Download or read book The Real Life of Laurence Olivier written by Roger Lewis and published by Arrow Books. This book was released on 2007 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Laurence Olivier was both an enchanter and a force of nature. Most of all, Olivier's life and work become a love story - the tale of the relationship with Vivien Leigh, who was destroyed by the extent of her passion for him, as he himself was cast into a frenzy of guilt and disillusionment.
Download or read book The Real Life of Laurence Olivier written by Roger Lewis and published by Random House (UK). This book was released on 1997 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The true story of Laurence Olivier has not been told. Roger Lewis here evaluates his relationships and motives. The boigraphy probes, for the first time, the cruelties and deceptions behind the triumphant progression. Beyond the Englishman, the heroism, the bravura acting; beyond the changes in his appearance - noses, wigs, walks - what mattered was inside; the sensibility, the spirit. The key to all this was the human tragedy of Olivier's relationship with Vivien Leigh, the supreme mutually destructive love affair of the twentieth century. Lewis shows how she transformed him, how as a woman simultaneously profound - or dreamily remote and shallow -she tempted him to abandon control, how she was the only person in Olivier's life who was too much for him."
Download or read book Laurence Olivier written by Donald Spoto and published by HarperPrism. This book was released on 1993-03-25 with total page 596 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A rich, definitive biography of Laurence Olivier, the most famous actor of the century. Bestselling biographer Donald Spoto brings together the many strands of the legend--both onstage and off--resulting in a penetrating look at the enigmatic man and his extraordinary work. 16-page photo insert.
Download or read book The Real Life Of Laurence Olivier written by Roger Lewis and published by . This book was released on 2024-09-16 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Lord Larry written by Michael Munn and published by Anova Books. This book was released on 2007-07 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This exciting new biography of Laurence Olivier reveals the life, work and personality of arguably one of the greatest actors of all time as well as a fascinating secret. Michael Munn's candid analysis is based on his association with Olivier through formal and informal conversations, in which the great actor spoke candidly to Munn about life, sex, secrets and Shakespeare. Michael Munn first met Olivier in 1971 and from then, the two became great friends. At the peak of their friendship, Olivier revealed a secret to him which he had told very few, mainly because of his lifelong fear of alienating the American public, but most curious of all, he kept it to himself out of an impulse not to be thought as a hero, which greatly contradicted his famously incredible ego. This secret has been disclosed by Munn for the first time and reveals that Laurence Olivier was recruited by SOE and MI-5, through film producer Alexander Korda, to promote the cause of Britain's war against Germany while in the USA at a time when many Americans were isolationists. This book reveals some highly personal and rarely expressed thoughts from Olivier and from the people who knew him best.
Download or read book Vivien Leigh written by Kendra Bean and published by Running Press Adult. This book was released on 2013-10-15 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Vivien Leigh's mystique was a combination of staggering beauty, glamour, romance, and genuine talent displayed in her Oscar-winning performances in Gone With the Wind and A Streetcar Named Desire. For more than thirty years, her name alone sold out theaters and cinemas the world over, and she inspired many of the greatest visionaries of her time: Laurence Olivier loved her; Winston Churchill praised her; Christian Dior dressed her. Through both an in-depth narrative and a stunning array of photos, Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait presents the personal story of one of the most celebrated women of the twentieth century, an engrossing tale of success, struggles, and triumphs. It chronicles Leigh's journey from her birth in India to prominence in British film, winning the most-coveted role in Hollywood history, her celebrated love affair with Laurence Olivier, through to her untimely death at age fifty-three in 1967. Author Kendra Bean is the first Vivien Leigh biographer to delve into the Laurence Olivier Archives, where an invaluable collection of personal letters and documents ranging from interview transcripts to film contracts to medical records shed new insight on Leigh's story. Illustrated by hundreds of rare and never-before-published images, including those by Leigh's "official" photographer, Angus McBean, Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait is the first illustrated biography to closely examine the fascinating, troubled, and often misunderstood life of Vivien Leigh: the woman, the actress, the legend.
Download or read book Olivier written by Terry Coleman and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2006-10-31 with total page 922 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on exclusive, unprecedented access, the definitive biography of Sir Laurence Olivier, the dashing, self-invented Englishman who became the greatest actor of the twentieth century Sir Laurence Olivier met everyone, knew everyone, and played every role in existence. But Olivier was as elusive in life as he was on the stage, a bold and practiced pretender who changed names, altered his identity, and defied characterization. In this mesmerizing book, acclaimed biographer Terry Coleman draws for the first time on the vast archive of Olivier's private papers and correspondence, and those of his family, finally uncovering the history and the private self that Olivier worked so masterfully all his life to obscure. Beginning with the death of his mother at age eleven, Olivier was defined throughout his life by a passionate devotion to the women closest to him. Acting and sex were for him inseparable: through famous romances with Vivien Leigh and Joan Plowright and countless trysts with lesser-known mistresses, these relationships were constantly entangled with his stage work, each feeding the other and driving Olivier to greater heights. And the heights were great: at every step he was surrounded by the foremost celebrities of the time, on both sides of the Atlantic—Richard Burton, Greta Garbo, William Wyler, Katharine Hepburn. The list is as long as it is dazzling. Here is the first comprehensive account of the man whose autobiography, written late in his life, told only a small part of the story. In Olivier, Coleman uncovers the origins of Olivier's genius and reveals the methods of the century's most fascinating performer.
