Laurence Olivier' Homosexual Life Confirmed

Poor Tarquin! He tried his best on the other thread, but now with this...

R1 LOL

It's obvious he was bisexual!

This is like the fourth Laurence Olivier thread in the last two months. He wasn't THAT fascinating!

I believe as far as women were concerned, Vivien Leigh was the only woman he lusted for/loved....Joan Plowright and the few others were just going through the motion..

This is BS

Seriously?!

Bring it on!

How sordid!

Old news!

Don't fuck with my Ex.husband fellas!

Told ya so, bitches.

Olivier's gay life is really no secret. He had a lengthy and very well-known love affair with comedian Danny Kaye. I think their respective wives knew about the relationship. It was one of those things that everyone in Hollywood "just knew about", but pretty much left alone

Vivien crazy ass drained Olivier sexually :

LEIGH'S HIGH SEX-DRIVE BROKE OLIVIER MARRIAGE.

Late screen siren VIVIEN LEIGH and her former husband SIR LAURENCE OLIVIER separated because the actress' sexual demands emotionally and physically drained the WUTHERING HEIGHTS star - according to the pair's previously unpublished letters.

And the couple's hand-written correspondence describes Olivier's reluctance to give into Leigh and make love to her three times a day. The letters also chart the collapse of their 20-year marriage in 1948, following the sexually-frustrated beauty's subsequent affair with actor PETER FINCH, during theatre company the Old Vic's tour of Australia.

In one letter, Olivier complains, "With Vivien it's every day, two or three times. She's wearing me out.".

A friend of Olivier, DEREK GRANGER adds, "Larry was exhausted by Vivien."

Author GARRY O'CONNOR, whose book DARLINGS OF THE GOD looked at the Old Vic tour, concludes, "Olivier was almost happy to palm Vivien off to Finch."

R14

That bastard killed Vivian.

R16 = Vivien' Pussy

Vivien was nymphomaniac/sick, It was impossible for Larry or any man to keep up with her insatiable demands.

This is my "I'm so shocked" face.

He had the most awful legs though. Pity, because from the waist up he was a strikingly handsome man.

R17 I actually thought this before posting, lol.

The irony.

"Olivier's gay life is really no secret. He had a lengthy and very well-known love affair with comedian Danny Kaye."

If you believe Donald Spoto, and I don't. He doesn't have any real evidence to prove there was a love affair between Olivier and Kaye. It's all speculation on his part.

Why another thread about Olivier? This is getting tiresome. Why give a fuck if he had some sexual experiences with men? Someone seems to have an obsession about this.

[quote]The Shakesperean actor suggests in his correspondence that he was attracted to old friend Douglas Fairbanks JR,

Don't take it too hard Larry, you're not the first and you probably won't be the last.

I know Doug Fairbanks Jr. was Mr. Joan Crawford for a few years starting when he was only nineteen, was totally gorgeous and acted in films, but I don't think I've ever seen one, nor can I name one.

Wait, we knew that Douglas Fairbanks Jr. "was noted for his varied sexual tastes"?!

So Larry sexually advanced Douglas Jr and he was turned down?!

Just exactly how dead do I have to be before the DL leaves me the fuck alone?

Dougie was NOT a fag, and I'm the dame who can prove it!

Let's talk about the knotted prepuce!

An Olivier letter:

[quote]“I am sitting naked with just my parts wrapped in your panties. My longing for you is so intense,”

[quote]I am sitting naked with just my parts wrapped in your panties.

Dear lord!

Letters hint at Olivier's gay suitor was Douglas Fairbanks Jr:

HE was the most famous British actor of his generation, revered across the world for his interpretations of Shakespeare. His companion was a dashing Hollywood star, renowned for his sexual dalliances. The carefully preserved archive of Laurence Olivier, seen for the first time, suggests that his friendship with Douglas Fairbanks Jr almost turned to an affair. The personal papers also show Olivier employed a "minder" to report on the health of Vivien Leigh, his second wife, before they were even married. The archive, stored in 180 large crates, was bought by the British Library from the Olivier family for £1m .

