Olivia de Havilland dead at 104

As Maid Marion in The Adventures of Robin Hood

Olivia de Havilland, winner of two Best Actress Academy Awards and the last remaining star of Gone with the Wind (1939) has died. She passed away in her sleep on July 25, 2020.

De Havilland was one of the last links to Hollywood’s Golden Age, having starred in so many classic films. Ironically, it was her lawsuit against Warner Brothers that helped bring down the studio system. She sued the studio for adding six months to her seven-year contract and won. Her court victory was known as the “de Havilland decision.” She was blackballed for a time by all the major studios, but she fought back and eventually reached heights few actresses ever attain.

In 1945, de Havilland signed a two-picture deal with Paramount. Her first film for that studio was The Well Groomed Bride co-starring Ray Milland, but it would her second Paramount release that would launch her career to the next level. As an unwed mother who gives up her child for adoption in Michell Leisen’s To Each His Own (1946), she won her first Best Actress Academy Award. Better roles continued with Robert Siodmak’s The Dark Mirror (1946) where she played identical twins—one good, the other a psychotic killer. One of her best roles was as Virginia Cunningham in Anatole Litvak’s The Snake Pit (1948). The film dealt with the treatment of patients suffering from mental illness under severe conditions at a state-run mental institution. The film’s success helped bring about many changes in mental hospitals.

William Wyler tapped de Havilland for the lead in The Heiress (1949). The movie was based on the Henry James novel Washington Square. For her performance, she won the New York Film Critics Award, the Golden Globe, and the Academy Award for Best Actress. Now a two-time Oscar winner, de Havilland’s services were in demand by top directors and studios. Elia Kazan wanted her for the role of Blache DuBois in his film version of A Streetcar Named Desire (1950), but she turned it down. Her Gone with the Wind co-star Vivien Leigh ended up playing Blanche, winning her second Best Actress Oscar in the process. Besides her work on the screen, de Havilland appeared on Broadway in Romeo and Juliet and Candida, taking the latter on the road.

Celeste Holm (left) and Olivia de Havilland in The Snake Pit

During the 1950s, de Havilland starred in Not as a Stranger (1955), receiving top-billing over Robert Mitchum and Frank Sinatra, The Ambassador’s Daughter (1956), and The Proud Rebel (1958). The Proud Rebel, directed by Michael Curtiz co-starred Alan Ladd who would become a lifelong friend. The Ladd family and the de Havilland family remain close to this day. In 1962 she starred in Guy Green’s Light in the Piazza. The film co-starred Rossano Brazzi with Yvette Mimiuex playing de Havilland’s mentally disabled daughter. That same year she starred on Broadway with Henry Fonda in A Gift of Time. The play brought some of the best reviews of her career. The New York World Telegram and Sun said of her performance, “It is Miss de Havilland who gives the play its unbroken continuity. This distinguished actress reveals Lael as a special and admirable woman.” Also that year-a busy one—she published her first book, Every Frenchman Has One about her attempts to adapt to living in France; it became a bestseller.

Olivia de Havilland (left) with Yvette Mimiuex in Light in the Piazza

Her movie career slowed down in the 1960s although she would appear—somewhat reluctantly—in the box office hit Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte with fellow Warner Brothers alum Bette Davis. De Havilland replaced Joan Crawford, at Davis’s request when Crawford dropped out of the film. During the 1970s, she still appeared in films, but she also appeared on television in a variety of productions including Roots: The Next Generations (1979) playing the wife of a former Confederate officer played by Henry Fonda. She won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Series, Miniseries or Television Film in 1986 for Anastasia: The Mystery of Anna.

This brief obituary of de Havilland is only a small slice of her talent and impact on Hollywood during its most creative period. Thankfully we have her tremendous body of work which will live on for generations to come.

Doris Day gets her due at The Music Box Theatre

For several weekends now, The Music Box Theatre, 3733 N. Southport Ave., Chicago, has been screening classic Doris Day movies. The series is titled “The Inimitable Doris Day” and the films have been screened, for the most part on Saturday mornings at 11:30 a.m.

