Actress, born in Darjeeling, NE India. She had a convent education, then studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London. She became an overnight sensation in the comedy The Mask of Virtue (1935). She married Laurence Olivier in 1940, and appeared opposite him in numerous classical plays, including Romeo and Juliet and Antony and Cleopatra. She is best remembered for her Oscar-winning performance as Scarlett O'Hara in the film Gone With the Wind (1939). Other major starring roles followed, notably in Lady Hamilton (1941), Anna Karenina (1948), and A Streetcar Named Desire (1951, Oscar). Manic depression and ill health marred her career and her marriage, and she was divorced from Olivier in 1961.
| Vivien Leigh | |
|
from the film Fire Over England (1937) |
|
| Born |
November 5, 1913 Darjeeling, West Bengal, British India (now India) |
| Died |
July 8, 1967 London, England |
|
Academy Awards |
Best Actress 1939 Gone With the Wind 1951 A Streetcar Named Desire |
Vivien Leigh (November 5, 1913 – July 8, 1967) was an English actress.
Lauded for her beauty, Leigh felt that it sometimes prevented her from being taken seriously as an actress, but ill health proved to be her greatest obstacle. She and Olivier divorced in 1960, and Leigh worked sporadically in film and theatre until her death from tuberculosis.
Early life and acting career
Leigh was born Vivian Mary Hartley in Darjeeling, British India to Ernest Hartley, an officer in the Indian Cavalry who was of English parentage, and Gertrude Robinson Yackje, who was of French and Irish descent.
In late 1931 she met Herbert Leigh Holman, known as Leigh, a barrister thirteen years her senior. She engaged an agent, John Gliddon, who believed that the name "Vivian Holman" was not suitable for an actress, and after rejecting his suggestion, "April Morn", she took "Vivian Leigh" as her professional name.
Cast in the play The Mask of Virtue in 1935, Leigh received excellent reviews followed by interviews and newspaper articles, among them one 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 that became characteristic of her. Korda, who attended her opening-night performance, admitted his error and signed her to a film contract, with the spelling of her name revised to "Vivien Leigh". 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 folded soon after. In 1960 Leigh recalled her ambivalence towards her first experience of critical acclaim and sudden fame, commenting, "some critics saw fit to be as foolish as to say that I was a great actress.
Meeting Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier saw Leigh in The Mask of Virtue, and a friendship developed after he congratulated her on her performance. While playing lovers in the film Fire Over England (1937), Olivier and Leigh developed a strong attraction, and after filming was completed, they began an affair. During this time Leigh read the Margaret Mitchell novel Gone with the Wind and instructed her American agent to suggest her to David O. 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.
Leigh played Ophelia to Olivier's Hamlet in an Old Vic Theatre production, and Olivier later recalled an incident during which her mood rapidly changed as she was quietly preparing to go onstage.
Leigh appeared with Robert Taylor, Lionel Barrymore and Maureen O'Sullivan in A Yank at Oxford (1938), the first of her films to receive attention in the United States.
Achieving international success
Olivier had been attempting to broaden his film career; 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 it, saying she would only play Cathy, a role already assigned to Merle Oberon. Leigh's American agent was the London representative of the Myron Selznick Agency (Myron was David's brother), and in February 1938 she asked that her name be placed in consideration for the role of Scarlett. Between February and August, Selznick rented all of her English pictures, and by August he was in negotiation with producer Alexander Korda, to whom Leigh was under contract, for her services later that year. Leigh travelled to Los Angeles, ostensibly to be with Olivier. When Leigh met Olivier's American agent Myron Selznick, he felt that she possessed the qualities his brother David O. Myron Selznick took Leigh and Olivier to the set where the burning of the Atlanta Depot scene was being filmed, and introduced Leigh. The following day, Leigh read a scene for Selznick, who organised a screen test and wrote to his wife, "She's the Scarlett dark horse and looks damn good. The director George Cukor concurred and praised the "incredible wildness" of Leigh, who was given the part soon after.
Filming proved difficult for Leigh;
In 2006 de Havilland responded to claims of Leigh's manic behaviour during filming Gone with the Wind, published in a biography of Laurence Olivier.
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. Among the ten Academy Awards won by Gone with the Wind was a Best Actress award for Leigh, who also won a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress.
Marriage and joint projects
In February 1940 Jill Esmond agreed to divorce Olivier, and Holman also agreed to divorce Leigh, although they maintained a strong friendship for the rest of Leigh's life. Esmond was granted custody of Tarquin, her son with Olivier, and Holman was granted custody of Suzanne, his daughter with Leigh. On August 30 Olivier and Leigh were married in Santa Barbara, California, in a ceremony attended only by their witnesses, Katharine Hepburn and Garson Kanin.
Leigh hoped to star with Olivier and made a screentest for Rebecca, which was to be directed by Alfred Hitchcock with Olivier in the leading role, but after viewing her screentest 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. He also refused to allow her to join Olivier in Pride and Prejudice (1940), and Greer Garson took the part Leigh had envisioned for herself. 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. Leigh's top-billing reflected her status in Hollywood, and despite her reluctance to participate without Olivier, the film proved to be popular with audiences and critics. The New York press discussed the adulterous nature that had marked the beginning of Olivier and Leigh's relationship, and questioned their ethics in not returning to England to help with the war effort, and the critics were hostile in their assessment of the production. 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." 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."
