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Vivien Leigh

January 04, 2023

Vivien Leigh (/liː/ LEE; 5 November 1913 – 8 July 1967; born Vivian Mary Hartley), styled as Lady Olivier after 1947, was a British actress. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice, for her definitive performances as Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939) and Blanche DuBois in the film version of A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), a role she had also played on stage in London's West End in 1949. She also won a Tony Award for her work in the Broadway musical version of Tovarich (1963). Although her career had periods of inactivity, in 1999 the American Film Institute ranked Leigh as the 16th-greatest female movie star of classic Hollywood cinema.

Vivien Leigh
Born
Vivian Mary Hartley

(1913-11-05)5 November 1913
Darjeeling, Bengal Presidency, British India
Died8 July 1967(1967-07-08) (aged 53)
Belgravia, London, England
Education
OccupationActress
Years active1935–1967
Notable work
Title
  • Lady Olivier (1947–1960)
  • Vivien, Lady Olivier (1960–1967)
Spouses
  • Herbert Leigh Holman
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1932; div. 1940)​
  • ​
    ​
    (m. 1940; div. 1960)​
PartnerJohn Merivale (1960–1967)
ChildrenSuzanne Farrington
AwardsList of awards and nominations
Signature

After completing her drama school education, Leigh appeared in small roles in four films in 1935 and progressed to the role of heroine in Fire Over England (1937). Lauded for her beauty, Leigh felt that her physical attributes sometimes prevented her from being taken seriously as an actress. Despite her fame as a screen actress, Leigh was primarily a stage performer. During her 30-year career, she played roles ranging from the heroines of Noël Coward and George Bernard Shaw comedies to classic Shakespearean characters such as Ophelia, Cleopatra, Juliet and Lady Macbeth. Later in life, she performed as a character actress in a few films.

At the time, the public strongly identified Leigh with her second husband, Laurence Olivier, who was her spouse from 1940 to 1960. Leigh and Olivier starred together in many stage productions, with Olivier often directing, and in three films. She earned a reputation for being difficult to work with and for much of her life, she had bipolar disorder, as well as recurrent bouts of chronic tuberculosis, which was first diagnosed in the mid-1940s and ultimately led to her death at age 53.[1]

Life and career

1913–1934: Early life and acting debut

Leigh was born Vivian Mary Hartley[2] on 5 November 1913 in British India on the campus of St. Paul's School in Darjeeling, Bengal Presidency. She was the only child of Ernest Richard Hartley, a British broker, and his wife, Gertrude Mary Frances (née Yackjee; she also used her mother's maiden name of Robinson).[3] Her father was born in Scotland in 1882, while her mother, a devout Roman Catholic, was born in Darjeeling in 1888 and might have been of Irish, Anglo-Indian and Armenian ancestry.[4][5][6] Gertrude's parents, who lived in India, were Michael John Yackjee (born 1840), an Anglo-Indian man of independent means, and Mary Teresa Robinson (born 1856), who was born to an Irish family killed during the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and grew up in an orphanage, where she met Yackjee; they married in 1872 and had five children, of whom Gertrude was the youngest.[6] Ernest and Gertrude Hartley were married in 1912 in Kensington, London.[7]

In 1917, Ernest Hartley was transferred to Bangalore as an officer in the Indian Cavalry, while Gertrude and Vivian stayed in Ootacamund.[8] At the age of three, young Vivian made her first stage appearance for her mother's amateur theatre group, reciting "Little Bo Peep".[9] Gertrude Hartley tried to instill an appreciation of literature in her daughter and introduced her to the works of Hans Christian Andersen, Lewis Carroll and Rudyard Kipling, as well as stories of Greek mythology and Indian folklore.[10] At the age of six, Vivian was sent by her mother from Loreto Convent, Darjeeling, to the Convent of the Sacred Heart (now Woldingham School) then situated in Roehampton, south-west London.[11] One of her friends there was future actress Maureen O'Sullivan, two years her senior, to whom Vivian expressed her desire to become "a great actress".[12][13] She was removed from the school by her father, and travelling with her parents for four years, she attended schools in Europe, notably in Dinard (Brittany, France), Biarritz (France), the Sacred Heart in San Remo on the Italian Riviera, and in Paris, becoming fluent in both French and Italian.[14] The family returned to Britain in 1931. She attended A Connecticut Yankee, one of O'Sullivan's films playing in London's West End, and told her parents of her ambitions to become an actress. Shortly after, her father enrolled Vivian at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London.[15]

Vivian met Herbert Leigh Holman, known as Leigh Holman, a barrister 13 years her senior, in 1931.[16] Despite his disapproval of "theatrical people", they married on 20 December 1932 and she terminated her studies at RADA, her attendance and interest in acting having already waned after meeting Holman.[17] On 12 October 1933 in London, she gave birth to a daughter, Suzanne, later Suzanne Farrington.[18][a]

1935–1936: Early career

Leigh's friends suggested she take a minor role as a schoolgirl in the film Things Are Looking Up, which was her film debut, albeit uncredited as an extra.[21] She engaged an agent, John Gliddon, who believed that "Vivian Holman" was not a suitable name for an actress. After rejecting his many suggestions, she took "Vivian Leigh" as her professional name.[22][b] Gliddon recommended her to Alexander Korda as a possible film actress, but Korda rejected her as lacking potential.[24] She was cast in the play The Mask of Virtue, directed by Sidney Carroll in 1935, and received excellent reviews, followed by interviews and newspaper articles. One such article was from the Daily Express, in which the interviewer noted "a lightning change came over her face", which was the first public mention of the rapid changes in mood which had become characteristic of her.[25] John Betjeman, the future poet laureate, described her as "the essence of English girlhood".[26] Korda attended her opening night performance, admitted his error, and signed her to a film contract.[22] She continued with the play but, when Korda moved it to a larger theatre, Leigh was found to be unable to project her voice adequately or to hold the attention of so large an audience, and the play closed soon after.[27] In the playbill, Carroll had revised the spelling of her first name to "Vivien".[28]

In 1960, Leigh recalled her ambivalence towards her first experience of critical acclaim and sudden fame, commenting, "that some critics saw fit to be as foolish as to say that I was a great actress. And I thought, that was a foolish, wicked thing to say, because it put such an onus and such a responsibility onto me, which I simply wasn't able to carry. And it took me years to learn enough to live up to what they said for those first notices.[29] I find it so stupid. I remember the critic very well and have never forgiven him."[30]

1935–1939: Meeting Laurence Olivier

In the autumn of 1935 and at Leigh's insistence, John Buckmaster introduced her to Laurence Olivier at the Savoy Grill, where he and his first wife Jill Esmond dined regularly after his performance in Romeo and Juliet.[31] Olivier had seen Leigh in The Mask of Virtue earlier in May and congratulated her on her performance.

Olivier and Leigh began an affair while acting as lovers in Fire Over England (1937), while Olivier was still married to Esmond and Leigh to Holman.[32] During this period, Leigh read the Margaret Mitchell novel Gone with the Wind and instructed her American agent to recommend her to David O. Selznick, who was planning a film version.[33] She remarked to a journalist, "I've cast myself as Scarlett O'Hara", and The Observer film critic C. A. Lejeune recalled a conversation of the same period in which Leigh "stunned us all" with the assertion that Olivier "won't play Rhett Butler, but I shall play Scarlett O'Hara. Wait and see."[34]

Despite her relative inexperience, Leigh was chosen to play Ophelia to Olivier's Hamlet in an Old Vic Theatre production staged at Elsinore, Denmark.[35] Olivier later recalled an incident when her mood rapidly changed as she was preparing to go onstage. Without apparent provocation, she began screaming at him before suddenly becoming silent and staring into space. She was able to perform without mishap, and by the following day she had returned to normal with no recollection of the event. It was the first time Olivier witnessed such behaviour from her.[36] They began living together, as their respective spouses had each refused to grant either of them a divorce.[37] Under the moral standards then enforced by the film industry, their relationship had to be kept from public view.

Leigh appeared with Robert Taylor, Lionel Barrymore and Maureen O'Sullivan in A Yank at Oxford (1938), which was the first of her films to receive attention in the United States. During production, she developed a reputation for being difficult and unreasonable, partly because she disliked her secondary role but mainly because her petulant antics seemed to be paying dividends.[38] After dealing with the threat of a lawsuit brought over a frivolous incident, Korda, however, instructed her agent to warn her that her option would not be renewed if her behaviour did not improve.[39] Her next role was in Sidewalks of London, also known as St. Martin's Lane (1938), with Charles Laughton.[40]

Olivier had been attempting to broaden his film career. He was not well known in the United States despite his success in Britain, and earlier attempts to introduce him to American audiences had failed. Offered the role of Heathcliff in Samuel Goldwyn's production of Wuthering Heights (1939), he travelled to Hollywood, leaving Leigh in London. Goldwyn and the film's director, William Wyler, offered Leigh the secondary role of Isabella, but she refused, preferring the role of Cathy, which went to Merle Oberon.[41]

1939: Gone with the Wind

 
Clark Gable and Leigh strike an amorous pose in Gone with the Wind (1939).

Hollywood was in the midst of a widely publicised search to find an actress to portray Scarlett O'Hara in David O. Selznick's production of Gone with the Wind (1939).[33] At the time, Myron Selznick—David's brother and Leigh's American theatrical agent—was the London representative of the Myron Selznick Agency. In February 1938, Leigh made a request to Myron Selznick that she be considered to play the part of Scarlett O'Hara.[42]

David O. Selznick watched her performances that month in Fire Over England and A Yank at Oxford and thought that she was excellent but in no way a possible Scarlett because she was "too British". Leigh travelled to Los Angeles, however, to be with Olivier and to try to convince David Selznick that she was the right person for the part. Myron Selznick also represented Olivier and when he met Leigh, he felt that she possessed the qualities that his brother was searching for.[43] According to legend, Myron Selznick took Leigh and Olivier to the set where the burning of the Atlanta Depot scene was being filmed and stage-managed an encounter, where he introduced Leigh, derisively addressing his younger brother, "Hey, genius, meet your Scarlett O'Hara."[44] The following day, Leigh read a scene for Selznick, who organized a screen test with director George Cukor and wrote to his wife, "She's the Scarlett dark horse and looks damn good. Not for anyone's ear but your own: it's narrowed down to Paulette Goddard, Jean Arthur, Joan Bennett and Vivien Leigh".[45] The director, George Cukor, concurred and praised Leigh's "incredible wildness". She secured the role of Scarlett soon after.[46]

 
Leigh's portrayal of Scarlett O'Hara

Filming proved difficult for Leigh. Cukor was dismissed and replaced by Victor Fleming, with whom Leigh frequently quarrelled. She and Olivia de Havilland secretly met with Cukor at night and on weekends for his advice about how they should play their parts.[47][48] Leigh befriended Clark Gable, his wife Carole Lombard and Olivia de Havilland, but she clashed with Leslie Howard, with whom she was required to play several emotional scenes.[48][49] Leigh was sometimes required to work seven days a week, often late into the night, which added to her distress, and she missed Olivier, who was working in New York City.[50] On a long-distance telephone call to Olivier, she declared: "Puss, my puss, how I hate film acting! Hate, hate, and never want to do another film again!"[50]

