He is an actor who many consider to be the greatest in the English-speaking world during the twentieth century. Though Sir Laurence Olivier was based mostly in England, he made a significant number of Hollywood films. He was nominated for Academy Awards as either an actor, producer or director twelve times, winning twice, while also being honored with two special Oscars. In his long and versatile career, Olivier appeared in more than 120 stage roles, nearly 60 films and more than 15 television productions.
The son of a clergyman, he was well educated, and introduced to the arts at an early age. He made his acting debut at the age of fifteen at the all-boys, All Saints Choir School. He continued playing Shakespearean and other classical roles while in training. Olivier's next big step was joining The Birmingham Repertory company in 1926. He had also acted on Broadway and was recognized by the American film industry. He had his chance at early Hollywood stardom when he played the lead in Yellow Ticket. By the time he made Fire Over England, he was a hot commodity, made even hotter by his well-publicized affair with his costar, the beautiful and talented Vivien Leigh. Tongues wagged wilder than usual because both Olivier and Leigh were married to other people at the time. They later freed themselves in order to marry each other, a union that lasted for more than 20 years.
As a sought after actor, Olivier heeded the call to Hollywood again and was considerably more successful. He starred as Heathclifff in the scintillating romance, Wuthering Heights (1939), and became an international matinee idol. He followed that hit with several others, including Rebecca and That Hamilton Woman. Olivier's most productive period came from directing and producing. He did this, while also starring in Henry V (1944) and Hamlet (1948). He won Best Film and Best Actor awards for Hamlet from the Academy. No matter what country has produced his films, Olivier remains an international star whose talent belongs to all nations.
Burdened by ill health for more than a decade, Olivier fought cancer and other ailments while working at a furious pace. He was knighted in 1947, and in 1970 he was made "Baron Olivier of Brighton," for services to the theater, which allowed him to sit in the House of the Lords. If that wasn't enough, in 1981 he was given the Order of Merit. In America, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences bestowed its version of knighthood on "Lord Larry," awarding him a special Oscar "for the full body of his work, the unique achievement of his entire career and his lifetime of contribution to the art of film.
Born: May 22, 1907, Dorking
Died: July 11, 1989, Ashurst
Spouse: Joan Plowright (m. 1961–1989), Vivien Leigh (m. 1940–1960), Jill Esmond (m. 1930–1940)
Children: Tarquin Olivier, Tamsin Olivier, Richard Olivier, Julie Kate Olivier
Remember that time when Indiana Jones found the Ark of the Covenant? This is a bit like that.
In the rural university town of Exeter, England, an academic has uncovered thirteen versions of a lost screenplay for Laurence Olivier’s "Macbeth." Exploring the library’s Laurence Olivier Archive (probably a good bet when hoping to come across such documents), the lecturer discovered a final shooting script adorned with intricate set designs and technical instructions, despite the theatrical icon’s life-long protestations that a mere “sketch” was all that remained.
While eighteen screen versions of Macbeth have been produced to date, Olivier’s was never made. Financially beleaguered, the project, which was to star Olivier and his then-wife Vivien Leigh, and would have seen them reprise what were widely believed to be their finest roles of the English stage, was derailed and abandoned. Things get a bit Da Vinci Code when one looks into the history of the Scottish Play. Shrouded in theatrical lore – a mystique which Olivier wielded with particularly public vigor after the ignominious loss of his own adaptation – "Macbeth" has haunted its prospective re-tellers with the kind of morbid revenge last seen from Banquo’s ghost. Its run on stage and screen has been beset with cast fatalities, financial ruin, and a notable severing of Macduff’s thumbs in a production of 1794. Abraham Lincoln himself purportedly read passages from Duncan’s assassination in the week prior to his death.
Vivien Leigh in a famous scene from her Academy Award winning performance in "Gone With the Wind". Because she's actually broke she's wearing a dress her maid created from the drapes of Tara
How much of the backstage drama depicted in the new Michelle Williams film 'My Week With Marilyn' -- which chronicles the tumultuous shoot of the 1957 Marilyn Monroe/Laurence Olivier romantic comedy 'The Prince and the Showgirl' -- actually happened? Quite a bit, according to various Monroe and Olivier biographies. If anything, the new movie understates the turmoil surrounding the notoriously insecure and unreliable yet charismatic and witty sex goddess, her frustrated co-star/director Olivier, her overwhelmed new husband Arthur Miller, her manipulative drama coach Paula Strasberg, and star-struck gofer Colin Clark (on whose memoirs 'My Week with Marilyn' is based). It's no wonder that the action behind the camera is better remembered today than the finished product, which plays like a pleasant but inessential trifle, a footnote in the careers of two of the greatest performers in film history. Read on to learn more about what really happened behind the scenes of 'The Prince and the Showgirl,' including events not mentioned in 'My Week with Marilyn.'
