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THE NEW MEXICAN Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind. ‘There is something really visceral about her performances,’ said British-based film scholar Kendra Bean, author of Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait. COURTESY PHOTO
Vivien Leigh is lavishly illustrated in a new biography By Susan King
Los Angeles Times
LOS ANGELES ritish actress Vivien Leigh had that undefinable star quality. For 30 years, the exquisitely beautiful Leigh captivated film and theater audiences with her well-crafted, magnetic performances. In fact, Leigh won lead actress Oscars for creating two of the most indelible characters in screen history — the strong-willed, manipulative Southern belle Scarlett O’Hara in the beloved 1939 Civil War epic Gone With the Wind and Tennessee Williams’ fragile, faded Southern beauty Blanche DuBois in 1951’s A Streetcar Named Desire. Her accomplishment is all the more remarkable because Leigh, who died at age 53, made only 19 movies. The power and honesty of Leigh’s acting has not diminished with time, from her Scarlett declaring through her tears, “Tara. Home. I’ll go home, and I’ll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another day” at the conclusion of Gone With the Wind, or her heartbreaking descent into madness in Streetcar. “There is something really visceral about her performances,” said British-based film scholar Kendra Bean, author of Vivien Leigh: An Intimate Portrait. The lavishly illustrated biography commemorating the actress’ centenary, being published Tuesday, combines historical material including documents from the archives of her second husband, Laurence Olivier, as well as interviews with those who knew her, including Tarquin Olivier, the celebrated actor’s son by his first wife, actress Jill Esmond. “She never would have called herself a Method actor by any means, but she really used her life experiences to forward these characters,” said Bean, who also writes the blog www.vivandlarry.com. In her final two films — 1961’s The Roman Spring of
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Newsmakers Liza Minnelli performs with broken wrist
Liza Minnelli
NEW YORK — The show went on for Liza Minnelli. A spokesman for the 67-year-old entertainer said she performed Monday night with a broken wrist at a benefit concert in New York. Minnelli broke her wrist in three places while rehearsing at home Sunday. The Cabaret star performed with her sister, Lorna Luft. The event marked their first performance together in 20 years since their duet at the 1993 Tony Awards.
Powell, Motown Records’ chief of charm, dies at 98
Maxine Powell
DETROIT — Maxine Powell, who was responsible for developing the charm, grace and style of Motown Records’ artists during the Detroit label’s 1960s heyday, has died. She was 98. Motown Museum CEO Allen Rawls says Powell died Monday at a hospital in Southfield, Mich. Powell directed the label’s Artists Development Department, also known as “Motown’s Finishing School.” She emphasized how artists should carry themselves, treat people and dress. Motown founder Berry Gordy said the training school was the only one of its kind offered at any record label. The Associated Press
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7 p.m. on NBC The Biggest Loser “Second Chances” is the theme of the weight-loss competition’s 15th season, which features the show’s first celebrity contestant: American Idol Season 2 winner Ruben Studdard. Also in the game is Olympic weightlifter Holley Mangold, who’s hoping to get in shape for the 2016 Olympics. 7 p.m. on PBS Superheroes: A Never-Ending Battle This three-hour special chronicles the evolution of a popular subgroup of comic-book characters, from the 1930s, when superhero comics were escapist entertainment for a Depression-plagued nation, to their present status as pop-culture powerhouses. 7 p.m. on ABC Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. The S.H.I.E.L.D. team is on the trail of a mysterious woman who has committed multiple high-stakes heists all by herself. The revelation of her identity threatens to expose a secret that could ruin Coulson (Clark Gregg) in the new episode “Eye-Spy.” Brett Dalton and Elizabeth Henstridge also star.
