The great and incomparable
Vivien Leigh, star of some of the most iconic characters in cinema history - Scarlett O'Hara in
Gone with the Wind (1939) and Blanche DuBois in
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) - married for twenty years to the equally legendary
Laurence Olivier and to whom my dearest Maman dedicated one of my middle names, has been on my mind a lot lately, in part due to the the impending Academy Awards that are set to take place this coming weekend but also because those lovely folks over at
Turner Classic Movies (kindred spirits, I secretly refer to them as) have been running a month-long "31 Days of Oscar" series that routes itself to ancient Rome this week.
Never quite the avid scholar of Ancient Classics, when on the subject of Rome, my mind conjures up instead images from Hollywood's love affair with the city, and with the entire country of Italy for that matter, and I start to wax nostalgic films like
Roman Holiday (1953) and
Three Coins in the Fountain (1954, see my post
here). Another mid-century film set in Rome that probably doesn't get nearly as much mention as it should is
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (1961) starring no other than the aforementioned Ms. Leigh and the then newly anointed "It Boy"
Warren Beaty, who - that same year - was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance in the critically acclaimed "coming of age" story
Splendor in the Grass (1961) with
Natalie Wood.
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone was based on a novel of the same name by
Tennessee Williams and the story centers around a renowned but aging actress at the so-called "end" of her career (despite only being middle aged) who, after the sudden death of her husband from a heart attack, retires to Rome to cope with her loss and eventually takes on a younger lover to help fill her days.
Leigh was only 47 years old at the time of filming and one can easily draw parallels between her and her character, as Leigh was then also experiencing the "loss" of a husband (she and Olivier divorced that year) and her once indomitable star power seemed to be on its last breaths. It is perhaps less known that Leigh also suffered from manic depression (or bipolar disorder), a
tormentous illness which she struggled all her life to conceal but whose devastating effects increasingly unraveled, ending her marriage to Olivier and contributing to the rapidly declining state of her mental and physical health. In his autobiography, Olivier wrote, "
Throughout her possession by that uncannily evil monster, manic depression, with its deadly ever-tightening spirals, she retained her own individual canniness – an ability to disguise her true mental condition from almost all except me, for whom she could hardly be expected to take the trouble." On top of that, she also battled with recurring tuberculosis and in May 1967, while rehearsing to appear in
Edward Albee's
A Delicate Balance with Michael Redgrave, the disease reared its ugly head once again. On July 7, 1967, Leigh was found dead in her bedroom by her then lover and fellow actor
John Merivale, lungs filled with water, at the age of 53. She was cremated and her ashes were scattered on the lake at her home, Tickerage Mill, near Blackboys, East Sussex, England.
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone was directed by
José Quintero,
with Production Design by
Roger Furse, Art Direction under
Herbert Smith and Costume Design by
Beatrice Dawson (
A Tale of Two Cities (1958),
The Importance of Being Earnest (1952),
Tom Brown's Schooldays (1951)). Leigh's character of the actress Karen Stone starts off dispirited, melancholic and in mourning, for the sudden death of her husband and perhaps more figuratively, for herself and for the
ending of her career.
black dress, pearl necklace, and a large broach pinned to the collar, a style that is repeated frequently on later outfits.
