[HMG] – Her role in ‘Gone with the Wind’ made Vivienne Leigh an international icon. But the private side of the actress has now been revealed in a new book as an adulterous, bisexual sham.
Born in Darjeeling, India in 1913 she joined the world-famous Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts before she was 20, received rave reviews for her debut on stage, and in 1940 she married the acting legend, Sir Laurence Olivier. And the pubic face of their union made them the toast of the world.
But it was all a lie.
A new biography due out in December, ‘Damn You, Scarlett O’Hara,’ reveals Vivien to be a bi-polar, bisexual adulteress who was cheating on Laurence with other women within weeks of their marriage. And he also cheated on her.
“Today, she would be diagnosed as bipolar, but in those days people didn’t know how to deal with a star who tore off all her clothes for no reason and ran out of her house,’ the book quotes one friend as saying.
Written by Darwin Porter, who worked with Vivien in the late 1960’s, and Sir Laurence’s former assistant, Roy Moseley, the book also details Vivien’s love of ‘rough trade’ – male prostitutes – whom she’d select at Scotty’s – a Los Angeles brothel that masqueraded as a gas station.
‘She’d drive to Scotty’s with her friend George Cukor [the first director of ‘Gone with the Wind’,] and they’d pick out young men for the night,’ the new book reveals. “She depended on their professional discretion not to boast they had just serviced Scarlett O’Hara,”
Her need got so bad, Vivien was even kicked out of a hotel for bringing back too many ’street boys.’
During her twenty-year marriage to Olivier she had affairs with numerous men, including Marlon Brando and Rex Harrison. Plus at least three well-known women. And she did it mostly to cause Laurence pain.
“They were both beautiful and both wanted more,’ says the book. ‘Vivien loved to torture Olivier with her affairs, especially as she grew more mentally ill, depressed and manic.”
In 1939 her role in ‘Gone with the Wind’ won her an Oscar. She won another as Blanche DuBois in 1951’s ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ [where she met Brando.] But Sir Laurence’s memoir unveils the truth about sharing a home with bi-polar depression.
“Throughout her possession by that evil monster, she retained an ability to disguise her true mental condition from all except me; for whom she could hardly be expected to take the trouble.”
At the age of 32 Vivien contracted Tuberculosis, and slowly recovered. But on the night of July 7, 1967 the infection returned and she was found sprawled on the floor, with all signs of life gone. She was just 53.
The new book debuts on December 16, and if you love great stories they don’t get much better than this…
Source: Daily Mail
http://www.hotmommagossip.com/2010/08/23/vivien-leigh-a-bipolar-bisexual-adulteress-says-new-book/