Quoted in a 2006 biography of Olivier, Olivia de Havilland defended Leigh against claims of her manic behaviour during the filming of Gone with the Wind: "Vivien was impeccably professional, impeccably disciplined on Gone with the Wind. She had two great concerns: doing her best work in an extremely difficult role and being separated from Larry [Olivier], who was in New York."[51]

Gone with the Wind brought Leigh immediate attention and fame, but she was quoted as saying, "I'm not a film star—I'm an actress. Being a film star—just a film star—is such a false life, lived for fake values and for publicity. Actresses go on for a long time and there are always marvellous parts to play."[50] The film won 10 Academy Awards including a Best Actress award for Leigh,[52] who also won a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress.[53]

1940–1949: Marriage and early collaborations with Olivier

In February 1940, Jill Esmond agreed to divorce Laurence Olivier, and Leigh Holman agreed to divorce Vivien, although they maintained a strong friendship for the rest of Leigh's life. Esmond was granted custody of Tarquin, her son with Olivier. Holman was granted custody of Suzanne, his daughter with Leigh. On 31 August 1940, Olivier and Leigh were married at the San Ysidro Ranch in Santa Barbara, California, in a ceremony attended only by their hosts, Ronald and Benita Colman and witnesses, Katharine Hepburn and Garson Kanin.[54] Leigh had made a screen test and hoped to co-star with Olivier in Rebecca, which was to be directed by Alfred Hitchcock with Olivier in the leading role. After viewing Leigh's screen test, David Selznick noted that "she doesn't seem right as to sincerity or age or innocence", a view shared by Hitchcock and Leigh's mentor, George Cukor.[55]

Selznick observed that she had shown no enthusiasm for the part until Olivier had been confirmed as the lead actor, so he cast Joan Fontaine. He refused to allow her to join Olivier in Pride and Prejudice (1940), and Greer Garson played the role Leigh had wanted for herself.[56] Waterloo Bridge (1940) was to have starred Olivier and Leigh; however, Selznick replaced Olivier with Robert Taylor, then at the peak of his success as one of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's most popular male stars.[57] Her top billing reflected her status in Hollywood, and the film was popular with audiences and critics.[58]

 
Leigh and Laurence Olivier in That Hamilton Woman (1941)

The Oliviers mounted a stage production of Romeo and Juliet for Broadway. The New York press publicised the adulterous nature of the beginning of Olivier and Leigh's relationship and questioned their ethics in not returning to the UK to help with the war effort.[59][c] Critics were hostile in their assessment of Romeo and Juliet. Brooks Atkinson for The New York Times wrote: "Although Miss Leigh and Mr. Olivier are handsome young people, they hardly act their parts at all."[62] While most of the blame was attributed to Olivier's acting and direction, Leigh was also criticised, with Bernard Grebanier commenting on the "thin, shopgirl quality of Miss Leigh's voice".[63] The couple had invested almost all of their combined savings of $40,000 in the project, and the failure was a financial disaster for them.[64]

The Oliviers filmed That Hamilton Woman (1941) with Olivier as Horatio Nelson and Leigh as Emma Hamilton. With the United States not yet having entered the war, it was one of several Hollywood films made with the aim of arousing a pro-British sentiment among American audiences.[65] The film was popular in the United States and an outstanding success in the Soviet Union.[66] Winston Churchill arranged a screening for a party that included Franklin D. Roosevelt and, on its conclusion, addressed the group, saying, "Gentlemen, I thought this film would interest you, showing great events similar to those in which you have just been taking part." The Oliviers remained favourites of Churchill, attending dinners and occasions at his request for the rest of his life; and, of Leigh, he was quoted as saying, "By Jove, she's a clinker."[67]

The Oliviers returned to Britain in March 1943,[68] and Leigh toured through North Africa that same year as part of a revue for the armed forces stationed in the region. She reportedly turned down a studio contract worth $5,000 a week in order to volunteer as part of the war effort.[68] Leigh performed for troops before falling ill with a persistent cough and fevers.[69] In 1944, she was diagnosed as having tuberculosis in her left lung and spent several weeks in hospital before appearing to have recovered. Leigh was filming Caesar and Cleopatra (1945) when she discovered she was pregnant, then had a miscarriage.[70] Leigh temporarily fell into a deep depression that hit its low point, with her falling to the floor, sobbing in an hysterical fit.[71] This was the first of many major bipolar disorder breakdowns. Olivier later came to recognise the symptoms of an impending episode—several days of hyperactivity followed by a period of depression and an explosive breakdown, after which Leigh would have no memory of the event, but would be acutely embarrassed and remorseful.[72]

 
Leigh and Olivier in Australia, June 1948

With her doctor's approval, Leigh was well enough to resume acting in 1946, starring in a successful London production of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth; but her films of this period, Caesar and Cleopatra (1945) and Anna Karenina (1948), were not great commercial successes. All British films in this period were adversely affected by a Hollywood boycott of British films.[73] In 1947, Olivier was knighted and Leigh accompanied him to Buckingham Palace for the investiture. She became Lady Olivier.[74] After their divorce, according to the style granted to the divorced wife of a knight, she became known socially as Vivien, Lady Olivier.[75]

By 1948, Olivier was on the board of directors for the Old Vic Theatre, and he and Leigh embarked on a six-month tour of Australia and New Zealand to raise funds for the theatre. Olivier played the lead in Richard III and also performed with Leigh in The School for Scandal and The Skin of Our Teeth. The tour was an outstanding success and, although Leigh was plagued with insomnia and allowed her understudy to replace her for a week while she was ill, she generally withstood the demands placed upon her, with Olivier noting her ability to "charm the press". Members of the company later recalled several quarrels between the couple as Olivier was increasingly resentful of the demands placed on him during the tour.[76] The most dramatic altercation occurred in Christchurch, New Zealand, when her shoes were not found and Leigh refused to go onstage without them. Olivier screamed an obscenity at her and slapped her face, and a devastated Leigh slapped him in return, dismayed that he would hit her publicly. Subsequently, she made her way to the stage in borrowed pumps, and in seconds, had "dried her tears and smiled brightly onstage".[77] By the end of the tour, both were exhausted and ill. Olivier told a journalist, "You may not know it, but you are talking to a couple of walking corpses." Later, he would observe that he "lost Vivien" in Australia.[78]

The success of the tour encouraged the Oliviers to make their first West End appearance together, performing the same works with one addition, Antigone, included at Leigh's insistence because she wished to play a role in a tragedy.[79]

1949–1951: Play and film roles in A Streetcar Named Desire

 
As Blanche DuBois, from the trailer for the film version of A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

Leigh next sought the role of Blanche DuBois in the West End stage production of Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire and was cast after Williams and the play's producer Irene Mayer Selznick saw her in The School for Scandal and Antigone; Olivier was contracted to direct.[80] The play contained a rape scene and references to promiscuity and homosexuality, and was destined to be controversial; the media discussion about its suitability added to Leigh's anxiety. Nevertheless, she believed strongly in the importance of the work.[81]

When the West End production of Streetcar opened in October 1949, J. B. Priestley denounced the play and Leigh's performance; and the critic Kenneth Tynan, who was to make a habit of dismissing her stage performances,[82] commented that Leigh was badly miscast because British actors were "too well-bred to emote effectively on stage". Olivier and Leigh were chagrined that part of the commercial success of the play lay in audience members attending to see what they believed would be a salacious story, rather than the Greek tragedy that they envisioned. The play also had strong supporters,[83] among them Noël Coward, who described Leigh as "magnificent".[84]

After 326 performances, Leigh finished her run, and she was soon assigned to reprise her role as Blanche DuBois in the film version of the play.[d] Her irreverent and often bawdy sense of humour allowed her to establish a rapport with Marlon Brando, but she had an initial difficulty in working with director Elia Kazan, who was displeased with the direction that Olivier had taken in shaping the character of Blanche.[86] Kazan had favoured Jessica Tandy and later, Olivia de Havilland over Leigh, but knew she had been a success on the London stage as Blanche.[85] He later commented that he did not hold her in high regard as an actress, believing that "she had a small talent." As work progressed, however, he became "full of admiration" for "the greatest determination to excel of any actress I've known. She'd have crawled over broken glass if she thought it would help her performance." Leigh found the role gruelling and commented to the Los Angeles Times, "I had nine months in the theatre of Blanche DuBois. Now she's in command of me."[87] Olivier accompanied her to Hollywood where he was to co-star with Jennifer Jones in William Wyler's Carrie (1952).

Leigh's performance in A Streetcar Named Desire won glowing reviews, as well as a second Academy Award for Best Actress,[88] a British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Award for Best British Actress, and a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress.[89] Tennessee Williams commented that Leigh brought to the role "everything that I intended, and much that I had never dreamed of". Leigh herself had mixed feelings about her association with the character; in later years, she said that playing Blanche DuBois "tipped me over into madness".[90]

1951–1960: Struggle with mental illness

In 1951, Leigh and Laurence Olivier performed two plays about Cleopatra, William Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra and George Bernard Shaw's Caesar and Cleopatra, alternating the play each night and winning good reviews.[91] They took the productions to New York, where they performed a season at the Ziegfeld Theatre into 1952.[92] The reviews there were also mostly positive, but film critic Kenneth Tynan angered them when he suggested that Leigh's was a mediocre talent that forced Olivier to compromise his own.[93] Tynan's diatribe almost precipitated another collapse; Leigh, terrified of failure and intent on achieving greatness, dwelt on his comments and ignored the positive reviews of other critics.[94]

In January 1953, Leigh travelled to Ceylon to film Elephant Walk with Peter Finch. Shortly after filming commenced, she had a nervous breakdown and Paramount Pictures replaced her with Elizabeth Taylor.[95] Olivier returned her to their home in Britain, where, between periods of incoherence, Leigh told him she was in love with Finch and had been having an affair with him.[96] Over a period of several months, she gradually recovered. As a result of this episode, many of the Oliviers' friends learned of her problems. David Niven said she had been "quite, quite mad". Noël Coward expressed surprise in his diary that "things had been bad and getting worse since 1948 or thereabouts".[97] Leigh's romantic relationship with Finch began in 1948, and waxed and waned for several years, ultimately flickering out as her mental condition deteriorated.[98]

Also in 1953, Leigh recovered sufficiently to play The Sleeping Prince with Olivier, and in 1955 they performed a season at Stratford-upon-Avon in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, Macbeth and Titus Andronicus.[99] They played to capacity houses and attracted generally good reviews, Leigh's health seemingly stable. John Gielgud directed Twelfth Night and wrote, "... perhaps I will still make a good thing of that divine play, especially if he will let me pull her little ladyship (who is brainier than he but not a born actress) out of her timidity and safeness. He dares too confidently ... but she hardly dares at all and is terrified of overreaching her technique and doing anything that she has not killed the spontaneity of by overpractice."[100] In 1955, Leigh starred in Anatole Litvak's film The Deep Blue Sea; co-star Kenneth More felt he had poor chemistry with Leigh during the filming.[101]