1. 'The Prince and the Showgirl' was to be the first movie made by Marilyn Monroe Productions, the independent company she had formed with photographer-turned-paramour-turned-platonic-business-partner Milton Greene. The company had acquired the rights to Terence Rattigan's London stage hit 'The Sleeping Prince' as a vehicle for Monroe to prove her serious thespian bona fides, although it didn't stray too far from her roots in light romantic comedy. She'd made the deal with Rattigan herself, meeting him for drinks in a downtown New York bar before his trip to Hollywood, where he'd receive a nibble but no firm offers.
2. The obvious choice for both star and director was Olivier, who had originated the role of the Carpathian prince in the London version opposite his wife, Vivien Leigh. Many other alumni of the stage version would work on the film as well, including Jeremy Spenser and Richard Wattis, who reprised their stage roles, and set designer Roger Furse.
Excerpt from 'The Prince and the Showgirl'
3. Olivier was considered the greatest actor of his generation and one of England's biggest stars, but in 1956, pushing 50, he felt his film career was in a rut. He thought that Monroe's freshness and glamour would rub off on him and rejuvenate him.
4. Monroe and Olivier announced plans to make the movie at a February 1956 press conference in New York City, a Q&A session whose biggest revelation was a wardrobe malfunction in which a shoulder strap on Marilyn's backless black dress broke. Cynical reporters accused her of rigging the strap to snap on purpose, a charge she denied. But even Olivier believed it was a stunt. In any case, the broken-strap incident was memorable enough for Olivier and Monroe to turn it into a gag in a scene in the film.
5. Monroe and Miller had been married for just two weeks when they came to London for the shoot. They had left America at a time when Miller was under threat of indictment for contempt of Congress for his refusal to name suspected Communists to the House Un-American Activities Committee. Days after their arrival, Congress voted to cite him for contempt, a citation that would ultimately lead to a trial the following spring, after the Millers had returned to America. The playwright was ultimately fined $500 and given a suspended sentence of a month behind bars. The conviction was overturned on appeal a year later. Meanwhile, Olivier and Monroe had inserted an in-joke about "un-Carpathian activities" into their film.
6. Two days before Monroe's arrival, Leigh, 42, announced she was expecting a child in December. Three weeks into filming, however, Leigh miscarried. That tragedy put a new strain on the Oliviers' fragile marriage.
7. Greene brought along a young assistant, David Maysles, effectively launching the young man's movie career. Years later, David and his brother Albert would become giants of the documentary, with such films as 'Gimme Shelter' and 'Grey Gardens.'
8. Colin Clark landed his job as third assistant director because his parents were friends of the Oliviers.
9. Monroe's Method training, which made her feel like she needed to delve into the motivation for every line and gesture, led to clashes with Olivier and his classically-trained, just-do-it actors. She felt inadequate among them, despite having studied the Method herself for years with famed drama teacher Lee Strasberg. Asked by a British reporter what had inspired her to start studying acting, she replied, "Seeing my own pictures."
10. Lee's wife, Paula Strasberg, came along as Monroe's acting coach and earned a higher salary than anyone else on the project except the two leads.
11. Olivier sought advice from other directors who'd worked with Monroe on how to handle the difficult actress. Billy Wilder's advice: Just put up with her; the results are worth it. Joshua Logan, who visited the set late in the shoot, told Olivier: Work closely with Paula Strasberg and Monroe in rehearsals but don't let Strasberg on the set. But that proved impossible as Monroe simply refused to work without her coach by her side.
12. Typical Strasberg advice to Marilyn: Olivier spent a morning trying to inspire in Monroe the wit and sparkle needed in the scene when their characters first meet. Strasberg told her, "Honey -- just think of Coca-Cola and Frank Sinatra."
'The Prince and the Showgirl' - Trailer
13. Monroe's frequent tardiness, inability to remember lines, and her insistence on having every direction of Olivier's reinterpreted by Strasberg led to numerous production delays. One scene, in which Monroe's character eats caviar, took two days, 34 takes, and 20 jars of caviar to complete.
14. Olivier displayed his anger by being patronizing. "All you have to do is be sexy, dear Marilyn," he said, demoralizing Monroe, who was trying to break out of sex-symbol status and be taken seriously as an actress. Off the set, he complained that trying to give her direction was like teaching Urdu to a marmoset.
15.Sybil Thorndike, the venerable actress who played the Dowager Queen, urged Olivier and the other actors to be patient with Monroe. "We need her desperately," Thorndike said. "She's really the only one of us who knows how to act in front of a camera!"
16. In addition to babysitting the star (including during her free time, as depicted in 'My Week With Marilyn'), Clark was also tasked with keeping cigarettes on hand at all times for Olivier to smoke, since the actor/director's costume had no pockets. He smoked Oliviers, a brand named after himself.
17. Monroe turned to her new husband for moral support, often distracting him from working on rewrites of his play 'A View From the Bridge,' which was having its London premiere. He'd expanded it from one act (as it had premiered on Broadway) to a full-length, two-act drama. There were censorship complications over the play's hints of homosexuality that led the producers to move it to another theater. When it finally premiered that fall, the Oliviers and Millers attended opening night together in a gesture of solidarity, with Monroe wearing a striking red dress that ensured enthusiastic press coverage. The play was a hit.
