Richard Burton's diaries only sparkle occasionally, most notably when he's demolishing one of his illustrious contemporaries
Richard Burton died in August 1984 at the age of 58, shortly before the premiere of Nineteen Eighty-Four, in which he gave his best performance for more than a decade as Orwell's totalitarian apparatchik O'Brien. His diaries cover some 44 years, from his early second world war schooldays in south Wales to the spring of 1983. In May that year he appeared on Broadway in a poorly received production of Coward's Private Lives with his ex-wife Elizabeth Taylor, and on 3 July he married his fourth wife in a Las Vegas hotel. A hefty brick-sized book, it brings to mind the telegram Warner Brothers boss Jack L Warner sent to the director Mervyn LeRoy, who'd inquired whether he'd got around to reading Hervey Allen's blockbuster Anthony Adverse. "Read it?" Warner replied. "I can't even lift it."
The...
Richard Burton died in August 1984 at the age of 58, shortly before the premiere of Nineteen Eighty-Four, in which he gave his best performance for more than a decade as Orwell's totalitarian apparatchik O'Brien. His diaries cover some 44 years, from his early second world war schooldays in south Wales to the spring of 1983. In May that year he appeared on Broadway in a poorly received production of Coward's Private Lives with his ex-wife Elizabeth Taylor, and on 3 July he married his fourth wife in a Las Vegas hotel. A hefty brick-sized book, it brings to mind the telegram Warner Brothers boss Jack L Warner sent to the director Mervyn LeRoy, who'd inquired whether he'd got around to reading Hervey Allen's blockbuster Anthony Adverse. "Read it?" Warner replied. "I can't even lift it."
The...
- 12/16/2012
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Actor whose good looks and charm took him to the heights of Hollywood with films such as Some Like It Hot and The Defiant Ones
Born into a family of Hungarian Jews who had emigrated to the Us, Bernard Schwartz – the boy who became the actor Tony Curtis – could scarcely have dreamed of the wealth, fame and rollercoaster life that awaited him. Curtis, who has died aged 85, starred in several of the best films of the 1950s, including Sweet Smell of Success (1957), The Defiant Ones (1958) and Some Like It Hot (1959). He enjoyed a long career thanks to his toughness and resilience (despite insecurities that demanded years of therapy).
He grew up in the Bronx, New York, the eldest of three sons. As a child, he was ill-treated by his mother, Helen, and spent time in an orphanage. One of his brothers, Robert, was a schizophrenic and the other, Julius, was...
Born into a family of Hungarian Jews who had emigrated to the Us, Bernard Schwartz – the boy who became the actor Tony Curtis – could scarcely have dreamed of the wealth, fame and rollercoaster life that awaited him. Curtis, who has died aged 85, starred in several of the best films of the 1950s, including Sweet Smell of Success (1957), The Defiant Ones (1958) and Some Like It Hot (1959). He enjoyed a long career thanks to his toughness and resilience (despite insecurities that demanded years of therapy).
He grew up in the Bronx, New York, the eldest of three sons. As a child, he was ill-treated by his mother, Helen, and spent time in an orphanage. One of his brothers, Robert, was a schizophrenic and the other, Julius, was...
- 9/30/2010
- by Brian Baxter
- The Guardian - Film News
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