Saturday, November 2, they’ll be screening one of Day’s most famous roles as Jan Morrow in Pillow Talk (1959). The film costarring Rock Hudson, was a tremendous box office hit, earning Day her only Academy Award Best Actress nomination. The picture did wonders for both Day and Hudson’s careers and they made two more successful comedies together: Lover Come Back (1961) and Send Me No Flowers (1964). The film also stars Tony Randall and Thelma Ritter. Randall also costars in Lover Come Back and Send Me No Flowers.

Pillow Talk demonstrates Day’s ability to tackle any movie genre with ease. She’s a natural comic actress and she’s a knockout in the clothes designed for her by Jean Louis.

Lover Come Back will be screened on November 23 and 24 at 11:30 a.m. For more details, please visit the Music Box Web site.

Happy Birthday, Olivia de Havilland...100 years young!

Olivia de Havilland (1916) turns 100 today. Not only is de Havilland the last surviving cast member of Gone with the Wind (1939), but she’s also one of the last links to Hollywood’s Golden Age. Her career in Hollywood started in 1934 when she signed a five-year contract with Warner Bros.

Olivia de Havilland as Maid Marion  in The Adventures of Robin Hood, directed by Michael Curtiz

As a contract player, de Havilland performed in a variety of movies from the classical, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935) to the adventure spectacle, The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). A seemingly effortless performer, she excelled in both comedy and drama. In 1935 she costarred with Errol Flynn in the swashbuckler adventure Captain Blood. Flynn and de Havilland’s classic good looks plus their on-screen chemistry made them one of the movies most popular screen teams. Other collaborations included Charge of the Light Brigade (1938), Four’s a Crowd (1938), Dodge City (1939), Santa Fe Trail (1940), and They Died with Their Boots On (1941).

As Melanie Hamilton in Gone with the Wind directed by Victor Fleming

When David O. Selznick acquired the rights to Margaret Mitchell’s best-selling novel, Gone with the Wind, every actress in and out of Hollywood wanted to play Scarlett O’Hara except de Havilland. She had her sights set on playing Melanie Hamilton. Unknown to de Havilland, Selznick wanted her for the part. Jack Warner at first refused to loan her to Selznick, but de Havilland appealed to Warner’s wife and she got the role and an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress (she lost to Hattie McDaniel).

With Charles Boyer in Hold Back the Dawn, directed by Mitchell Leisen

With the success of Gone with the Wind, you’d think that Warner Bros. would have given de Havilland bigger and better roles, but she found some of her best parts on loan to other studios. She made Hold Back the Dawn (1941) at Paramount and received her first Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, losing famously to her younger sister Joan Fontaine. Eventually, she would fight Warner Bros. in court over the terms of the typical Hollywood contract and their habit of putting stars on suspension for turning down roles. She won the case and in many ways it was the beginning of the end of the studio system.

With John Lund in To Each His Own, directed by Mitchell Leisen

With her court case behind her, de Havilland signed a contract with Paramount. Her first picture for them was the comedy, The Well Groomed Bride (1946) costarring Ray Milland. But it was her next picture, To Each His Own (1946) directed by Mitchell Leisen, that would be one of her greatest successes. The movie was a hit and de Havilland won the Best Actress Oscar for her performance. More great roles followed, including playing twins—one good, one evil—in The Dark Mirror (1946). She starred in the groundbreaking film about a woman suffering from mental illness in The Snake Pit (1948). For that performance she was nominated for another Best Actress Oscar. She didn’t win that year, but her performance was honored with awards from the National Board of Review, New York Film Critics Circle Award, and the Venice Film Festival Volpi Cup. With all the honors and new acclaim, de Havilland was in demand; all the major directors in Hollywood wanted to work with her.

Playing identical twins in The Dark Mirror, directed by Robert Siodmak

Another great role came her way when she starred in the William Wyler production of The Heiress (1949). De Havilland’s performance is a tour de force of emotion with her character starting out as an innocent and shy woman to one who becomes worldly-wise, hard and steely by the film’s end. The Academy honored de Havilland with another Best Actress Oscar. Once again, de Havilland was in demand from the best directors in Hollywood. Elia Kazan wanted her to star as Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951). She turned that role down, saying she wasn’t able to relate to the character being too happy after the birth of her son. Ironically, the role went to Vivian Leigh, her costar in Gone with the Wind. Leigh would go on to win her second Oscar.

