One of my favorite things about living near Los Angeles is all of the fun events and screenings that are put on by the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Currently, they’re hosting an exhibition about the “Master,” called “Star Quality: The World of Noel Coward.” Noel Coward is one of many people who’s work I became familiar with through my fascination with the Oliviers, as he was a long-time friend of both Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier. He was a famous playwright and teamed up with director David Lean in the 1940s to produce what have become two of my favorite films, Brief Encounter and Blithe Spirit. Laurence Olivier’s stage career was practically launched by Noel, who gave him the part of Victor Prynne in Private Lives in 1932, and Vivien Leigh worked with him in the 1956 production of South Sea Bubble and again in the 1959 play Look After Lulu.
Noel by Louis Athol-Shmith
I’ve been on quite a Noel Coward kick for a couple of years now. Just this Christmas I received The Noel Coward Diaries, and saw a fabulous documentary called The Noel Coward Trilogy, in which Noel’s partner, Graham Payne, said Laurence Olivier liked to smoke a bowl whenever he and Vivien visited Noel at Blue Harbor in Jamaica, which I thought was hilarious. Though Noel had a lot to say about the Oliviers in his diaries, it is quite hard to find longer passages of people, especially Vivien Leigh, talking about Noel. Luckily for your reading pleasure, I’ve found a terrific story by Vivien. This is from a collection of remembrances about Noel called The Pleasure of His Company: Noel Coward Remembered by William Marchant. I think this story really shows something of Vivien’s friendly character.
A while back, my friend Tanguy, knowing my love for foreign epic amazingness, recommended I watch a film called The Leopard (Il Gattopardo), starring Alain Delon, Burt Lancaster, Claudia Cardinalle, and directed by Luchino Visconti. I finally got it yesterday via Netflix, and decided to google it to see if I could find out any interesting facts. Landing on the wikipedia article about the film, I was surprised to see this:
When Visconti was told by producers that they needed to cast a star in order to help to ensure that they’d earn enough money to justify the big budget, Visconti’s first choice was one of the Soviet Union’s preeminent actors, Nikolai Cherkasov. Learning that Cherkasov was in no condition, health-wise, to take the part, Visconti then set his hopes on getting Laurence Olivier, but he already had another commitment.
How many times have I read that Laurence Olivier was offered a part, or the director had him in mind, but he was doing something else at the time and so another actor ended up playing the character? A lot. The same goes for Vivien Leigh.
This got me thinking about Larry and Vivien’s missed connections, i.e. parts that they were offered or planned to do, but it just didn’t work out. Here’s a little list I put together:
Clive Candy in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
Clive Candy in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943). Director Michael Powell, who had worked with Olivier on the 1941 film 49th Parallel, wanted him for the role of Clive Candy. Larry was in the navy and couldn’t get leave to do the film. The part was eventually played by Roger Livesey. Livesey actually played Larry’s father in The Entertainer (1960), even though he was only a year Larry’s senior.
David Niven wrote two of the best “autobiographies” out of anyone in show business. His first book, The Moon’s A Balloon, is a straight autobiography. His second book, Bring on the Empty Horses is a compilation of stories about his famous friends. In Bring on the Empty Horses, Niven tells the story of a famous girl named “Missie” who had a terrible breakdown in Hollywood (there were actually two ‘Missies” in his book but we’re focusing on the second one today). Whenever I check the stats for vivandlarry.com, it’s amazing how many people land on the site through a google search for “David Niven Who Is Missie?”
The cat’s out of the bag; “Missie” was Vivien Leigh.
One of the things Vivien Leigh did after finishing filming on Gone with the Wind was test for the role of the second Mrs. DeWinter in the film version of Daphne DuMaurier’s Rebecca. The film, being directed by Alfred Hitchcock and produced by David O. Selznick, was set to star Laurence Olivier (Vivien’s then fiancee) in the lead as Maxim DeWinter. Vivien wanted the part because she’d be acting opposite Olivier, but not many people were enthusiastic about her getting it. It wasn’t because they doubted her acting ability, it was because her personality was deemed too strong for such a weak character.