 
Photograph by Roloff Beny, 1958

In 1956, Leigh took the lead role in the Noël Coward play South Sea Bubble, but withdrew from the production when she became pregnant. Several weeks later, she miscarried and entered a period of depression that lasted for months.[102] She joined Olivier for a European tour of Titus Andronicus, but the tour was marred by Leigh's frequent outbursts against Olivier and other members of the company. After their return to London, her former husband, Leigh Holman, who could still exert a strong influence on her, stayed with the Oliviers and helped calm her.[103]

In 1958, considering her marriage to be over, Leigh began a relationship with actor Jack Merivale, who knew of Leigh's medical condition and assured Olivier that he would care for her. In 1959, when she achieved a success with the Noël Coward comedy Look After Lulu!, a critic working for The Times described her as "beautiful, delectably cool and matter of fact, she is mistress of every situation".[104]

In 1960, she and Olivier divorced and Olivier soon married actress Joan Plowright.[105] In his autobiography, Olivier discussed the years of strain they had experienced because of Leigh's illness: "Throughout her possession by that uncannily evil monster, manic depression, with its deadly ever-tightening spirals, she retained her own individual canniness—an ability to disguise her true mental condition from almost all except me, for whom she could hardly be expected to take the trouble."[1]

1961–1967: Final years and death

Merivale proved to be a stabilising influence for Leigh, but despite her apparent contentment, she was quoted by Radie Harris as confiding that she "would rather have lived a short life with Larry [Olivier] than face a long one without him".[106] Her first husband Leigh Holman also spent considerable time with her. Merivale joined her for a tour of Australia, New Zealand and Latin America that lasted from July 1961 until May 1962, and Leigh enjoyed positive reviews without sharing the spotlight with Olivier.[107] Though she was still beset by bouts of depression, she continued to work in the theatre and, in 1963, won a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical for her role in Tovarich. She also appeared in the films The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (1961) and Ship of Fools (1965).[108]

Leigh's last screen appearance in Ship of Fools was both a triumph and emblematic of her illnesses that were taking root. Producer and director Stanley Kramer, who ended up with the film, planned to star Leigh but was initially unaware of her fragile mental and physical state.[e] Later recounting her work, Kramer remembered her courage in taking on the difficult role, "She was ill, and the courage to go ahead, the courage to make the film—was almost unbelievable."[110] Leigh's performance was tinged by paranoia and resulted in outbursts that marred her relationship with other actors, although both Simone Signoret and Lee Marvin were sympathetic and understanding.[111] In one unusual instance during the attempted rape scene, Leigh became distraught and hit Marvin so hard with a spiked shoe that it marked his face.[112] Leigh won the L'Étoile de Cristal for her performance in a leading role in Ship of Fools.[113][f]

In May 1967, Leigh was rehearsing to appear with Michael Redgrave in Edward Albee's A Delicate Balance when her tuberculosis resurfaced.[114] Following several weeks of rest, she seemed to recover. On the night of 7 July 1967, Merivale left her as usual at their Eaton Square flat to perform in a play, and he returned home just before midnight to find her asleep. About 30 minutes later (by now 8 July), he entered the bedroom and discovered her body on the floor. She had been attempting to walk to the bathroom and, as her lungs filled with liquid, she collapsed and suffocated.[115] Merivale first contacted her family and later was able to reach Olivier, who was receiving treatment for prostate cancer in a nearby hospital.[116] In his autobiography, Olivier described his "grievous anguish" as he immediately travelled to Leigh's residence, to find that Merivale had moved her body onto the bed. Olivier paid his respects, and "stood and prayed for forgiveness for all the evils that had sprung up between us",[117] before helping Merivale make funeral arrangements; Olivier stayed until her body was removed from the flat.[116][g]

Her death was publicly announced on 8 July, and the lights of every theatre in central London were extinguished for an hour.[119] A Catholic service for Leigh was held at St. Mary's Church, Cadogan Street, London. Her funeral was attended by the luminaries of British stage and screen.[120] According to the provisions of her will, Leigh was cremated at the Golders Green Crematorium and her ashes were scattered on the lake at her summer home, Tickerage Mill, near Blackboys, East Sussex, England.[121] A memorial service was held at St Martin-in-the-Fields, with a final tribute read by John Gielgud.[122] In 1968, Leigh became the first actress honoured in the United States by "The Friends of the Libraries at the University of Southern California".[123] The ceremony was conducted as a memorial service, with selections from her films shown and tributes provided by such associates as George Cukor, who screened the tests that Leigh had made for Gone with the Wind, the first time the screen tests had been seen in 30 years.[124]

Legacy

 
Regarded as one of the most beautiful actresses of her era, Leigh was also acclaimed for her performances on the stage and the screen.

Leigh was considered to be one of the most beautiful actresses of her day, and her directors emphasised this in most of her films. When asked if she believed her beauty had been an impediment to being taken seriously as an actress, she said, "People think that if you look fairly reasonable, you can't possibly act, and as I only care about acting, I think beauty can be a great handicap, if you really want to look like the part you're playing, which isn't necessarily like you."[30]

Director George Cukor described Leigh as a "consummate actress, hampered by beauty",[125] and Laurence Olivier said that critics should "give her credit for being an actress and not go on forever letting their judgments be distorted by her great beauty."[126] Garson Kanin shared their viewpoint and described Leigh as "a stunner whose ravishing beauty often tended to obscure her staggering achievements as an actress. Great beauties are infrequently great actresses—simply because they don't need to be. Vivien was different; ambitious, persevering, serious, often inspired."[127]

Leigh explained that she played "as many different parts as possible" in an attempt to learn her craft and to dispel prejudice about her abilities. She believed that comedy was more difficult to play than drama because it required more precise timing and said that more emphasis should be placed upon comedy as part of an actor's training. Nearing the end of her career, which ranged from Noël Coward comedies to Shakespearean tragedies, she observed, "It's much easier to make people cry than to make them laugh."[30]

Her early performances brought her immediate success in Britain, but she remained largely unknown in other parts of the world until the release of Gone with the Wind. In December 1939, film critic Frank Nugent wrote in The New York Times, "Miss Leigh's Scarlett has vindicated the absurd talent quest that indirectly turned her up. She is so perfectly designed for the part by art and nature that any other actress in the role would be inconceivable",[128] and as her fame escalated, she was featured on the cover of Time magazine as Scarlett. In 1969, critic Andrew Sarris commented that the success of the film had been largely due to "the inspired casting" of Leigh,[129] and in 1998, wrote that "she lives in our minds and memories as a dynamic force rather than as a static presence".[130] Film historian and critic Leonard Maltin described the film as one of the all-time greats, writing in 1998 that Leigh "brilliantly played" her role.[131]

Her performance in the West End production of A Streetcar Named Desire, described by the theatre writer Phyllis Hartnoll as "proof of greater powers as an actress than she had hitherto shown", led to a lengthy period during which she was considered one of the finest actresses in British theatre.[132] Discussing the subsequent film version, Pauline Kael wrote that Leigh and Marlon Brando gave "two of the greatest performances ever put on film" and that Leigh's was "one of those rare performances that can truly be said to evoke both fear and pity."[133]

 
English Heritage blue plaque at Leigh's final home at 54 Eaton Square in Belgravia

Her greatest critic was Kenneth Tynan who ridiculed Leigh's performance opposite Olivier in the 1955 production of Titus Andronicus, commenting that she "receives the news that she is about to be ravished on her husband's corpse with little more than the mild annoyance of one who would have preferred foam rubber."[134] He was also critical of her reinterpretation of Lady Macbeth in 1955, saying that her performance was insubstantial and lacked the necessary fury demanded of the role.[135] After her death, however, Tynan revised his opinion, describing his earlier criticism as "one of the worst errors of judgment" he had ever made. He came to believe that Leigh's interpretation, in which Lady Macbeth uses her sexual allure to keep Macbeth enthralled, "made more sense ... than the usual battle-axe" portrayal of the character.[h] In a survey of theatre critics conducted shortly after Leigh's death, several named her performance as Lady Macbeth as one of her greatest achievements in theatre.[136]

In 1969, a plaque to Leigh was placed in the Actors' Church, St Paul's, Covent Garden, London. In 1985, a portrait of her was included in a series of United Kingdom postage stamps, along with Sir Alfred Hitchcock, Sir Charlie Chaplin, Peter Sellers and David Niven to commemorate "British Film Year".[137] In April 1996, she appeared in the Centenary of Cinema stamp issue (with Sir Laurence Olivier) and in April 2013 was again included in another series, this time celebrating the 100th anniversary of her birth.[138] The British Library in London purchased the papers of Olivier from his estate in 1999. Known as The Laurence Olivier Archive, the collection includes many of Leigh's personal papers, including numerous letters she wrote to Olivier. The papers of Leigh, including letters, photographs, contracts and diaries, are owned by her daughter, Mrs. Suzanne Farrington. In 1994, the National Library of Australia purchased a photograph album, monogrammed "L & V O" and believed to have belonged to the Oliviers, containing 573 photographs of the couple during their 1948 tour of Australia. It is now held as part of the record of the history of the performing arts in Australia.[139] In 2013, an archive of Leigh's letters, diaries, photographs, annotated film and theatre scripts and her numerous awards was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.[140] Also in 2013, Leigh was among the ten people selected by the Royal Mail for their "Great Britons" commemorative postage stamp issue.[141]

In popular culture

Leigh was portrayed by American actress Morgan Brittany in The Day of the Locust (1975), Gable and Lombard (1976) and The Scarlett O'Hara War (1980).[142] Julia Ormond played Leigh in My Week with Marilyn (2011).[143] Leigh was also portrayed by Katie McGuinness in the Netflix miniseries Hollywood (2020).[144]

Filmography

Main article: Vivien Leigh on stage and screen

Accolades

Organizations[i] Year[j] Category Work Result
Academy Awards 1940 Best Actress Gone with the Wind Won
1952 A Streetcar Named Desire Won
BAFTA Awards 1953 Best Film British Actress Won
Faro Island Film Festival 1939 Audience Award for Best Actress Gone with the Wind Nominated
Golden Globe Awards 1952 Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama A Streetcar Named Desire Nominated
National Board of Review of Motion Pictures Awards 1940 Best Acting Gone with the Wind & Waterloo Bridge Won
New York Film Critics Circle Awards 1939 Best Actress Gone with the Wind Won
1951 A Streetcar Named Desire Won
Online Film & Television Association Awards 2001 Film Hall of Fame Induction — Honored
Sant Jordi Awards 1957 Special Award for Acting A Streetcar Named Desire Honored
Venice Film Festival 1951 Volpi Cup for Best Actress Won
Hollywood Walk of Fame 1960 Hollywood Walk of Fame Star[k] — Honored