Download or read book Laurence Olivier written by Anthony Holden and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 570 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A biography of the 20th century English actor describing his life and achievements. iSBN 0-689-11536-9.
Download or read book Olivier written by Philip Ziegler and published by MacLehose Press. This book was released on 2014-06-03 with total page 538 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A finalist for the Sheridan Morley Prize that has been called "probably the best Olivier book for general readers" (Kirkus Reviews), Philip Ziegler's Olivier provides an incredibly accessible and comprehensive portrait of this Hollywood superstar, Oscar-winning director, and one who is considered the greatest stage actor of the twentieth century. The era abounded in great actors--Gielgud, Richardson, Guinness, Burton, O'Toole--but none could challenge Laurence Olivier's range and power. By the 1940s he had achieved international stardom. His affair with Vivien Leigh led to a marriage as glamorous and as tragic as any in Hollywood history. He was as accomplished a director as he was a leading man: his three Shakespearian adaptations are among the most memorable ever filmed. And yet, at the height of his fame, he accepted what was no more than an administrator's wage to become the founding Director of the National Theatre. In 2013 the theatre celebrates its fiftieth anniversary; without Olivier's leadership it would never have achieved the status that it enjoys today. Off-stage, Olivier was the most extravagant of characters: generous, yet almost insanely jealous of those few contemporaries whom he deemed to be his rivals; charming but with a ferocious temper. With access to more than fifty hours of candid, unpublished interviews, Ziegler ensures that Olivier's true character--at its most undisguised--shines through as never before.
Download or read book Truly Madly written by Stephen Galloway and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2022-03-22 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST A New York Times Bestseller "A "well rounded and entertaining" (New York Times) Hollywood biography about the passionate, turbulent marriage of Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh. In 1934, a friend brought fledgling actress Vivien Leigh to see Theatre Royal, where she would first lay eyes on Laurence Olivier in his brilliant performance as Anthony Cavendish. That night, she confided to a friend, he was the man she was going to marry. There was just one problem: she was already married—and so was he. TRULY, MADLY is the biography of a marriage, a love affair that still captivates millions, even decades after both actors' deaths. Vivien and Larry were two of the first truly global celebrities – their fame fueled by the explosive growth of tabloids and television, which helped and hurt them in equal measure. They seemed to have it all and yet, in their own minds, they were doomed, blighted by her long-undiagnosed mental-illness, which transformed their relationship from the stuff of dreams into a living nightmare. Through new research, including exclusive access to previously unpublished correspondence and interviews with their friends and family, author Stephen Galloway takes readers on a bewitching journey. He brilliantly studies their tempestuous liaison, one that took place against the backdrop of two world wars, the Golden Age of Hollywood and the upheavals of the 1960s — as they struggled with love, loss and the ultimate agony of their parting.
Download or read book Olivier written by Thomas Kiernan and published by . This book was released on 1981 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Scandals of Classic Hollywood written by Anne Helen Petersen and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2014-09-30 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Celebrity gossip meets history in this compulsively readable collection from Buzzfeed reporter Anne Helen Peterson. This guide to film stars and their deepest secrets is sure to top your list for movie gifts and appeal to fans of classic cinema and hollywood history alike. Believe it or not, America’s fascination with celebrity culture was thriving well before the days of TMZ, Cardi B, Kanye's tweets, and the #metoo allegations that have gripped Hollywood. And the stars of yesteryear? They weren’t always the saints that we make them out to be. BuzzFeed's Anne Helen Petersen, author of Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud, is here to set the record straight. Pulling little-known gems from the archives of film history, Petersen reveals eyebrow-raising information, including: • The smear campaign against the original It Girl, Clara Bow, started by her best friend • The heartbreaking story of Montgomery Clift’s rapid rise to fame, the car accident that destroyed his face, and the “long suicide” that followed • Fatty Arbuckle's descent from Hollywood royalty, fueled by allegations of a boozy orgy turned violent assault • Why Mae West was arrested and jailed for "indecency charges" • And much more Part biography, part cultural history, these stories cover the stuff that films are made of: love, sex, drugs, illegitimate children, illicit affairs, and botched cover-ups. But it's not all just tawdry gossip in the pages of this book. The stories are all contextualized within the boundaries of film, cultural, political, and gender history, making for a read that will inform as it entertains. Based on Petersen's beloved column on the Hairpin, but featuring 100% new content, Scandals of Classic Hollywood is sensationalism made smart.
