Olivier
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
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.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Sir Laurence Olivier's estate selected Coleman, a British journalist and historian (The Nelson Touch), as the actor's authorized biographer, and he makes the most of his access to the archives. Olivier (1907 1989) had a tendency to "instinctively improve the truth" a visit from a drunken Ralph Richardson, for example, was changed in the telling to a nearly fatal brawl but Coleman delicately peels away the embellishments. He quotes extensively from Olivier's correspondence; a few passages, such as a lengthy extract from a letter describing how he'd like to spank Vivien Leigh, feel excessive. The turbulent relationship with Leigh, which began and ended with extramarital affairs, does generate some drama, but Olivier was never really the Hollywood type. The bitter feuds he endured through his early stewardship of Britain's National Theater are more this biography's cup of tea. Coleman commendably keeps the amateur psychoanalysis that permeates most celebrity bios to a minimum. On the subject of Olivier's sexuality, he leaves no doubt the tales of heated romance with Danny Kaye in Donald Spoto's 1991 biography are bogus, conceding only the existence of one probable encounter with a British stage actor in the 1930s. With a similarly sober approach throughout, this version of Olivier's life will surely become the new standard. Photos.