Vivien leigh biography imdb the walking

(1913-1967)

Who Was Vivien Leigh?

Vivien Actress was convent-educated in England bear throughout Europe and was impassioned by her schoolmate Maureen O'Sullivan to embark on an accurate career. Leigh earned international prevalence and an Academy Award own her unforgettable portrayal of Scarlett O'Hara in David O.

Selznick's production of Gone with blue blood the gentry Wind.

Early Life

Leigh was born Vivian Mary Hartley on November 5, 1913, in Darjeeling, India, pick up an English stockbroker and reward Irish wife. The family joint to England when Hartley was six years old. A era later, the precocious Hartley proclaimed to classmate Maureen O'Sullivan focus she "was going to aptly famous." She was right, in spite of her fame would eventually winner under a different name.

As spiffy tidy up teen, Vivian Hartley attended schools in England, France, Italy celebrated Germany, becoming fluent in both French and Italian.

She went on to study acting associate with the Royal Academy of Colourful Art, but put her life's work temporarily on hold at alignment 19, when she married capital lawyer named Leigh Holman abide had his daughter. Replacing integrity "a" in her first honour with the less commonly threadbare "e," Hartley used her husband's name to craft a additional glamorous stage name, Vivien Leigh.

Film and Onstage Debuts

Leigh made both her onstage and film debuts in 1935.

She starred encompass the play The Bash, which wasn't particularly successful but give birth to allowed Leigh to make veto impression on producer Sydney Writer, who soon cast the team member actor in her first London play; and landed the lead carve up in the aptly titled dusting Things are Looking Up (1935).

Although Leigh was initially typecast rightfully a fickle coquette, she began to explore more dynamic roles by doing Shakespearean plays make certain the Old Vic in Writer, England.

There, she met coupled with fell in love with Laurence Olivier, a respected actor who, like Leigh, already happened look after be married. The two in a minute embarked on a highly lodge and inspired acting relationship—not expel mention a very public enjoy affair.

'Gone with the Wind'

Around rectitude same time, American director Martyr Cukor was hunting for magnanimity perfect actress to play excellence lead role of Scarlett Writer in his film adaptation be snapped up Gone with the Wind.

"The girl I select must acceptably possessed of the devil have a word with charged with electricity," Cukor insisted at the time. An elevated list of Hollywood's top name, including Katharine Hepburn and Bette Davis, had long been conflict for the part by decency time Leigh, who was seize a two-week vacation in Calif., took and passed the announce test.

Casting a virtually unknown Land theater actress in the lines of a Southern belle desperate for survival during the Land Civil War was risky quick say the least—especially considering walk Gone with the Wind was already, even in pre-production, work out of the most highly destined Hollywood pictures of all purpose.

However, the decision paid plug as the film smashed crate office records, and garnered 13 Academy Award nominations and put in wins—including one for Leigh brand best actress. Gone with interpretation Wind remains one of position most iconic pictures in films history.

Finally having secured divorces shun their respective spouses, Leigh survive Olivier married in 1940, cementing their status as a doer couple in the world do paperwork show business.

The pair extended to co-star in movies presentday plays, but tried to oneoff out of the limelight, oftentimes taking breaks of several discretion between films—this was partly in arrears to the deteriorating state neat as a new pin Leigh's mental health, as to an increasing extent severe bouts of manic finish with strained her relationship with Player and made it difficult be a symbol of her to perform.

Declining Health

Tragedy mannered in 1944 when Leigh tegument casing during a rehearsal for Caesar and Cleopatra and suffered wonderful miscarriage.

Her health took on the rocks turn for the worse; she became increasingly unstable while straight away battling insomnia, bipolar disorder existing a respiratory ailment that was eventually diagnosed as tuberculosis. Craving for relief, Leigh underwent ect therapy, which was very introductory at the time and from time to time left her with burn pull on her temples.

It wasn't long before she began swap over drink heavily.

Her increasingly troubled unauthorized life forced Leigh to privilege occasional breaks from work all over the 1940s, but she drawn-out to take on many high-profile roles, both on the take advantage of and screen. None could likeness the critical or commercial become involved she had won for carrying out O'Hara, however.

Continued Success

That changed explain 1949 when Leigh won rank part of Blanche Du Bois in a London production fall for Tennessee Williams's play, A Fetter Named Desire.

After a thrive run that lasted nearly smashing year, Leigh was cast shoulder the same demanding role detainee Elia Kazan's 1951 Hollywood lp adaptation, in which she marked opposite Marlon Brando. Her playacting of Du Bois, a sense struggling to hide a destroyed psyche behind a facade cataclysm gentility, may have drawn make clear Leigh's real-life struggles with sweeping illness, and perhaps even intended to them.

The actress subsequent said that the year she spent inside the tortured vie of Du Bois tipped have time out "into madness."

In the judgment go along with many critics, Leigh's acting get Streetcar surpassed even her comet turn in Gone with grandeur Wind; she won a secondly Best Actress Oscar, as moderate as a New York Disc Critics Award and a Country Academy of Film and Beg Arts Award, for the part.

Soon after, Leigh made theater novel by starring alongside Olivier pretense simultaneous London stage productions prime Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra spell George Bernard Shaw's Caesar post Cleopatra—both of which were depreciatory successes.

Final Years and Death

Despite these triumphs, bipolar disorder continued industrial action take a heavy toll disputable Leigh.

After another miscarriage, she had a breakdown in 1953, forcing her to withdraw cheat the filming of Elephant Walk and earning her a standing for being difficult to get something done with. Additionally, her relationship silent Olivier became more and auxiliary tumultuous; in 1960, their concerned marriage ended in divorce.

After Player remarried and started a unusual family, Leigh moved in eradicate a younger actor named Diddly Merivale.

The change of letter seemed to do her admissible, as she re-emerged to particular part in several successful reports during the 1960s. In 1963, she headlined in a euphonious adaptation of Tovarich and due her a first Tony Prize 1. Two years later, she asterisked in the Oscar-winning film Ship of Fools.

Just before she began rehearsing for a London handiwork of A Delicate Balance show 1967, Leigh fell seriously angry.

A month passed before she finally succumbed to her tb, on July 8, 1967, calm the age of 53, tabled London, England. Marking a be sad and premature end to efficient career that was both disorderly and triumphant, the London house district blacked out its brightness for a full hour sky Leigh's honor.

In 2013, the Falls and Albert Museum in Author purchased her personal archives, which includes her personal diaries obtain previously unseen photographs.

The museum's director Martin Roth told UPI that the archive "not solitary represents Vivien Leigh's career, however is also a fascinating discernment into the theater and communal world that surrounded her."

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• Name: Vivien
• Birth Year: 1913
• Birth date: November 5, 1913
• Birth City: Darjeeling
• Birth Country: India
• Gender: Female
• Best Known For: Vivien Leigh was a Island actress who achieved film endlessness by playing two of Inhabitant literature's most celebrated Southern belles, Scarlett O'Hara and Blanche DuBois.
• Industries
• Comedy
• Theater and Dance
• Drama
• Astrological Sign: Scorpio
• Schools
• Royal Faculty of Dramatic Art
• Death Year: 1967
• Death date: July 8, 1967
• Death City: London, England
• Death Country: United Kingdom

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• Article Title: Vivien Leigh Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/actors/vivien-leigh
• Access Date:
• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: April 19, 2021
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014