The death has been announced of actress Olivia de Havilland. A two-time Oscar winner, de Havilland died weeks after her 104th birthday.
De Havilland's career started in 1935 when she acted in Warner Bros.' version of A Midsummer Night's Dream, although the studio released another of her movies first, Alibi Ike opposite Joe E. Brown.
One of her most frequent co-stars was Errol Flynn; the two made nine movies together, including the classic The Adventures of Robin Hood:
Her first Oscar nomination came in the Supporting Actress category for Gone With the Wind, where she played Melanie Wilkes; wife of Ashley (Leslie Howard). De Havilland lost to her co-star Hattie McDaniel.
Her first Best Actress nomination came two years later in Hold Back the Dawn, playing a teacher in love with refugee Charles Boyer.
De Havilland lost to her sister, Joan Fontaine, which led to a lifelong rift between the two. De Havilland would go on to win, of course, first for To Each His Own, and then for The Heiress:
Later in her career, she's play opposite good friend Bette Davis in Hush, Hush... Sweet Charlotte and get roped into lousy all-star disaster pics like The Swarm:
TCM's Summer Under the Stars begins on Saturday and de Havilland was not selected this year, I believe, so either they'll preempt somebody or else give de Havilland a 24-hour tribute in September. They do have a TCM Remembers page with embedded video of the piece that's probably already airing on TCM. (I forgot to check just before 8PM yesterday.)
Monday, July 27, 2020
Olivia de Havilland, 1916-2020
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Great tribute to a grande Dame who looked so demure but could dish it out when need be. I just watched The Dark Mirror and it was enjoyable but that was the time when movies had many themes about the mind and how it works so ink blots and the psyche were all the rage. The 70s was a strange era where huge stars were in these campy disaster flicks like The Swarm which was great fun to watch. I do remember shaking my head as to why she took this role. Gloria Swanson was in Killer Bees and Henry Fonda starred with a giant octopus. I wonder if De Havilland was ever on The Love Boat
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