They filmed That Hamilton Woman (1941) with Olivier as Horatio Nelson and Leigh as Emma Hamilton.
The Oliviers returned to England, and Leigh toured through North Africa in 1943, performing for troops before falling ill with a persistent cough and fevers. Olivier 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.
In 1947 Olivier was knighted, and Leigh accompanied him to Buckingham Palace for the investiture.
By 1948 Olivier was on the Board of Directors for the Old Vic Theatre, and he and Leigh embarked on a tour of Australia and New Zealand to raise funds for the theatre. During their six-month tour, Olivier performed 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". Olivier slapped her face, and Leigh slapped him in return and swore at him before she made her way to the stage.
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.
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 The School for Scandal and Antigone, and Olivier was contracted to direct. Containing a rape scene and references to promiscuity and homosexuality, the play was destined to be controversial, and the media discussion about its suitability added to Leigh's anxiety, but she believed strongly in the importance of the work. Priestley denounced the play and Leigh's performance, and the critic Kenneth Tynan 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 and sensationalist story, rather than the Greek tragedy that they envisioned, but the play also had strong supporters, among them Noël Coward who described Leigh as "magnificent".
After 326 performances Leigh finished her run; Leigh found the role gruelling and commented to the Los Angeles Times, "I had nine months in the theatre of Blanche DuBois. The film won glowing reviews for her, and she won a second Academy Award for Best Actress, a BAFTA Award and a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress. Tennessee Williams commented that Leigh brought to the role "everything that I intended, and much that I had never dreamed of", but in later years, Leigh would say that playing Blanche DuBois "tipped me over into madness".
Continuing illness
In 1951, Leigh and 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. The reviews there were also mostly positive, but the critic Kenneth Tynan angered them when he suggested that Leigh's was a mediocre talent which forced Olivier to compromise his own.
In January 1953 Leigh travelled to Ceylon to film Elephant Walk with Peter Finch. Olivier returned her to their home in England, where between periods of incoherence, Leigh told him that she was in love with Finch, and had been having an affair with him.
Leigh recovered sufficiently to play The Sleeping Prince with Olivier in 1953, and in 1955 they performed a season at Stratford-upon-Avon in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, Macbeth and Titus Andronicus. They played to capacity houses and attracted generally good reviews, Leigh's health seemingly stable. She joined Olivier for a European tour with 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 continued to exert a strong influence over her, stayed with the Oliviers and helped calm her.
In 1958, considering her marriage to be over, Leigh began a relationship with the actor Jack Merivale, who knew of Leigh's medical condition and assured Olivier he would care for her.
In 1960 she and Olivier divorced, and Olivier married the actress Joan Plowright. In his autobiography he discussed the years of problems they had experienced because of Leigh's illness, writing, "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."
Final years and death
Merivale proved to be a stable 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". 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 Olivier sharing the spotlight with her. 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.
Critical comments
Vivien Leigh was considered one of the most beautiful actresses of her day, and her directors emphasised this in most of her films.
George Cukor commented that Leigh was a "consummate actress, hampered by beauty", and Laurence Olivier said that critics should "give her credit for being an actress and not go on forever letting their judgements be distorted by her great beauty." Garson Kanin shared their viewpoint and described Leigh as "a stunner whose ravishing beauty often tended to obscure her staggering achievements as an actress.
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. In December 1939 the New York Times wrote, "Miss Leigh's Scarlett has vindicated the absurd talent quest that indirectly turned her up. In 1969 critic Andrew Sarris commented that the success of the film had been largely due to "the inspired casting" of Leigh, and in 1998 wrote that "she lives in our minds and memories as a dynamic force rather than as a static presence." Leonard Maltin described the film as one of the all-time greats, writing in 1998 that Leigh "brilliantly played" her role. 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."
Kenneth Tynan 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." In a survey of theatre critics conducted shortly after Leigh's death, several named it as one of her greatest achievements in theatre.
In 1969 a plaque to Leigh was placed in the actors' church, St Paul's, Covent Garden, and in 1985 a portrait of her was included in a series of postage stamps, along with Alfred Hitchcock, Charles Chaplin, Peter Sellers and David Niven to commemorate "British Film Year". Known as The Laurence Olivier Archive, the collection includes many of Vivien Leigh's personal papers, including numerous letters written by her to Olivier.
Awards and nominations
| Year | Award | Work |
|---|---|---|
| 1939 |
Academy Award for Best Actress (won) New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress (won) |
Gone With the Wind |
| 1952 |
Academy Award for Best Actress (won) BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role (won) Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama (nominated) New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress (won) Venice Film Festival - Volpi Cup (won) |
A Streetcar Named Desire |
| 1963 | Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical (won) | Tovarich |
|
Preceded by: Bette Davis for Jezebel |
Academy Award for Best Actress 1939 for Gone with the Wind |
Succeeded by: Ginger Rogers for Kitty Foyle |
|
Preceded by: Judy Holliday for Born Yesterday |
Academy Award for Best Actress 1951 for A Streetcar Named Desire |
Succeeded by: Shirley Booth for Come Back, Little Sheba |
|
Preceded by: (tie) Anna Maria Alberghetti for Carnival and Diahann Carroll for No Strings |
Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical 1963 for Tovarich |
Succeeded by: Carol Channing for Hello, Dolly! |
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