References

Informational notes

  1. ^ Holman was granted custody of their child after their divorce.[19] Leigh became a grandmother when Suzanne, decades later, had three sons.[20]
  2. ^ For stage names, Gliddon proposed "Susan" then "Suzanne Hartley" and "Mary Hartley", before the more outlandish "April Morn" and "April Maugham".[23]
  3. ^ After Olivier enrolled in the Fleet Air Arm, he served for two years as a pilot, resigning his commission in 1943 as a lieutenant-commander.[60] Ultimately, Ralph Richardson and others dissuaded him, convincing Olivier that his contribution to the war effort should be on stage and in film.[61]
  4. ^ Leigh's fee of $100,000 for A Streetcar Named Desire made her the highest paid British actress in 1951; her costar, Marlon Brando, was paid $75,000 for his role as Stanley Kowalski.[85]
  5. ^ At one point in the pre-production, Katharine Hepburn was considered for the role of Mary Treadwell, but dropped out and was replaced by Leigh.[109]
  6. ^ L'Étoile de Cristal was the French equivalent of the Oscar.[113]
  7. ^ Leigh's death certificate gave her date of death as 8 July 1967, although she may have died before midnight the night before.[118]
  8. ^ In a 1983 interview after his death, Kenneth Tynan's widow derided her husband's vindictive campaign against Leigh as "completely unnecessary". Olivier dismissed it as jealousy; Leigh, however, was adversely affected by his comments.[135]
  9. ^ Awards, festivals, honors and other miscellaneous organizations are listed in alphabetical order.
  10. ^ Year in which award ceremony was held.
  11. ^ Motion Picture Category

Citations

  1. ^ a b Olivier 1982, p. 174.
  2. ^ Briggs 1992, p. 338.
  3. ^ Bean 2013, pp. 20–21.
  4. ^ Bean 2013, p. 20.
  5. ^ Strachan 2018, p. 3.
  6. ^ a b Vickers 1988, p. 6.
  7. ^ General Register Office of England and Wales, Marriages, June quarter 1912, Kensington vol. 1a, p. 426.
  8. ^ Vickers 1988, p. 9.
  9. ^ Walker 1987, p. 25.
  10. ^ Bean 2013, p. 21.
  11. ^ Taylor 1984, p. 32.
  12. ^ Walker 1987, p. 32.
  13. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 12–19.
  14. ^ Taylor 1984, pp. 33–34.
  15. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 25–30.
  16. ^ Walker 1987, p. 39.
  17. ^ Walker 1984, pp. 38–39.
  18. ^ "Vivien Leigh profile." Turner Classic Movies. Retrieved 13 October 2013.
  19. ^ Capua 2003, p. 40.
  20. ^ Bean 2013, p. 167.
  21. ^ Bean 2013, p. 24.
  22. ^ a b Taylor 1984, p. 38.
  23. ^ Capua 2003, p. 19.
  24. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 30–43.
  25. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 74.
  26. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 75.
  27. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 50–55.
  28. ^ Taylor 1984, p. 40.
  29. ^ Bean 2013, pp. 26–27.
  30. ^ a b c Funke and Boothe 1983, p. 82.
  31. ^ Lasky 1978, p. 13; Vickers 1988, p. 62.
  32. ^ Walker 1987, pp. 75–76.
  33. ^ a b Taylor 1984, p. 14.
  34. ^ Coleman 2005, pp. 76–77, 90, 94–95.
  35. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 92.
  36. ^ Coleman 2005, pp. 97–98.
  37. ^ Walker 1987, p. 92.
  38. ^ Walker 1987, p. 93.
  39. ^ Walker 1987, p. 95.
  40. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 97.
  41. ^ Berg 1989, p. 323.
  42. ^ Bean 2013, p. 52.
  43. ^ Walker 1987, p. 113.
  44. ^ Bean 2013, pp. 51–53.
  45. ^ Taylor 1984 p. 15.
  46. ^ Haver 1980, p. 259.
  47. ^ Walker 1987, p. 124.
  48. ^ a b Taylor 1984, p. 22.
  49. ^ Howard 1984, p. 19.
  50. ^ a b c Taylor 1984, pp. 22–23.
  51. ^ Thomas, Bob quoting Olivia de Havilland. "Official biography of Olivier benefits from cache of actor's letters". St. Louis Post-Dispatch (The Associated Press), 4 January 2006, p. E1
  52. ^ "Gone with the Wind." Archived 22 December 2014 at archive.today Academy Awards Database (Oscars.org) (Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences). Retrieved 15 January 2015.
  53. ^ "1939 Awards." nyfcc.com (New York Film Critics Circle). Retrieved 15 January 2015.
  54. ^ Walker 1987, pp. 150–151.
  55. ^ McGilligan 2003, p. 238.
  56. ^ Vickers 1988, p. 118.
  57. ^ Bean 2013, pp. 73–74.
  58. ^ "Vivien Leigh – Biography." 15 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine Yahoo! Movies. Retrieved 13 October 2012.
  59. ^ Vickers 1988, p. 152.
  60. ^ Spoto 2001, pp. 147–148.
  61. ^ Walker 1987, p. 157.
  62. ^ Edwards 1978, p. 127.
  63. ^ Holden 1989, pp. 189–190.
  64. ^ Taylor 1984, p. 59.
  65. ^ Bean 2013, pp. 80–81.
  66. ^ Walker 1987, p. 65.
  67. ^ Holden 1989, pp. 202, 205, 325.
  68. ^ a b Click: The National Picture Monthly, "Hollywood's Manpower" (March 1943), p. 17. Author not credited.
  69. ^ Walker 1987, pp. 166–167.
  70. ^ Vickers 1988, p. 167.
  71. ^ Walker 1987, p. 170.
  72. ^ Holden 1989, pp. 221–222.
  73. ^ Bean 2013, p. 115.
  74. ^ Bean 2013, p. 111.
  75. ^ Spoto 2001, p. 327.
  76. ^ Spoto 2001, p. 216.
  77. ^ Spoto 2001, pp. 217–218.
  78. ^ Holden 1989, p. 295.
  79. ^ Spoto 2001, p. 218.
  80. ^ Bean 2013, pp. 125–126.
  81. ^ Spoto 2001, pp. 218–219.
  82. ^ Shellard 2003, p. 126.
  83. ^ Coleman 2005, pp. 227–231.
  84. ^ Holden 1989, p. 312.
  85. ^ a b Walker 1987, p. 167.
  86. ^ Thomas 1974, p. 67.
  87. ^ Coleman 2005, pp. 233–236.
  88. ^ Taylor 1984, p. 91.
  89. ^ Bean 2013, p. 145.
  90. ^ Holden 1989, pp. 312–313.
  91. ^ Walker 1987, pp. 204–205.
  92. ^ Capua 2003, p. 119.
  93. ^ Tynan 1961, p. 9.
  94. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 196–197.
  95. ^ Taylor 1984, pp. 93–94.
  96. ^ Walker 1987, p. 213.
  97. ^ Coleman 2005, pp. 254–263.
  98. ^ Brooks, Richard. "Olivier Worn Out by Love and Lust of Vivien Leigh". The Sunday Times, 7 August 2005. (Password required) Retrieved: 27 July 2008.
  99. ^ Capua 2003, p. 131.
  100. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 271.
  101. ^ More 1978, pp. 163–167.
  102. ^ Capua 2003. pp. 138–139.
  103. ^ Walker 1987, p. 222.
  104. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 219–234, 239.
  105. ^ Spoto 2001, p. 301.
  106. ^ Walker 1987, p. 290.
  107. ^ Walker 1987, pp. 258–259.
  108. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 266–272.
  109. ^ Andersen 1997, pp. 552–553.
  110. ^ Steinberg, Jay. "Articles: Ship of Fools." Turner Classic Movies. Retrieved 18 January 2015.
  111. ^ David 1995, p. 46.
  112. ^ Walker 1987, p. 281.
  113. ^ a b Bean 2013, p. 279.
  114. ^ "Actress Vivien Leigh Dies At 53 In London." Daytona Beach Sunday News-Journal, 9 July 1967. Retrieved 4 October 2016.
  115. ^ Edwards 1978, pp. 304–305.
  116. ^ a b Edwards 1978, p. 284.
  117. ^ Olivier 1982, pp. 273–274.
  118. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 384.
  119. ^ Edge, Simon. "Salacious secrets lay behind the glamorous life of Gone With the Wind star Vivien Leigh." Sunday Express, 3 November 2013. Retrieved 25 January 2015.
  120. ^ Spoto 2001, p. 346.
  121. ^ Walker 1987, p. 297.
  122. ^ Bean 2013, p. 243.
  123. ^ Edwards 1978, p. 306.
  124. ^ Bean 2013, p. 244.
  125. ^ Shipman 1988, p. 126.
  126. ^ Coleman 2005, p. 227.
  127. ^ Shipman 1988, p. 125.
  128. ^ Haver 1980, p. 305.
  129. ^ Ebert, Roger. "Vivien Leigh." Roger Ebert.com quoting Andrew Sarris, The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929–1968. Retrieved 6 January 2006.
  130. ^ "Reviews on the Web", quoting Andrew Sarris in You Ain't Heard Nothin' Yet, The American Talking Film: History & Memory, 1927–1949." The New York Times, 3 May 1998. Retrieved 11 January 2006.
  131. ^ Maltin 1997, p. 522.
  132. ^ Hartnoll 1972, p. 301.
  133. ^ Kael 1982, p. 564.
  134. ^ Ellis, Samantha. "Peter Brook's Titus Andronicus, August 1955 (quoting Kenneth Tynan)." The Guardian, 23 June 2003. Retrieved 7 January 2005.
  135. ^ a b Bean 2013, p. 181.
  136. ^ Taylor 1984, p. 99.
  137. ^ Walker 1987, pp. 303, 304.
  138. ^ "Vivien Leigh Centenary: Great Britons Stamps". BFDC. Retrieved 4 May 2020.
  139. ^ "Laurence Olivier/Vivien Leigh." Gateways: National Library of Australia. ISSN 1443-0568, #14, March 1995. Retrieved 7 January 2006.
  140. ^ "Vivien Leigh archive acquired by V&A.". BBC News, 14 August 2013.
  141. ^ "Royal Mail celebrates 'Great Britons' with launch of latest special stamp collection". Royal Mail. 17 April 2013. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  142. ^ British Film Institute Morgan Brittany
  143. ^ New "My Week With Marilyn". Pics Include Julia Ormond as Vivien Leigh. NBC. Retrieved 4 May 2020
  144. ^ Montgomery, Hugh (29 April 2020). "Hollywood review: This lavish period fantasy is a disaster". BBC. Retrieved 29 April 2020.

