’s just me, that’s the beauty of it, learning I can do all these things myself. I’m really, really proud of myself. Nobody could have told me I could do that.”
Regardless of Robinson’s declaration, her video prompted speculation that she’s been left destitute by a combination of factors: her self-reported family estrangement, her well-known professional downturn and her falling out with her En Vogue members, Terry Ellis, Cindy Herron and Maxine Jones.
It’s true that it’s been decades since En Vogue last scored a hit as one of the best-selling girl groups of all time, following such successes as “My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It),” “Free Your Mind” and “Giving Him Something He Can Feel.” Robinson chose to leave the group in 1997 after they scored one of their last hits, “Don’t Let Go (Love),” with Robinson singing lead vocals.
Robinson subsequently joined the R&B group Lucy Pearl, launched a solo career, but also reunited with En Vogue through the 2000s before parting ways again, leading to a long, drawn-out legal battle in which a judge granted only Herron and Ellis the exclusive right to tour under the name En Vogue.
Robinson reunited with En Vogue members again in 2019 for a performance at the City of Hope Gala. But as recently as last year, she expressed anger over being “forced out” of the group for “no reason.”
“I was ousted,” she said in another YouTube video. Recording herself on a beach somewhere, Robinson didn’t specify whether this ouster occurred in the 1990s or later. “I felt betrayed,” she continued. “I was just scared, because I’m on my own, and I helped build this brand. … I just felt it was wrong.”
In 2021, Robinson also gave an interview in which she claimed that she and the other rEn Vogue “divas” were paid a pittance on their rise to fame, just $0.02 per album.
It turns out that Robinson may have been complaining about her former En Vogue colleagues and their low pay, while dealing with the setbacks that led to living out of her car. In her video, she said she went to live with her parents in Las Vegas in 2020, during the pandemic.
“That was wonderful until it wasn’t,” she said “I love my mom, but she became very angry. A lot of her anger, she was taking out on me. I was her target all the time and I was like, ‘I can’t deal with this.’”
Robinson said she initially lived in her car in Las Vegas, until one of her managers urged her to return to Los Angeles and offered her a place to stay in his apartment. But when Robinson arrived in Los Angeles, this unnamed manager “actually didn’t have room for me.”
Robinson ended checking into a hotel for a night, and that hotel stay extended to eight months, prompting her to seriously research “car life.” She said, “I loved what I was seeing. I just thought, ‘Wow I can do that. I can do this.’”
Robinson revealed that the hardest part of the past three years was when her 16-year-old dog, Max, died in her car. “That was hard,” she said. “That was the longest relationship I’ve ever had.I thought, now I’m really on my own.”
Robinson also vowed that she was planning her career comeback, saying she plans to be “on top again.” She said, “From here in my car to that life, it’s going to be amazing.”
As Robinson plots her comeback, her ex-husband, Andre Allen, has offered to give her a job to help tide her over, E! News reported. Allen, who was married to the singer from 2003 to 2010, told TMZ that Robinson could consider a career in hospitality, specifically at the Hilton Hotel brands, where he is a sales executive.