Gone With The Leigh

So this weekend I travelled to my second home, the V&A, for an afternoon of lectures about one of my all time favourite actresses, Vivien Leigh.


Now most of us, I am sure, are familiar with the game where you reveal who you would invite (famous or not) to a dinner party? Most people will name scientists, comedians, the latest Oscar winner or even musicians. I, on the other hand will spout off names from the golden era of Hollywood including Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, Katherine Hepburn and Maureen O'Hara. However; the head of the table is undoubtedly reserved for my acting heroine Vivien Leigh. 


My obsession and wonderment of Vivien began when I was in my early teens when I saw photos in magazines of the visually captivating actress and immediately I was a fan. I must confess that it wasn't till a few years later that I watched Gone With the Wind in its entirety - it was Christmas Eve and I'd stayed awake to watch it whilst my sister stitched together a gigantic bean bag for my brother. The bean bag never saw the light of day, but Gone With the Wind established itself as my favourite film.


So why host an afternoon lecture about the British actress? Last year the V&A acquired around 10,000 personal items belonging to Vivien Leigh. The collection contains over 7,000 letters, according to the speakers she was an avid writer of letters, and around 2,000 photographs along with other bits of memorabilia. We were even lucky to see images of some of the most priceless items including a guest book which Lord and Lady Olivier asked guests to sign when they visited their home Notley Abbey - it's not every day that the likes of Gary Cooper, Merle Oberon and Bette Davis pop around to your house for tea. It comes as no surprise that they are still cataloguing the vast number of items and taking due care to make sure these personal items remain preserved. There's talk of a potential exhibition to show the collection, but there's no confirmed date as to when this might happen. I'll be keeping my eye on the V&A website.


I've been to several evening lectures at the V&A and listened to A.S. Byatt and Matthew Williamson talk about their professions, but I've never been to an afternoon of seminars where I've been engaged from start to finish - my lectures from my old university are probably wondering where this concentration has come from as I lacked it for the entirety of my degree. 


How do you tackle the subject of Vivien Leigh? Well five experts and Vivien fans brought to life the actresses transformation from her breakthrough stage role in the 1930's to her untimely death with the aid of the new archive and footage from films and interviews. I particularly enjoyed the part where V&A curator Keith Lodwick highlighted a letter where playwright Bernard Shaw told her "Don't be an idiot" after she'd told him that she was going to change a line in the film Caesar and Cleopatra. 


If there's one thing we all learnt from each speaker its that Vivien was a dedicated and hardworking actress. Kendra Bean, a vintage film enthusiast and biographer for the actress, revealed that Vivien didn't want to be known as a Hollywood Star, but merely as an accomplished actress who would win roles according to her acting merit and not her looks. 


However; it wasn't just her looks that Vivien had to worry about. When it came to casting her as Scarlett O'Hara, Vivien faced tough competition to win the role. David O'Selznick, according to Professor Helen Taylor, wanted to cast a relative unknown as Scarlett as he didn't want the audience to associate the actress to another film role or character. Unfortunately once she was cast there was an uproar about how someone who had "lived and breathed England" couldn't possible play the role of a southern belle. How attitudes changed when the film made it to the theatres. 


You can't help but wonder how much more potential Vivien could have unleashed if she'd stayed in Hollywood and hadn't returned to England to be with Laurence Olivier? What other great films could she have appeared in or what other other characters would she have immortalized on the silver screen. Unfortunately we'll never know, but at least we can see still see some of her masterpieces although a part of me regrets not being around to see her on stage.


I wanted to end this blog post with a quote from the great lady herself and after scouring several sources I found the below which is something I feel I can relate to myself.


"I cannot let well enough alone. I get restless. I have to be doing different things. I am [a] very impatient person and headstrong. If I've made up my mind to do something, I can't be persuaded out of it."


She may only have made 19 films in her career, but her determination to bring the characters of Scarlett O'Hara and Blanche Dubois to life paid off with two Oscar wins. If you have never seen Vivien Leigh in action then this is definitely the year to see Gone With the Wind - after all 2014 marks the epic movies 75th anniversary.


For more information about the Vivien Leigh archive visit www.vam.ac.uk