Bibliography

External links

 
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Vivien Leigh (category)

January 04, 2023
vivien, leigh, november, 1913, july, 1967, born, vivian, mary, hartley, styled, lady, olivier, after, 1947, british, actress, academy, award, best, actress, twice, definitive, performances, scarlett, hara, gone, with, wind, 1939, blanche, dubois, film, version. Vivien Leigh l iː LEE 5 November 1913 8 July 1967 born Vivian Mary Hartley styled as Lady Olivier after 1947 was a British actress She won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice for her definitive performances as Scarlett O Hara in Gone with the Wind 1939 and Blanche DuBois in the film version of A Streetcar Named Desire 1951 a role she had also played on stage in London s West End in 1949 She also won a Tony Award for her work in the Broadway musical version of Tovarich 1963 Although her career had periods of inactivity in 1999 the American Film Institute ranked Leigh as the 16th greatest female movie star of classic Hollywood cinema Vivien LeighLeigh as Scarlett O Hara in Gone with the Wind 1939 BornVivian Mary Hartley 1913 11 05 5 November 1913Darjeeling Bengal Presidency British IndiaDied8 July 1967 1967 07 08 aged 53 Belgravia London EnglandEducationLoreto ConventConvent of the Sacred HeartRoyal Academy of Dramatic ArtOccupationActressYears active1935 1967Notable workGone with the Wind A Streetcar Named Desire TovarichTitleLady Olivier 1947 1960 Vivien Lady Olivier 1960 1967 SpousesHerbert Leigh Holman m 1932 div 1940 wbr Sir Laurence Olivier m 1940 div 1960 wbr PartnerJohn Merivale 1960 1967 ChildrenSuzanne FarringtonAwardsList of awards and nominationsSignatureAfter completing her drama school education Leigh appeared in small roles in four films in 1935 and progressed to the role of heroine in Fire Over England 1937 Lauded for her beauty Leigh felt that her physical attributes sometimes prevented her from being taken seriously as an actress Despite her fame as a screen actress Leigh was primarily a stage performer During her 30 year career she played roles ranging from the heroines of Noel Coward and George Bernard Shaw comedies to classic Shakespearean characters such as Ophelia Cleopatra Juliet and Lady Macbeth Later in life she performed as a character actress in a few films At the time the public strongly identified Leigh with her second husband Laurence Olivier who was her spouse from 1940 to 1960 Leigh and Olivier starred together in many stage productions with Olivier often directing and in three films She earned a reputation for being difficult to work with and for much of her life she had bipolar disorder as well as recurrent bouts of chronic tuberculosis which was first diagnosed in the mid 1940s and ultimately led to her death at age 53 1 Contents 1 Life and career 1 1 1913 1934 Early life and acting debut 1 2 1935 1936 Early career 1 3 1935 1939 Meeting Laurence Olivier 1 4 1939 Gone with the Wind 1 5 1940 1949 Marriage and early collaborations with Olivier 1 6 1949 1951 Play and film roles in A Streetcar Named Desire 1 7 1951 1960 Struggle with mental illness 1 8 1961 1967 Final years and death 2 Legacy 2 1 In popular culture 3 Filmography 4 Accolades 5 References 6 External linksLife and career Edit1913 1934 Early life and acting debut Edit Leigh was born Vivian Mary Hartley 2 on 5 November 1913 in British India on the campus of St Paul s School in Darjeeling Bengal Presidency She was the only child of Ernest Richard Hartley a British broker and his wife Gertrude Mary Frances nee Yackjee she also used her mother s maiden name of Robinson 3 Her father was born in Scotland in 1882 while her mother a devout Roman Catholic was born in Darjeeling in 1888 and might have been of Irish Anglo Indian and Armenian ancestry 4 5 6 Gertrude s parents who lived in India were Michael John Yackjee born 1840 an Anglo Indian man of independent means and Mary Teresa Robinson born 1856 who was born to an Irish family killed during the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and grew up in an orphanage where she met Yackjee they married in 1872 and had five children of whom Gertrude was the youngest 6 Ernest and Gertrude Hartley were married in 1912 in Kensington London 7 In 1917 Ernest Hartley was transferred to Bangalore as an officer in the Indian Cavalry while Gertrude and Vivian stayed in Ootacamund 8 At the age of three young Vivian made her first stage appearance for her mother s amateur theatre group reciting Little Bo Peep 9 Gertrude Hartley tried to instill an appreciation of literature in her daughter and introduced her to the works of Hans Christian Andersen Lewis Carroll and Rudyard Kipling as well as stories of Greek mythology and Indian folklore 10 At the age of six Vivian was sent by her mother from Loreto Convent Darjeeling to the Convent of the Sacred Heart now Woldingham School then situated in Roehampton south west London 11 One of her friends there was future actress Maureen O Sullivan two years her senior to whom Vivian expressed her desire to become a great actress 12 13 She was removed from the school by her father and travelling with her parents for four years she attended schools in Europe notably in Dinard Brittany France Biarritz France the Sacred Heart in San Remo on the Italian Riviera and in Paris becoming fluent in both French and Italian 14 The family returned to Britain in 1931 She attended A Connecticut Yankee one of O Sullivan s films playing in London s West End and told her parents of her ambitions to become an actress Shortly after her father enrolled Vivian at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art RADA in London 15 Vivian met Herbert Leigh Holman known as Leigh Holman a barrister 13 years her senior in 1931 16 Despite his disapproval of theatrical people they married on 20 December 1932 and she terminated her studies at RADA her attendance and interest in acting having already waned after meeting Holman 17 On 12 October 1933 in London she gave birth to a daughter Suzanne later Suzanne Farrington 18 a 1935 1936 Early career Edit Leigh s friends suggested she take a minor role as a schoolgirl in the film Things Are Looking Up which was her film debut albeit uncredited as an extra 21 She engaged an agent John Gliddon who believed that Vivian Holman was not a suitable name for an actress After rejecting his many suggestions she took Vivian Leigh as her professional name 22 b Gliddon recommended her to Alexander Korda as a possible film actress but Korda rejected her as lacking potential 24 She was cast in the play The Mask of Virtue directed by Sidney Carroll in 1935 and received excellent reviews followed by interviews and newspaper articles One such article was from the Daily Express in which the interviewer noted a lightning change came over her face which was the first public mention of the rapid changes in mood which had become characteristic of her 25 John Betjeman the future poet laureate described her as the essence of English girlhood 26 Korda attended her opening night performance admitted his error and signed her to a film contract 22 She continued with the play but when Korda moved it to a larger theatre Leigh was found to be unable to project her voice adequately or to hold the attention of so large an audience and the play closed soon after 27 In the playbill Carroll had revised the spelling of her first name to Vivien 28 In 1960 Leigh recalled her ambivalence towards her first experience of critical acclaim and sudden fame commenting that some critics saw fit to be as foolish as to say that I was a great actress And I thought that was a foolish wicked thing to say because it put such an onus and such a responsibility onto me which I simply wasn t able to carry And it took me years to learn enough to live up to what they said for those first notices 29 I find it so stupid I remember the critic very well and have never forgiven him 30 1935 1939 Meeting Laurence Olivier Edit In the autumn of 1935 and at Leigh s insistence John Buckmaster introduced her to Laurence Olivier at the Savoy Grill where he and his first wife Jill Esmond dined regularly after his performance in Romeo and Juliet 31 Olivier had seen Leigh in The Mask of Virtue earlier in May and congratulated her on her performance Olivier and Leigh began an affair while acting as lovers in Fire Over England 1937 while Olivier was still married to Esmond and Leigh to Holman 32 During this period Leigh read the Margaret Mitchell novel Gone with the Wind and instructed her American agent to recommend her to David O Selznick who was planning a film version 33 She remarked to a journalist I ve cast myself as Scarlett O Hara and The Observer film critic C A Lejeune recalled a conversation of the same period in which Leigh stunned us all with the assertion that Olivier won t play Rhett Butler but I shall play Scarlett O Hara Wait and see 34 Despite her relative inexperience Leigh was chosen to play Ophelia to Olivier s Hamlet in an Old Vic Theatre production staged at Elsinore Denmark 35 Olivier later recalled an incident when her mood rapidly changed as she was preparing to go onstage Without apparent provocation she began screaming at him before suddenly becoming silent and staring into space She was able to perform without mishap and by the following day she had returned to normal with no recollection of the event It was the first time Olivier witnessed such behaviour from her 36 They began living together as their respective spouses had each refused to grant either of them a divorce 37 Under the moral standards then enforced by the film industry their relationship had to be kept from public view Leigh appeared with Robert Taylor Lionel Barrymore and Maureen O Sullivan in A Yank at Oxford 1938 which was the first of her films to receive attention in the United States During production she developed a reputation for being difficult and unreasonable partly because she disliked her secondary role but mainly because her petulant antics seemed to be paying dividends 38 After dealing with the threat of a lawsuit brought over a frivolous incident Korda however instructed her agent to warn her that her option would not be renewed if her behaviour did not improve 39 Her next role was in Sidewalks of London also known as St Martin s Lane 1938 with Charles Laughton 40 Olivier had been attempting to broaden his film career He was not well known in the United States despite his success in Britain and earlier attempts to introduce him to American audiences had failed Offered the role of Heathcliff in Samuel Goldwyn s production of Wuthering Heights 1939 he travelled to Hollywood leaving Leigh in London Goldwyn and the film s director William Wyler offered Leigh the secondary role of Isabella but she refused preferring the role of Cathy which went to Merle Oberon 41 1939 Gone with the Wind Edit Clark Gable and Leigh strike an amorous pose in Gone with the Wind 1939 Hollywood was in the midst of a widely publicised search to find an actress to portray Scarlett O Hara in David O Selznick s production of Gone with the Wind 1939 33 At the time Myron Selznick David s brother and Leigh s American theatrical agent was the London representative of the Myron Selznick Agency In February 1938 Leigh made a request to Myron Selznick that she be considered to play the part of Scarlett O Hara 42 David O Selznick watched her performances that month in Fire Over England and A Yank at Oxford and thought that she was excellent but in no way a possible Scarlett because she was too British Leigh travelled to Los Angeles however to be with Olivier and to try to convince David Selznick that she was the right person for the part Myron Selznick also represented Olivier and when he met Leigh he felt that she possessed the qualities that his brother was searching for 43 According to legend Myron Selznick took Leigh and Olivier to the set where the burning of the Atlanta Depot scene was being filmed and stage managed an encounter where he introduced Leigh derisively addressing his younger brother Hey genius meet your Scarlett