Mrs. Stone and 1965’s Ship of Fools, she was cast as a lonely, aging woman looking for love. Ship of Fools director Stanley Kramer later said he believed Leigh knew she was “playing something like her own life, and yet she never, by word or gesture, betrayed any such recognition.” Despite her film legacy, Bean said, Leigh wasn’t interested in being a Hollywood star. Both she and Olivier left Hollywood for London during the outbreak of World War II. “She wanted to be on stage,” Bean said. Her theatrical collaborations with Olivier, to whom she was married from 1940 to 1960, are the stuff of legend — he even directed her in the London production of Streetcar— as were the glamorous parties she threw that were attended by the British and Hollywood elite, from Noel Coward to Gary Cooper. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was among her most ardent fans — Leigh and Olivier’s 1941 romantic drama, That Hamilton Woman, was his favorite film. But Leigh’s life was as complicated and ultimately as tragic as the heroines she played. Not only did Leigh battle chronic tuberculosis — she would die of the disease in 1967 — the actress also suffered from bipolar disorder for which she underwent shock treatments. Because Leigh never wrote an autobiography and Olivier refused to be interviewed about her, there has been a lot of speculation, often sensationalized, about the couple’s star-crossed romance and often turbulent marriage. But Leigh’s massive archives, which were recently donated by her grandchildren to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, is shedding new light on their private lives. The files feature hundreds of letters, telegrams and photographs chronicling their romance, marriage, career and her bouts with depression. Coward, writing to Olivier after her death, said: “She always reminded me of a bird of paradise. Perhaps now she can find her own.”
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7 p.m. on CW The Originals Klaus and Rebekah (Joseph Morgan, Claire Holt) pick up some interesting information about someone in Marcel’s (Charles Michael Davis) inner circle and set about trying to unravel his empire from within. Elijah (Daniel Gillies) isn’t sure this is a good idea, and neither is Sophie (Daniella Pineda). 8 p.m. TNT Cold Justice In this new episode, crime scene investigator Yolanda McClary and former prosecutor Kelly Sieglerm, pictured, are in Ohio’s Sandusky County to help the sheriff’s office revisit the 1988 murder of Isabella Cordle. The 49-year-old mother of six was killed with a hatchet as she slept on the couch in her family’s home. Applying modern testing methods to the evidence collected 25 years ago may hold the key to cracking the case in “Hatchet.”
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3:00 p.m. KOAT The Ellen DeGeneres Show Wanda Sykes; Jared Leto; Fitz & the Tantrums perform; guest DJ Jason Derulo. KRQE Dr. Phil KTFQ Laura Escenario para la discusión de todo tipo de asuntos que afectan a la comunidad en la actualidad. Conducido por: Laura Bozzo. KWBQ The Bill Cunningham Show Tired of accusations, guests take lie detector tests. CNN The Situation Room FNC The Five MSNBC The Ed Show 4:00 p.m. KOAT The Dr. Oz Show KTEL Al Rojo Vivo con María Celeste María Celeste conduce este espacio donde informa al televidente sobre el acontecer diario, presenta videos dramáticos e insólitos, además ofrece segmentos de interés. KASY The Steve Wilkos Show
FNC Special Report With Bret Baier 5:00 p.m. KASA Steve Harvey KCHF The 700 Club KASY Maury FNC On the Record With Greta Van Susteren 6:00 p.m. CNN Anderson Cooper 360 FNC The O’Reilly Factor 7:00 p.m. CNN Piers Morgan Live MSNBC The Rachel Maddow Show 7:30 p.m. HBO Real Time With Bill Maher 8:00 p.m. CNN AC 360 Later E! E! News FNC Hannity 9:00 p.m. FNC The O’Reilly Factor 10:00 p.m. KASA The Arsenio Hall Show CNN Piers Morgan Live MSNBC The Rachel Maddow Show TBS Conan 10:34 p.m. KOB The Tonight Show
With Jay Leno Robin Williams. 10:35 p.m. KRQE Late Show With David Letterman Sylvester Stallone; Anna Faris; Deltron 3030 performs. 11:00 p.m. KNME Charlie Rose KOAT Jimmy Kimmel Live Johnny Knoxville and Jackson Nicoll; Julianne Hough. CNN Anderson Cooper 360 FNC Hannity 11:30 p.m. KASA Dish Nation TBS Conan 11:37 p.m. KRQE The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson Actor Michael C. Hall; actress Laura Bell Bundy. 12:00 a.m. E! Chelsea Lately Comic Jen Kirkman; comic Jo Koy; guest J.B. Mauney. 12:02 a.m. KOAT Nightline 12:06 a.m. KOB Late Night With Jimmy Fallon 12:30 a.m. E! E! News 1:06 a.m. KOB Last Call With Carson Daly