18. Here's how Miller assesed the 'Prince and the Showgirl' shoot:
Olivier was soon prepared to murder Paula outright, and from time to time, I would not have minded joining him, for Marilyn, a natural comedienne, seemed distracted by half-digested spitballed imagery and pseudo-Stanislavskian parallelisms that left her unable to free her own native joyousness. As for Olivier, with all his limitations in directing Marilyn -- an arch tongue too quick with the cutting joke, an irritating mechanical exactitude in positioning her and imposing his preconceived notions upon her -- he still could have helped her far more than Paula with her puddings of acting philosophy.
19. It was during his time in England that Miller began writing the short story that would become 'The Misfits,' which would be the last film Monroe would complete.
20. Despite the countless production delays, Olivier finished the shoot a few days ahead of schedule. Still, he was said to be so shattered by the process that he didn't direct another film for 14 years (when he shot 1970's 'Three Sisters'), though he remained in demand as a stage and screen actor.
21. Warner Bros. changed the title 'The Sleeping Prince' to 'The Prince and the Showgirl' to play up the presence of Monroe, the movie's chief box office draw. The film was advertised with a poster of Olivier and Monroe locked in a steamy embrace, a clinch that doesn't actually appear in the film. Despite these efforts, the movie earned mixed reviews and was considered a box office disappointment in America. In Europe, however, critics were kinder, and Monroe even earned awards for her performance in France and Italy.
22. Monroe and Greene's partnership dissolved in bitterness. She didn't work again for another two years, until she made her triumphant comeback in 'Some Like It Hot.'
23. Years later, Olivier admitted that the tribulations of working with Monroe had been worth it. Thorndike had been right; the camera had captured only Monroe's magic, without any of her doubts and frailties. "No one had such a look of unconscious wisdom, and her personality was strong on the screen," Olivier said. "She was quite wonderful, the best of all."
24. 'The Prince and the Showgirl' was the only movie Monroe filmed outside North America.
The highly anticipated MY WEEK WITH MARILYN will release on Friday 25th November in cinemas across the UK and Ireland. Starring an award-winning all-star cast and based on the diaries of Colin Clark, the film captures a love affair with the world’s most famous woman, Marilyn Monroe.
Academy Award® nominee Michelle Williams stars as Marilyn Monroe(Blue Valentine, Shutter Island, Brokeback Mountain) and is joined by a stellar cast including Eddie Redmayne as Colin Clark (The Other Boleyn Girl, The Good Shepherd), Kenneth Branagh as Sir Laurence Olivier (Thor, ‘Wallander’), Dame Judi Dench as Dame Sybil Thorndike (Quantum of Solace), Julia Ormond as Vivien Leigh (Che, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), Dougray Scott as Arthur Miller (Mission Impossible II), Zoe Wanamaker as Paula Strasberg (Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone), Emma Watson (Harry Potter), Dominic Cooper (Tamara Drewe, An Education, Mamma Mia), Derek Jacobi (Gosford Park), Toby Jones (Frost Nixon, Infamous), Miranda Raison (Spooks), Philip Jackson (Little Voice), Geraldine Somerville (Harry Potter) and Michael Kitchen (‘Foyle’s War’).
MY WEEK WITH MARILYN is the true story of a star-struck boy who falls in love with the biggest celebrity in the world, Marilyn Monroe.
23 year-old Colin Clark was determined to break into the film business and his first job was The Prince and The Showgirl - the film that was set to be the smash hit of the year famously uniting the biggest stars of the day, Marilyn Monroe and Sir Laurence Olivier. On honeymoon in Britain with her new husband, Arthur Miller, Marilyn is excited about the project but quickly becomes desperate to run away from her Hollywood entourage, the pressures of work and the press who hound her. For Marilyn, Colin is a welcome antidote and he offers her everything she craves when, together, they escape the film set to get closer in an idyllic Britain.
Simon Curtis’ director credits include the BAFTA and Emmy-winning, ‘Cranford,’ the International Emmy-winning, ‘A Short Stay in Switzerland,’ and the Golden Globe nominated ‘Five Days.’ The film is produced by Academy Award® and BAFTA winner David Parfitt (Shakespeare in Love, The Madness of King George, I Capture the Castle) and the screenplay is by Adrian Hodges (Tom and Viv, ‘The Ruby in the Smoke’ and ‘David Copperfield’). The film is produced by Trademark Films and is financed by The Weinstein Company. BBC Films and Lipsync Productions also financed the picture. It was developed in association with the UK Film Council and BBC Films.
21. Warner Bros. changed the title 'The Sleeping Prince' to 'The Prince and the Showgirl' to play up the presence of Monroe, the movie's chief box office draw. The film was advertised with a poster of Olivier and Monroe locked in a steamy embrace, a clinch that doesn't actually appear in the film. Despite these efforts, the movie earned mixed reviews and was considered a box office disappointment in America. In Europe, however, critics were kinder, and Monroe even earned awards for her performance in France and Italy.