O Hara 44 The following day Leigh read a scene for Selznick who organized a screen test with director George Cukor and wrote to his wife She s the Scarlett dark horse and looks damn good Not for anyone s ear but your own it s narrowed down to Paulette Goddard Jean Arthur Joan Bennett and Vivien Leigh 45 The director George Cukor concurred and praised Leigh s incredible wildness She secured the role of Scarlett soon after 46 Leigh s portrayal of Scarlett O Hara Filming proved difficult for Leigh Cukor was dismissed and replaced by Victor Fleming with whom Leigh frequently quarrelled She and Olivia de Havilland secretly met with Cukor at night and on weekends for his advice about how they should play their parts 47 48 Leigh befriended Clark Gable his wife Carole Lombard and Olivia de Havilland but she clashed with Leslie Howard with whom she was required to play several emotional scenes 48 49 Leigh was sometimes required to work seven days a week often late into the night which added to her distress and she missed Olivier who was working in New York City 50 On a long distance telephone call to Olivier she declared Puss my puss how I hate film acting Hate hate and never want to do another film again 50 Quoted in a 2006 biography of Olivier Olivia de Havilland defended Leigh against claims of her manic behaviour during the filming of Gone with the Wind Vivien was impeccably professional impeccably disciplined on Gone with the Wind She had two great concerns doing her best work in an extremely difficult role and being separated from Larry Olivier who was in New York 51 Gone with the Wind brought Leigh immediate attention and fame but she was quoted as saying I m not a film star I m an actress Being a film star just a film star is such a false life lived for fake values and for publicity Actresses go on for a long time and there are always marvellous parts to play 50 The film won 10 Academy Awards including a Best Actress award for Leigh 52 who also won a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress 53 1940 1949 Marriage and early collaborations with Olivier Edit In February 1940 Jill Esmond agreed to divorce Laurence Olivier and Leigh Holman agreed to divorce Vivien although they maintained a strong friendship for the rest of Leigh s life Esmond was granted custody of Tarquin her son with Olivier Holman was granted custody of Suzanne his daughter with Leigh On 31 August 1940 Olivier and Leigh were married at the San Ysidro Ranch in Santa Barbara California in a ceremony attended only by their hosts Ronald and Benita Colman and witnesses Katharine Hepburn and Garson Kanin 54 Leigh had made a screen test and hoped to co star with Olivier in Rebecca which was to be directed by Alfred Hitchcock with Olivier in the leading role After viewing Leigh s screen test David Selznick noted that she doesn t seem right as to sincerity or age or innocence a view shared by Hitchcock and Leigh s mentor George Cukor 55 Selznick observed that she had shown no enthusiasm for the part until Olivier had been confirmed as the lead actor so he cast Joan Fontaine He refused to allow her to join Olivier in Pride and Prejudice 1940 and Greer Garson played the role Leigh had wanted for herself 56 Waterloo Bridge 1940 was to have starred Olivier and Leigh however Selznick replaced Olivier with Robert Taylor then at the peak of his success as one of Metro Goldwyn Mayer s most popular male stars 57 Her top billing reflected her status in Hollywood and the film was popular with audiences and critics 58 Leigh and Laurence Olivier in That Hamilton Woman 1941 The Oliviers mounted a stage production of Romeo and Juliet for Broadway The New York press publicised the adulterous nature of the beginning of Olivier and Leigh s relationship and questioned their ethics in not returning to the UK to help with the war effort 59 c Critics were hostile in their assessment of Romeo and Juliet Brooks Atkinson for The New York Times wrote Although Miss Leigh and Mr Olivier are handsome young people they hardly act their parts at all 62 While most of the blame was attributed to Olivier s acting and direction Leigh was also criticised with Bernard Grebanier commenting on the thin shopgirl quality of Miss Leigh s voice 63 The couple had invested almost all of their combined savings of 40 000 in the project and the failure was a financial disaster for them 64 The Oliviers filmed That Hamilton Woman 1941 with Olivier as Horatio Nelson and Leigh as Emma Hamilton With the United States not yet having entered the war it was one of several Hollywood films made with the aim of arousing a pro British sentiment among American audiences 65 The film was popular in the United States and an outstanding success in the Soviet Union 66 Winston Churchill arranged a screening for a party that included Franklin D Roosevelt and on its conclusion addressed the group saying Gentlemen I thought this film would interest you showing great events similar to those in which you have just been taking part The Oliviers remained favourites of Churchill attending dinners and occasions at his request for the rest of his life and of Leigh he was quoted as saying By Jove she s a clinker 67 The Oliviers returned to Britain in March 1943 68 and Leigh toured through North Africa that same year as part of a revue for the armed forces stationed in the region She reportedly turned down a studio contract worth 5 000 a week in order to volunteer as part of the war effort 68 Leigh performed for troops before falling ill with a persistent cough and fevers 69 In 1944 she was diagnosed as having tuberculosis in her left lung and spent several weeks in hospital before appearing to have recovered Leigh was filming Caesar and Cleopatra 1945 when she discovered she was pregnant then had a miscarriage 70 Leigh temporarily fell into a deep depression that hit its low point with her falling to the floor sobbing in an hysterical fit 71 This was the first of many major bipolar disorder breakdowns Olivier later came to recognise the symptoms of an impending episode several days of hyperactivity followed by a period of depression and an explosive breakdown after which Leigh would have no memory of the event but would be acutely embarrassed and remorseful 72 Leigh and Olivier in Australia June 1948 With her doctor s approval Leigh was well enough to resume acting in 1946 starring in a successful London production of Thornton Wilder s The Skin of Our Teeth but her films of this period Caesar and Cleopatra 1945 and Anna Karenina 1948 were not great commercial successes All British films in this period were adversely affected by a Hollywood boycott of British films 73 In 1947 Olivier was knighted and Leigh accompanied him to Buckingham Palace for the investiture She became Lady Olivier 74 After their divorce according to the style granted to the divorced wife of a knight she became known socially as Vivien Lady Olivier 75 By 1948 Olivier was on the board of directors for the Old Vic Theatre and he and Leigh embarked on a six month tour of Australia and New Zealand to raise funds for the theatre Olivier played the lead in Richard III and also performed with Leigh in The School for Scandal and The Skin of Our Teeth The tour was an outstanding success and although Leigh was plagued with insomnia and allowed her understudy to replace her for a week while she was ill she generally withstood the demands placed upon her with Olivier noting her ability to charm the press Members of the company later recalled several quarrels between the couple as Olivier was increasingly resentful of the demands placed on him during the tour 76 The most dramatic altercation occurred in Christchurch New Zealand when her shoes were not found and Leigh refused to go onstage without them Olivier screamed an obscenity at her and slapped her face and a devastated Leigh slapped him in return dismayed that he would hit her publicly Subsequently she made her way to the stage in borrowed pumps and in seconds had dried her tears and smiled brightly onstage 77 By the end of the tour both were exhausted and ill Olivier told a journalist You may not know it but you are talking to a couple of walking corpses Later he would observe that he lost Vivien in Australia 78 The success of the tour encouraged the Oliviers to make their first West End appearance together performing the same works with one addition Antigone included at Leigh s insistence because she wished to play a role in a tragedy 79 1949 1951 Play and film roles in A Streetcar Named Desire Edit As Blanche DuBois from the trailer for the film version of A Streetcar Named Desire 1951 Leigh next sought the role of Blanche DuBois in the West End stage production of Tennessee Williams s A Streetcar Named Desire and was cast after Williams and the play s producer Irene Mayer Selznick saw her in The School for Scandal and Antigone Olivier was contracted to direct 80 The play contained a rape scene and references to promiscuity and homosexuality and was destined to be controversial the media discussion about its suitability added to Leigh s anxiety Nevertheless she believed strongly in the importance of the work 81 When the West End production of Streetcar opened in October 1949 J B Priestley denounced the play and Leigh s performance and the critic Kenneth Tynan who was to make a habit of dismissing her stage performances 82 commented that Leigh was badly miscast because British actors were too well bred to emote effectively on stage Olivier and Leigh were chagrined that part of the commercial success of the play lay in audience members attending to see what they believed would be a salacious story rather than the Greek tragedy that they envisioned The play also had strong supporters 83 among them Noel Coward who described Leigh as magnificent 84 After 326 performances Leigh finished her run and she was soon assigned to reprise her role as Blanche DuBois in the film version of the play d Her irreverent and often bawdy sense of humour allowed her to establish a rapport with Marlon Brando but she had an initial difficulty in working with director Elia Kazan who was displeased with the direction that Olivier had taken in shaping the character of Blanche 86 Kazan had favoured Jessica Tandy and later Olivia de Havilland over Leigh but knew she had been a success on the London stage as Blanche 85 He later commented that he did not hold her in high regard as an actress believing that she had a small talent As work progressed however he became full of admiration for the greatest determination to excel of any actress I ve known She d have crawled over broken glass if she thought it would help her performance Leigh found the role gruelling and commented to the Los Angeles Times I had nine months in the theatre of Blanche DuBois Now she s in command of me 87 Olivier accompanied her to Hollywood where he was to co star with Jennifer Jones in William Wyler s Carrie 1952 Leigh s performance in A Streetcar Named Desire won glowing reviews as well as a second Academy Award for Best Actress 88 a British Academy of Film and Television Arts BAFTA Award for Best British Actress and a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress 89 Tennessee Williams commented that Leigh brought to the role everything that I intended and much that I had never dreamed of Leigh herself had mixed feelings about her association with the character in later years she said that playing Blanche DuBois tipped me over into madness 90 1951 1960 Struggle with mental illness Edit In 1951 Leigh and Laurence Olivier performed two plays about Cleopatra William Shakespeare s Antony and Cleopatra and George Bernard Shaw s Caesar and Cleopatra alternating the play each night and winning good reviews 91 They took the productions to New York where they performed a season at the Ziegfeld Theatre into 1952 92 The reviews there were also mostly positive but film critic Kenneth Tynan angered them when he suggested that Leigh s was a mediocre talent that forced Olivier to compromise his own 93 Tynan s diatribe almost precipitated another collapse Leigh