Download or read book My Father Laurence Olivier written by Tarquin Olivier and published by Trafalgar Square. This book was released on 1992 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Olivier's son shares letters, photos, and stories never before published which reveal the confused emotions, pain, guilt, humor, happiness, and love of Sir Laurence.
Download or read book On Acting written by Laurence Olivier and published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson. This book was released on 1986 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Overpeinzingen van de Engelse auteur (geb. 1907).
Download or read book Olivier written by Francis Beckett and published by Haus Publishing. This book was released on 2015-02-15 with total page 1018 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1930s he established himself as a wide-ranging Shakespearean actor. His marriage in 1940 to Vivien Leigh (his second wife) seemed to complete the image of the romantic star. From the mid-40s he excelled in directing himself in Shakespeare on film, such as his dramatically-shot Henry V (1944), with its timely excesses of patriotism. When the new wave of British drama began in the late 1950s, Olivier was immediately part of it. As an actor of such wide range, and a successful producer and director, Olivier was a natural choice to bring the National Theatre into existence in 1963. Together with his new wife Joan Plowright (they had married in 1961), he built up a brilliant company and repertoire at the Old Vic. Olivier became the first actor to be given a peerage.
Download or read book The Life and Death of Peter Sellers written by Roger Lewis and published by Hal Leonard Corporation. This book was released on 1997 with total page 532 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traces the life and career of the British actor, discusses his major roles, and depicts his complex and often difficult personality
Download or read book Laurence Olivier and Richard Burton written by Charles River Editors and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2017-03-25 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Includes pictures *Includes the actors' quotes about their lives and careers *Includes online resources and a bibliography for further reading Of all the great actors of the 20th century, none personifies acting royalty more than Laurence Olivier, and some of this is simply due to the fact that he was actually knighted in 1947, along with a lengthy list of other honors that include being named a life peer in 1970 and admission to the Order of Merit in 1984. To speak of The Right Honourable Lord Laurence Olivier is not a figure of speech but rather a fact. Of course, in addition to the literal sense of the term, there is undeniably a manner in which Laurence Olivier qualifies as acting royalty, as it is not for nothing that Spencer Tracy once referred to Olivier as "the greatest actor in the English-speaking world" (Bacall). It is also important to note that Tracy refers to Olivier not as a film or theater actor specifically, because much of Olivier's lofty standing derives from his ability to successfully navigate different mediums like stage, film, and television. The breadth of mediums in which he worked, the various roles he inhabited within them (actor, producer, director), and the formidable time span of his career lend Olivier's career a scope of perhaps unmatched magnitude. Indeed, Laurence Olivier worked for so long and was so successful that few actors receive the level of visibility that he still enjoys, even more than two decades after his death. While his theatrical performances exist only as memories, his cinematic adaptations of several of Shakespeare's most famous plays remain the most canonical even to this day. Hamlet, for example, has been produced for the screen by several famous directors, but his version, released in 1948, is the most well-known and best-received. It is through his films that viewers also gain a full appreciation of his creative style, as Olivier assumed full authorial control (from actor to director to producer) over many of his films, particularly the Shakespearean ones. In this sense, it is appropriate to claim that Laurence Olivier was not only a storied actor but also an artist who worked best when enjoying full authority over his productions. In the 1960s, the most popular actor in the world was Richard Burton, a hard-drinking Welshman who was nevertheless so professional that he was one of the preeminent stage performers of his day. In fact, he performed Shakespeare so magnificently that he was compared to British legend Laurence Olivier, and that success ultimately led to a film career that earned him 7 Academy Award nominations, as well as BAFTA and Golden Globe awards for Best Actor. Given his accomplishments on the stage and in Hollywood, Burton became one of the world's most recognizable leading men, so it seemed fitting that he engaged in one of Hollywood's most legendary romances with Elizabeth Taylor while on the set of Cleopatra, one of the era's most notorious movies. In fact, his tumultuous relationship with Taylor, which included two marriages, dominated tabloids and remains the one thing most people associate with Burton today, despite the rest of his accomplishments. Burton's high-profile marriage to Taylor helped bring attention, but it also led to more self-destructive behavior, and in a sense it represented the peak of Burton's career. Over the last decade of his life, Burton began appearing in mediocre films, and due to his declining health and constant drunkenness, his performances were mediocre as well, often involving incoherent slurring. The fast life ultimately caught up with him in 1984, when a cerebral hemorrhage killed him at the age of 58. Fittingly, it was the same cause of death that befell his alcoholic father in 1957, just as Burton was at the precipice of Hollywood stardom.
