Mar.-September 1948: Tour of Australia and New Zealand with Old Vic Company.
The play "Serena Blandish" was opened on 13 September 1938.
Angie and Cleopatra After Claudette Colbert, Elizabeth Taylor, and Vivien Leigh, Angelina Jolie might become
the new Cleopatra in a biopic about the historical Queen of Egypt whose reputation over
the centuries has developed to nearly legendary proportions. The new film by Oscar winning
producer Scott Rudin (No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood) is based
on the book by Pulitzer Prize winner Stacy Shiff.
Description: The tempestuous, scandalous love affair of the 20th century's Romeo and Juliet was second in fame and notoriety only to that of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, and by many accounts, even more corrupt. Even though the spotlight shone on this famous pair throughout most of their tabloid-fueled careers, much of what went on behind the velvet curtain remained hidden from view until the publication of this ground-breaking biography. For the first time, the sexual excesses and interpersonal anguish of this impossibly famous team of actors are exposed in graphic, sometimes wrenching detail.
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ABOUT VIVIEN LEIGH
Vivien Leigh, Lady Olivier (real name Vivian Mary Hartley) was a legendary beauty whose film fame rests largely on her two Oscar-winning US roles: in Gone with the Wind (1939) and in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951).
Trained at RADA, Vivien always claimed the stage (debut 1935) as her first allegiance, though the jury remained divided about her work in classical drama.
She entered films in 1935, getting her first major chance in Fire Over England (1937), as romantic interest of future husband Laurence Olivier, and then was vivid enough in several late 1930s films of which the best remembered is A Yank at Oxford (1937).
There were romantic-tragic successes in two US films - Waterloo Bridge (1940) and That Hamilton Woman (1941). However, Vivien Leigh's postwar British films saw her unequal to the demands of Caesar and Cleopatra (1945), Anna Karenina (1948) and The Deep Blue Sea (1955).
Also, Vivien Leigh was a prolific stage performer, frequently in collaboration with her husband, Laurence Olivier, who directed her in several of her roles.
She played parts that ranged from the heroines of Noel Coward and George Bernard Shaw comedies to classic Shakespearean characters such as Ophelia, Cleopatra, Juliet, and Lady Macbeth.
Unfortunately, lauded for her beauty, Vivien Leigh often felt that it prevented her from being taken seriously as an actress. Also, ill health proved to be the greatest obstacle for Vivien. Affected by bipolar disorder for most of her adult life, Vivien Leigh gained a reputation for being a difficult person to work with, and her career went
through periods of decline. She was further weakened by recurrent bouts of chronic tuberculosis, with which she was first diagnosed in the mid-1940s.
Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier divorced in 1960, and Vivien worked sporadically in film and theatre until her death from tuberculosis.
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After Claudette Colbert, Elizabeth Taylor, and Vivien Leigh, Angelina Jolie might become
the new Cleopatra in a biopic about the historical Queen of Egypt whose reputation over
the centuries has developed to nearly legendary proportions. The new film by Oscar winning
producer Scott Rudin (No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood) is based
on the book by Pulitzer Prize winner Stacy Shiff.