terrified of failure and intent on achieving greatness dwelt on his comments and ignored the positive reviews of other critics 94 In January 1953 Leigh travelled to Ceylon to film Elephant Walk with Peter Finch Shortly after filming commenced she had a nervous breakdown and Paramount Pictures replaced her with Elizabeth Taylor 95 Olivier returned her to their home in Britain where between periods of incoherence Leigh told him she was in love with Finch and had been having an affair with him 96 Over a period of several months she gradually recovered As a result of this episode many of the Oliviers friends learned of her problems David Niven said she had been quite quite mad Noel Coward expressed surprise in his diary that things had been bad and getting worse since 1948 or thereabouts 97 Leigh s romantic relationship with Finch began in 1948 and waxed and waned for several years ultimately flickering out as her mental condition deteriorated 98 Also in 1953 Leigh recovered sufficiently to play The Sleeping Prince with Olivier and in 1955 they performed a season at Stratford upon Avon in Shakespeare s Twelfth Night Macbeth and Titus Andronicus 99 They played to capacity houses and attracted generally good reviews Leigh s health seemingly stable John Gielgud directed Twelfth Night and wrote perhaps I will still make a good thing of that divine play especially if he will let me pull her little ladyship who is brainier than he but not a born actress out of her timidity and safeness He dares too confidently but she hardly dares at all and is terrified of overreaching her technique and doing anything that she has not killed the spontaneity of by overpractice 100 In 1955 Leigh starred in Anatole Litvak s film The Deep Blue Sea co star Kenneth More felt he had poor chemistry with Leigh during the filming 101 Photograph by Roloff Beny 1958 In 1956 Leigh took the lead role in the Noel Coward play South Sea Bubble but withdrew from the production when she became pregnant Several weeks later she miscarried and entered a period of depression that lasted for months 102 She joined Olivier for a European tour of Titus Andronicus but the tour was marred by Leigh s frequent outbursts against Olivier and other members of the company After their return to London her former husband Leigh Holman who could still exert a strong influence on her stayed with the Oliviers and helped calm her 103 In 1958 considering her marriage to be over Leigh began a relationship with actor Jack Merivale who knew of Leigh s medical condition and assured Olivier that he would care for her In 1959 when she achieved a success with the Noel Coward comedy Look After Lulu a critic working for The Times described her as beautiful delectably cool and matter of fact she is mistress of every situation 104 In 1960 she and Olivier divorced and Olivier soon married actress Joan Plowright 105 In his autobiography Olivier discussed the years of strain they had experienced because of Leigh s illness Throughout her possession by that uncannily evil monster manic depression with its deadly ever tightening spirals she retained her own individual canniness an ability to disguise her true mental condition from almost all except me for whom she could hardly be expected to take the trouble 1 1961 1967 Final years and death Edit Merivale proved to be a stabilising influence for Leigh but despite her apparent contentment she was quoted by Radie Harris as confiding that she would rather have lived a short life with Larry Olivier than face a long one without him 106 Her first husband Leigh Holman also spent considerable time with her Merivale joined her for a tour of Australia New Zealand and Latin America that lasted from July 1961 until May 1962 and Leigh enjoyed positive reviews without sharing the spotlight with Olivier 107 Though she was still beset by bouts of depression she continued to work in the theatre and in 1963 won a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical for her role in Tovarich She also appeared in the films The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone 1961 and Ship of Fools 1965 108 Leigh s last screen appearance in Ship of Fools was both a triumph and emblematic of her illnesses that were taking root Producer and director Stanley Kramer who ended up with the film planned to star Leigh but was initially unaware of her fragile mental and physical state e Later recounting her work Kramer remembered her courage in taking on the difficult role She was ill and the courage to go ahead the courage to make the film was almost unbelievable 110 Leigh s performance was tinged by paranoia and resulted in outbursts that marred her relationship with other actors although both Simone Signoret and Lee Marvin were sympathetic and understanding 111 In one unusual instance during the attempted rape scene Leigh became distraught and hit Marvin so hard with a spiked shoe that it marked his face 112 Leigh won the L Etoile de Cristal for her performance in a leading role in Ship of Fools 113 f In May 1967 Leigh was rehearsing to appear with Michael Redgrave in Edward Albee s A Delicate Balance when her tuberculosis resurfaced 114 Following several weeks of rest she seemed to recover On the night of 7 July 1967 Merivale left her as usual at their Eaton Square flat to perform in a play and he returned home just before midnight to find her asleep About 30 minutes later by now 8 July he entered the bedroom and discovered her body on the floor She had been attempting to walk to the bathroom and as her lungs filled with liquid she collapsed and suffocated 115 Merivale first contacted her family and later was able to reach Olivier who was receiving treatment for prostate cancer in a nearby hospital 116 In his autobiography Olivier described his grievous anguish as he immediately travelled to Leigh s residence to find that Merivale had moved her body onto the bed Olivier paid his respects and stood and prayed for forgiveness for all the evils that had sprung up between us 117 before helping Merivale make funeral arrangements Olivier stayed until her body was removed from the flat 116 g Her death was publicly announced on 8 July and the lights of every theatre in central London were extinguished for an hour 119 A Catholic service for Leigh was held at St Mary s Church Cadogan Street London Her funeral was attended by the luminaries of British stage and screen 120 According to the provisions of her will Leigh was cremated at the Golders Green Crematorium and her ashes were scattered on the lake at her summer home Tickerage Mill near Blackboys East Sussex England 121 A memorial service was held at St Martin in the Fields with a final tribute read by John Gielgud 122 In 1968 Leigh became the first actress honoured in the United States by The Friends of the Libraries at the University of Southern California 123 The ceremony was conducted as a memorial service with selections from her films shown and tributes provided by such associates as George Cukor who screened the tests that Leigh had made for Gone with the Wind the first time the screen tests had been seen in 30 years 124 Legacy Edit Regarded as one of the most beautiful actresses of her era Leigh was also acclaimed for her performances on the stage and the screen Leigh was considered to be one of the most beautiful actresses of her day and her directors emphasised this in most of her films When asked if she believed her beauty had been an impediment to being taken seriously as an actress she said People think that if you look fairly reasonable you can t possibly act and as I only care about acting I think beauty can be a great handicap if you really want to look like the part you re playing which isn t necessarily like you 30 Director George Cukor described Leigh as a consummate actress hampered by beauty 125 and Laurence Olivier said that critics should give her credit for being an actress and not go on forever letting their judgments be distorted by her great beauty 126 Garson Kanin shared their viewpoint and described Leigh as a stunner whose ravishing beauty often tended to obscure her staggering achievements as an actress Great beauties are infrequently great actresses simply because they don t need to be Vivien was different ambitious persevering serious often inspired 127 Leigh explained that she played as many different parts as possible in an attempt to learn her craft and to dispel prejudice about her abilities She believed that comedy was more difficult to play than drama because it required more precise timing and said that more emphasis should be placed upon comedy as part of an actor s training Nearing the end of her career which ranged from Noel Coward comedies to Shakespearean tragedies she observed It s much easier to make people cry than to make them laugh 30 Her early performances brought her immediate success in Britain but she remained largely unknown in other parts of the world until the release of Gone with the Wind In December 1939 film critic Frank Nugent wrote in The New York Times Miss Leigh s Scarlett has vindicated the absurd talent quest that indirectly turned her up She is so perfectly designed for the part by art and nature that any other actress in the role would be inconceivable 128 and as her fame escalated she was featured on the cover of Time magazine as Scarlett In 1969 critic Andrew Sarris commented that the success of the film had been largely due to the inspired casting of Leigh 129 and in 1998 wrote that she lives in our minds and memories as a dynamic force rather than as a static presence 130 Film historian and critic Leonard Maltin described the film as one of the all time greats writing in 1998 that Leigh brilliantly played her role 131 Her performance in the West End production of A Streetcar Named Desire described by the theatre writer Phyllis Hartnoll as proof of greater powers as an actress than she had hitherto shown led to a lengthy period during which she was considered one of the finest actresses in British theatre 132 Discussing the subsequent film version Pauline Kael wrote that Leigh and Marlon Brando gave two of the greatest performances ever put on film and that Leigh s was one of those rare performances that can truly be said to evoke both fear and pity 133 English Heritage blue plaque at Leigh s final home at 54 Eaton Square in Belgravia Her greatest critic was Kenneth Tynan who ridiculed Leigh s performance opposite Olivier in the 1955 production of Titus Andronicus commenting that she receives the news that she is about to be ravished on her husband s corpse with little more than the mild annoyance of one who would have preferred foam rubber 134 He was also critical of her reinterpretation of Lady Macbeth in 1955 saying that her performance was insubstantial and lacked the necessary fury demanded of the role 135 After her death however Tynan revised his opinion describing his earlier criticism as one of the worst errors of judgment he had ever made He came to believe that Leigh s interpretation in which Lady Macbeth uses her sexual allure to keep Macbeth enthralled made more sense than the usual battle axe portrayal of the character h In a survey of theatre critics conducted shortly after Leigh s death several named her performance as Lady Macbeth as one of her greatest achievements in theatre 136 In 1969 a plaque to Leigh was placed in the Actors Church St Paul s Covent Garden London In 1985 a portrait of her was included in a series of United Kingdom postage stamps along with Sir Alfred Hitchcock Sir Charlie Chaplin Peter Sellers and David Niven to commemorate British Film Year 137 In April 1996 she appeared in the Centenary of Cinema stamp issue with Sir Laurence Olivier and in April 2013 was again included in another series this time celebrating the 100th anniversary of her birth 138 The British Library in London purchased the papers of Olivier from his estate in 1999 Known as The Laurence Olivier Archive the collection includes many of Leigh s personal papers including numerous letters she wrote to Olivier The papers of Leigh including letters photographs