With David Ladd and Alan Ladd in The Proud Rebel, directed by Michael Curtiz

Other big roles came her way including star turns in My Cousin Rachel (1952), Not as a Stranger (1955), The Ambassador’s Daughter (1956), and one of my personal favorites, The Proud Rebel (1958) costarring Alan Ladd who would become a lifelong friend. After the film Libel (1959), de Havilland’s film career began to slow down. She made occasional films like the romantic drama Light in the Piazza (1962), Lady in a Cage (1964), and to the help out old friend Bette Davis, she replaced Joan Crawford in Robert Aldrich’s Hush…Hush Sweet Charlotte (1964). During the 1970s, she appeared in supporting roles in several movies. She also starred in television movies, including Roots: The Next Generation (1979) as the wife of a former Confederate officer played by Henry Fonda. The production reunited the two stars who played husband and wife in The Male Animal (1942). In 1986 de Havilland won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress playing the Dowager Empress Maria in the miniseries Anastasia: The Mystery of Anna.

A great beauty and a great talent, de Havilland was and is one of the true legends of classic Hollywood.


Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is honoring de Havilland as the July star of the month.

“Mildred Pierce”: 4th Film in “High Heels and Fedoras” series at Daystar Center May 14, 2013

Tuesday, May 14, 2013
6:30 p.m.
The Venue 1550 at the Daystar Center
1550 S. State Street


Mildred Pierce was a critical and financial hit when released in 1945. It resurrected the career of screen legend, Joan Crawford, who many had written off as a has-been. The movie was a showcase for some new talent too, but it was Crawford’s film and she commands the screen in every scene she’s in.

The straightforward narrative in the James M. Cain novel was changed for the film version. Mildred’s story is told in flashback, a popular film noir convention that works really well and adds to the movie’s texture. The film itself is put together very nicely with the Warner Brothers A-Team pulling out all the stops. Cinematographer Ernest “Ernie” Haller’s black and white photography is beautifully atmospheric. The angles, the contrasts, are seamless and help advance the story without getting in the way. The score by Max Steiner is lush without being overwhelming, at least not overwhelming as far as Steiner scores go (They’re all kind of overwhelming, actually). Legendary makeup artist Perc Westore makes Crawford’s transition from waitress/working mom into successful/sophisticated businesswomen seem natural and believable. Much of Crawford’s look in this film, and for the rest of the decade, is due in great part to the costuming of Milo Anderson. Last but not least, director Michael Curtiz assembled all the pieces together to form a perfect whole, but Curtiz wasn’t at all set on working with Crawford.

Zachary Scott, Joan Crawford, and Ann Blyth

According to Crawford, Curtiz wanted Barbara Stanwyck to play Mildred. He didn’t want to work with a “difficult” has-been. In order to change Curtiz’s mind, Crawford submitted to a screen test. This was unheard of for an established star, but so determined was Crawford to snag the role that she consented. Crawford’s screen test impressed Curtiz enough that he agreed to direct her. And for Crawford, a new career was born at Warners.

Mildred Pierce was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actress. Crawford’s Best Actress Award was the only win, put it propelled her back to the top of the heap, giving fellow Warner contract-player, Bette Davis a run for her money. Ironically, Davis’s career was on a downward arch while Crawford was starring in some critical and commercially successful melodramas. After Mildred Pierce, Crawford starred in Humoresque (1946), Possessed (1947), Daisy Kenyon (1947), and Flamingo Road (1949). Possessed brought her a second Best Actress nomination.

Mildred Pierce isn’t considered a true film noir movie, by some critics. But it sure feels like film noir to this movie fan.

To purchase tickets for the May 14 screening, click here. Tickets are $5 per person general admission $3 for students and seniors. Tickets may also be purchased at the door. To stay on top of film events like this, join the Chicago Film Club Meetup.

To download a flyer to post in your building or office, click here.


The Venue 1550 is located at 1550 S. State St. in the Daystar Center. The Daystar Center offers a variety of educational, artistic and cultural activities, including classes for children that teach practical life skills like social aptitude, creativity and cultural awareness in fun ways; classes for adults that give space for self-reflection and improvement; room rentals for many different-sized groups in several multipurpose rooms. For more information, call 312.674.0001 or visit their Web site.