Vivien and Alan Marshall
Even in the book, DuMaurier’s heroine is shy, plain, meek, and “gauche,” as she describes herself. Vivien, even without make-up and silly blond wigs, is anything but gauche and plain. Her eyes have a fiery intensity in the screentests, and opposite Alan Marshall, she seems more Scarlett in a cardigan than the weakling the part called for. Her test opposite Laurence Olivier is very interesting by contrast. Vivien plays it down but puts forth obvious love and intensity for “Maxim.” When the two tests are compared, I think it is easy to tell that she and Larry were in love with each other off-camera, and this is something that Hitchcock did not want. He thought it would not be believable to audiences when everyone knew they were together in real life. Larry shared in this sentiment as well. In Charlotte Chandler’s book “It’s Only a Movie,” Larry is quoted having said:
“When they called to say someone named Joan Fontaine had been given the role opposite me, I can’t say I was thrilled. I’d certainly never heard of her. When I met her, what I noticed was how young and skinny she was. I didn’t really understand what my character, Maxim DeWinter, could see in her. As I understood Max better, I decided that she was just what he wanted–someone exactly the opposite of Rebecca. He’d had enough of Rebecca, and he was looking for docile, even wilted.
“I admit I was prejudiced from the start. I’d exerted my influence to persuade Selznick that the best possible choice for the part was Vivien. Vivien had her heart set on playing opposite me, and she loved the part, which she tested for. She was a very good actress, and it was rather mortifying for me not to have been more influential. It affected our personal lives for a while…
“I didn’t like having to plead Vivien’s case, but I couldn’t say no to her. Hitch was very decent about it. But the worst part of it was I really didn’t want to have her get the part. There was already so much strain in our personal life, our divorces, leaving a wife and a child, and a husband and child in England, the European situation, the war. It was perhaps better for us to have a little vacation from constant togetherness.
“Vivien thought I didn’t try hard enough for her with Hitchcock for the part in Rebecca. Well, I didn’t. I hadn’t felt she was right for that part, truth be told.
“Vivien was exactly the opposite of Scarlett O’Hara, who said something like, ‘I’ll worry about it tomorrow.’ She worried about everything–yesterday, today, and tomorrow. But she was so beautiful.”
Despite Vivien being thought of as totally wrong for the role of Mrs. DeWinter and was thus denied the part (which eventually went to Joan Fontaine, who happened to be blond, in true Hitchcockian form), there was a role Alfred Hitchcock, at least, thought she’d have been perfect for: the ghostly, yet ever-present Rebecca. When Hitch was interviewed by Henri Langlois, the director of the Cinematheque Francais, he spoke of the perfect Rebecca.
“But there WAS an actress to play Rebecca. A perfect Rebecca. And she even wanted to be in the film, only she wanted to play the wrong part, that of the cringing, meek girl with rounded shoulders who was totally lacking in self-confidence.
“The actress was Vivien Leigh, who was born to be Rebecca, as she was to be Scarlett O’Hara. Scarlett shared many characteristics with Rebecca. Vivien Leigh had the requisite beauty. She and Rebecca were both uniquely strong women who knew that they wanted and how to get it, if not how to enjoy it. They were not girls; they were women.
“Vivien Leigh was absolutely right to play Rebecca, but Rebecca never appears in the film, so neither does Vivien. And for people who knew about the real life affair between Olivier and Leigh, that would have intruded on any illusion.”
I have to say I agree with Hitchcock. Although it’s a shame she and Hitch never worked together, I think Vivien would have been much more believable as Rebecca than as “I” in this film. Apparently the people who design Italian movie posters thought so, too.
Continuing with “Vivien in Fashion” Week, today we throw the spotlight on photographer and costume designer Cecil Beaton. Cecil is perhaps the most interesting of all of the Vogue photographers who photographed Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier because he also had somewhat of a personal relationship with them as well as a professional one.
Vivien and Cecil in Paris for Anna Karenina costume fittings, 1947
Since I first became interested in vintage fashion and photography, I have been interested in Beaton’s photographs of Vivien Leigh in particular (and he did take my all time favorite portrait of Laurence Olivier in 1948). Cecil was the photographer on Caesar and Cleopatra, and the costume designer for Anna Karenina as well as for the play The School for Scandal which the Oliviers performed in 1948 and 49. In my opinion, he took the best photos of Vivien Leigh, and his abrupt falling out with the Oliviers in 1948 makes me rather sad. But it is an interesting story, so I thought it would be nice to hear about their personal and professional relationship from someone who knows quite a bit about it.
Most of you know Hugo Vickers for writing the definitive biography on Vivien Leigh. He is also the Literary Executor for the Cecil Beaton Estate and has published Beaton’s biography and diaries. He was very kind in writing out the tale of the Oliviers and Cecil Beaton especially for vivandlarry.com. Thanks, Hugo!