contracts and diaries are owned by her daughter Mrs Suzanne Farrington In 1994 the National Library of Australia purchased a photograph album monogrammed L amp V O and believed to have belonged to the Oliviers containing 573 photographs of the couple during their 1948 tour of Australia It is now held as part of the record of the history of the performing arts in Australia 139 In 2013 an archive of Leigh s letters diaries photographs annotated film and theatre scripts and her numerous awards was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London 140 Also in 2013 Leigh was among the ten people selected by the Royal Mail for their Great Britons commemorative postage stamp issue 141 In popular culture Edit Leigh was portrayed by American actress Morgan Brittany in The Day of the Locust 1975 Gable and Lombard 1976 and The Scarlett O Hara War 1980 142 Julia Ormond played Leigh in My Week with Marilyn 2011 143 Leigh was also portrayed by Katie McGuinness in the Netflix miniseries Hollywood 2020 144 Filmography EditMain article Vivien Leigh on stage and screenAccolades EditOrganizations i Year j Category Work ResultAcademy Awards 1940 Best Actress Gone with the Wind Won1952 A Streetcar Named Desire WonBAFTA Awards 1953 Best Film British Actress WonFaro Island Film Festival 1939 Audience Award for Best Actress Gone with the Wind NominatedGolden Globe Awards 1952 Best Actress in a Motion Picture Drama A Streetcar Named Desire NominatedNational Board of Review of Motion Pictures Awards 1940 Best Acting Gone with the Wind amp Waterloo Bridge WonNew York Film Critics Circle Awards 1939 Best Actress Gone with the Wind Won1951 A Streetcar Named Desire WonOnline Film amp Television Association Awards 2001 Film Hall of Fame Induction HonoredSant Jordi Awards 1957 Special Award for Acting A Streetcar Named Desire HonoredVenice Film Festival 1951 Volpi Cup for Best Actress WonHollywood Walk of Fame 1960 Hollywood Walk of Fame Star k HonoredReferences EditInformational notes Holman was granted custody of their child after their divorce 19 Leigh became a grandmother when Suzanne decades later had three sons 20 For stage names Gliddon proposed Susan then Suzanne Hartley and Mary Hartley before the more outlandish April Morn and April Maugham 23 After Olivier enrolled in the Fleet Air Arm he served for two years as a pilot resigning his commission in 1943 as a lieutenant commander 60 Ultimately Ralph Richardson and others dissuaded him convincing Olivier that his contribution to the war effort should be on stage and in film 61 Leigh s fee of 100 000 for A Streetcar Named Desire made her the highest paid British actress in 1951 her costar Marlon Brando was paid 75 000 for his role as Stanley Kowalski 85 At one point in the pre production Katharine Hepburn was considered for the role of Mary Treadwell but dropped out and was replaced by Leigh 109 L Etoile de Cristal was the French equivalent of the Oscar 113 Leigh s death certificate gave her date of death as 8 July 1967 although she may have died before midnight the night before 118 In a 1983 interview after his death Kenneth Tynan s widow derided her husband s vindictive campaign against Leigh as completely unnecessary Olivier dismissed it as jealousy Leigh however was adversely affected by his comments 135 Awards festivals honors and other miscellaneous organizations are listed in alphabetical order Year in which award ceremony was held Motion Picture Category Citations a b Olivier 1982 p 174 Briggs 1992 p 338 Bean 2013 pp 20 21 Bean 2013 p 20 Strachan 2018 p 3 a b Vickers 1988 p 6 General Register Office of England and Wales Marriages June quarter 1912 Kensington vol 1a p 426 Vickers 1988 p 9 Walker 1987 p 25 Bean 2013 p 21 Taylor 1984 p 32 Walker 1987 p 32 Edwards 1978 pp 12 19 Taylor 1984 pp 33 34 Edwards 1978 pp 25 30 Walker 1987 p 39 Walker 1984 pp 38 39 Vivien Leigh profile Turner Classic Movies Retrieved 13 October 2013 Capua 2003 p 40 Bean 2013 p 167 Bean 2013 p 24 a b Taylor 1984 p 38 Capua 2003 p 19 Edwards 1978 pp 30 43 Coleman 2005 p 74 Coleman 2005 p 75 Edwards 1978 pp 50 55 Taylor 1984 p 40 Bean 2013 pp 26 27 a b c Funke and Boothe 1983 p 82 Lasky 1978 p 13 Vickers 1988 p 62 Walker 1987 pp 75 76 a b Taylor 1984 p 14 Coleman 2005 pp 76 77 90 94 95 Coleman 2005 p 92 Coleman 2005 pp 97 98 Walker 1987 p 92 Walker 1987 p 93 Walker 1987 p 95 Coleman 2005 p 97 Berg 1989 p 323 Bean 2013 p 52 Walker 1987 p 113 Bean 2013 pp 51 53 Taylor 1984 p 15 Haver 1980 p 259 Walker 1987 p 124 a b Taylor 1984 p 22 Howard 1984 p 19 a b c Taylor 1984 pp 22 23 Thomas Bob quoting Olivia de Havilland Official biography of Olivier benefits from cache of actor s letters St Louis Post Dispatch The Associated Press 4 January 2006 p E1 Gone with the Wind Archived 22 December 2014 at archive today Academy Awards Database Oscars org Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Retrieved 15 January 2015 1939 Awards nyfcc com New York Film Critics Circle Retrieved 15 January 2015 Walker 1987 pp 150 151 McGilligan 2003 p 238 Vickers 1988 p 118 Bean 2013 pp 73 74 Vivien Leigh Biography Archived 15 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine Yahoo Movies Retrieved 13 October 2012 Vickers 1988 p 152 Spoto 2001 pp 147 148 Walker 1987 p 157 Edwards 1978 p 127 Holden 1989 pp 189 190 Taylor 1984 p 59 Bean 2013 pp 80 81 Walker 1987 p 65 Holden 1989 pp 202 205 325 a b Click The National Picture Monthly Hollywood s Manpower March 1943 p 17 Author not credited Walker 1987 pp 166 167 Vickers 1988 p 167 Walker 1987 p 170 Holden 1989 pp 221 222 Bean 2013 p 115 Bean 2013 p 111 Spoto 2001 p 327 Spoto 2001 p 216 Spoto 2001 pp 217 218 Holden 1989 p 295 Spoto 2001 p 218 Bean 2013 pp 125 126 Spoto 2001 pp 218 219 Shellard 2003 p 126 Coleman 2005 pp 227 231 Holden 1989 p 312 a b Walker 1987 p 167 Thomas 1974 p 67 Coleman 2005 pp 233 236 Taylor 1984 p 91 Bean 2013 p 145 Holden 1989 pp 312 313 Walker 1987 pp 204 205 Capua 2003 p 119 Tynan 1961 p 9 Edwards 1978 pp 196 197 Taylor 1984 pp 93 94 Walker 1987 p 213 Coleman 2005 pp 254 263 Brooks Richard Olivier Worn Out by Love and Lust of Vivien Leigh The Sunday Times 7 August 2005 Password required Retrieved 27 July 2008 Capua 2003 p 131 Coleman 2005 p 271 More 1978 pp 163 167 Capua 2003 pp 138 139 Walker 1987 p 222 Edwards 1978 pp 219 234 239 Spoto 2001 p 301 Walker 1987 p 290 Walker 1987 pp 258 259 Edwards 1978 pp 266 272 Andersen 1997 pp 552 553 Steinberg Jay Articles Ship of Fools Turner Classic Movies Retrieved 18 January 2015 David 1995 p 46 Walker 1987 p 281 a b Bean 2013 p 279 Actress Vivien Leigh Dies At 53 In London Daytona Beach Sunday News Journal 9 July 1967 Retrieved 4 October 2016 Edwards 1978 pp 304 305 a b Edwards 1978 p 284 Olivier 1982 pp 273 274 Coleman 2005 p 384 Edge Simon Salacious secrets lay behind the glamorous life of Gone With the Wind star Vivien Leigh Sunday Express 3 November 2013 Retrieved 25 January 2015 Spoto 2001 p 346 Walker 1987 p 297 Bean 2013 p 243 Edwards 1978 p 306 Bean 2013 p 244 Shipman 1988 p 126 Coleman 2005 p 227 Shipman 1988 p 125 Haver 1980 p 305 Ebert Roger Vivien Leigh Roger Ebert com quoting Andrew Sarris The American Cinema Directors and Directions 1929 1968 Retrieved 6 January 2006 Reviews on the Web quotingAndrew Sarris in You Ain t Heard Nothin Yet The American Talking Film History amp Memory 1927 1949 The New York Times 3 May 1998 Retrieved 11 January 2006 Maltin 1997 p 522 Hartnoll 1972 p 301 Kael 1982 p 564 Ellis Samantha Peter Brook s Titus Andronicus August 1955 quoting Kenneth Tynan The Guardian 23 June 2003 Retrieved 7 January 2005 a b Bean 2013 p 181 Taylor 1984 p 99 Walker 1987 pp 303 304 Vivien Leigh Centenary Great Britons Stamps BFDC Retrieved 4 May 2020 Laurence Olivier Vivien Leigh Gateways National Library of Australia ISSN 1443 0568 14 March 1995 Retrieved 7 January 2006 Vivien Leigh archive acquired by V amp A BBC News 14 August 2013 Royal Mail celebrates Great Britons with launch of latest special stamp collection Royal Mail 17 April 2013 Retrieved 29 September 2022 British Film Institute Morgan Brittany New My Week With Marilyn Pics Include Julia Ormond as Vivien Leigh NBC Retrieved 4 May 2020 Montgomery Hugh 29 April 2020 Hollywood review This lavish period fantasy is a disaster BBC Retrieved 29 April 2020 Bibliography Andersen Christopher P An Affair to Remember The Remarkable Love Story of Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy Glasgow Scotland William Morrow amp Co 1997 ISBN 978 0 688 15311 3 Bean Kendra Vivien Leigh An Intimate Portrait Philadelphia Pennsylvania Running Press 2013 ISBN 978 0 7624 5099 2 Berg A Scott Goldwyn London Sphere Books 1989 ISBN 0 7474 0593 X Briggs Asa ed A Dictionary of Twentieth Century World Biography London Book Club Associates 1992 ISBN 978 0 19 211679 6 Capua Michelangelo Vivien Leigh A Biography Jefferson North Carolina McFarland amp Company 2003 ISBN 978 0 7864 1497 0 Coleman Terry Olivier The Authorised Biography London Bloomsbury Publishing 2005 ISBN 0 7475 8306 4 David Catherine Simone Signoret New York Overlook Press 1995 ISBN 978 0 87951 581 2 Edwards Anne Vivien Leigh A Biography London Coronet Books 1978 edition ISBN 0 340 23024 X Funke Lewis and John E Boothe eds Actors Talk about Acting Fourteen Intimate Interviews Volume 2 London Avon Books 1983 First edition 1961 ISBN 978 0 380 01006 6 Fury David Maureen O Sullivan No Average Jane Minneapolis Minnesota Artist s Press 2006 ISBN 0 924556 06 4 Hartnoll Phyllis The Concise Companion to the Theatre Peachtree City Georgia United States Omega Books 1972 ISBN 1 85007 044 X Haver Ronald David O Selznick s Hollywood New York Bonanza Books 1980 ISBN 0 517 47665 7 Holden Anthony Olivier London Sphere Books Limited 1989 ISBN 0 7221 4857 7 Howard Ronald In Search of My Father A Portrait of Leslie Howard London St Martin s Press 1984 ISBN 0 312 41161 8 Kael Pauline 5001 Nights at the Movies Minneapolis Minnesota Zenith Books 1982 ISBN 0 09 933550 6 Lasky Jr Jesse L Love Scene The story of Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh Brighton Angus amp Robertson 1978 ISBN 978 0 690 01413 6 Maltin Leonard 1998 Movie and Video Guide New York Signet Books 1997 ISBN 978 0 452 25993 5 McGilligan Patrick Alfred Hitchcock A Life in Darkness and Light Chichester West Sussex UK Wiley Press 2003 ISBN 0 470 86973 9 More Kenneth More or Less London Hodder amp Staughton 1978 ISBN 978 0 340 22603 2 Olivier Laurence Confessions of an Actor New York Simon amp Schuster 1982 ISBN 0 14 006888 0 Selznick David O and Rudy Behlmer editor Memo from David O Selznick New York Modern Library 2000 ISBN 0 375 75531 4 Shellard Dominic Kenneth Tynan A Life London Yale University Press 2003 ISBN 978 0 300 09919 5 Shipman David Movie Talk New York St Martin s Press 1988 ISBN 0 312 03403 2 Spoto Donald Laurence Olivier A Biography London Cooper Square Press 2001 ISBN 978 0 8154 1146 8 Strachan Alan Dark Star A Biography of Vivien Leigh London and New York I B Tauris 2018 ISBN 978 1 78831 208 0 Taylor John Russell Vivien Leigh London Elm Tree Books 1984 ISBN 0 241 11333 4 Thomas Bob Marlon Portrait of the Rebel as an Artist New York Random House 1973 ISBN 978 0 394 48728 1 Tynan Kenneth Curtains Selections from the Drama Criticism and Related Writings London Atheneum 1961 Vickers Hugo Vivien Leigh A Biography London Little Brown and Company 1988 edition ISBN 978 0 330 31166 3 Walker Alexander Vivien The Life of Vivien Leigh New York Grove Press 1987 ISBN 0 8021 3259 6 External links Edit Wikimedia Commons has media related to Vivien Leigh category Vivien Leigh com Archived 2 February 2006 Accessed 8 July 2020 Viv amp Larry Vivien Leigh at the Internet Broadway Database Vivien Leigh at IMDb Vivien Leigh at the TCM Movie Database Vivien Leigh at the BFI s Screenonline University of Bristol Theatre Collection University of Bristol Australian National Library photographs from Australian tour Portals Biography Film Theater Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Vivien Leigh amp oldid 1129669476, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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