The archive reveals other aspects of Olivier's sex life. Olivier was not, but he confessed to being tempted by a man on one occasion. In the past, speculation has centred on Noël Coward, Danny Kaye or Richard Burton, but the archive suggests the real "suitor" may have been Fairbanks. An old and close friend of Olivier, famous for his wide-ranging sexual tastes,

There is a series of highly camp letters from Fairbanks, including a set of pornographic drawings featuring a well-endowed man. One of the letters, not dated but evidently in response to a note from Olivier, says: "'Spurned?' No, dear! Only anxious not to suspect recollections of your visit had placed me in that awkward 'Oh Christ! What'll I do? What'll I say?' category. I gather now that was not the case."

Olivier on Vivien Leigh "She was fucking mad from the get go!":

The collection includes passionate love letters between Olivier and Leigh, and accounts from doctors and others of her bouts of mental illness. Although her illness was believed by most biographers to have come on gradually during their marriage, the archive shows that Olivier knew before they wed that Leigh was unstable. He even employed an assistant, Sunny Lash, to report to him on his future wife's health and state of mind while she was playing Scarlett O'Hara on the set of Gone with the Wind. Lash describes her staggering around her room after taking too many sedatives. "I get so upset when things aren't right - and Vivien is impossible - or need I tell you?" Lash wrote to Olivier.

The telegrams from his "Vivling" during their frequent separations testify to their passionate love and chart her gradual mental degeneration. Although they both had affairs, Leigh's five-year liaison with Peter Finch, an actor renowned for his charm, hard drinking and womanising, had a devastating effect on her and her marriage. After Finch abruptly abandoned her in 1953, she was treated in a mental institution.

Who knows if Olivier had homosexual sex? Why should anybody care? But one thing IS for certain: he certainly liked sex with women. When he and Marilyn Monroe were to star in "The Prince and the Showgirl" he assumed that he would fall immediately in love with her and they would have a grand, passionate affair. But she was so dreadful to work with he ended up loathing her. The making of that movie was a horror story for him and at the same time he had to deal with his increasingly bonkers wife Vivien Leigh. An assistant of his said "Imagine being tormented by both of those women at the same time: Marilyn Monroe and Vivien Leigh. And I don't think he was having sex with either of them." Poor Larry.

[quote]But she was so dreadful to work with he ended up loathing her.

That was, in part, because Monroe was impossible to work with. But it was also because he was a pompous snob.

She got the last laugh: It is only her performance that is worth watching.

With Vivien's hungry pussy and Larry's gayness I'm shocked the marriage lasted HALF as long as it did.

[quote]Who knows if Olivier had homosexual sex?

Everyone?

"But it was also because he was a pompous snob."

He wasn't a pompous snob. He was a highly trained, disciplined actor being driven crazy because Monroe was constantly late, couldn't remember her lines and completely relied on her obnoxious ass kissing acting coach Paul Strasberg. In all innocence he said to her before a scene "just be sexy" and she took great offense at that and couldn't continue. He just expected her to give a good performance and getting one out of her was like pulling teeth.

"Everyone?"

How would "everyone" know Olivier had homosex? Were they under the bed? Were YOU under the bed? No, I didn't think so.

[quote]He wasn't a pompous snob. He was a highly trained, disciplined actor

Yes, and all the kudos for his training and acting went to his head. He, quite stupidly, thought that just because he was lauded stage actor, he could teach one of the biggest movie stars of all time how to play a scene on film.

Yes, she was a total pain in the ass to work with, but she has innumerable classic scenes caught on film. He does not. He came across as a affected ham.

He ruined [italic]Rebecca[/italic] with His hammy emoting. Between his ham fisted histrionics and Joan Fontaine's fluttery mannerisms, the movie is one big kikifest for me.

[quote]How would "everyone" know Olivier had homosex?

Common sense? Experience of the world and of people? A higher than single-digit IQ?

It's funny--and rather telling-- that r34 / r39 requires eye witness accounts of the gay sex act and preferably photos and film of Olivier not only having gay sex but also enjoying it (just to make sure he wasn't doing it purely out of ambition), yet also claims "But one thing IS for certain: he certainly liked sex with women." This always happens on here when a closeted celebrity is spoken of: someone always demands absolute proof of gay sex but also accepts with unwavering credulity every claim of heterosexuality, without the slightest question.

"How would anyone know Olivier had gay sex unless they were there? But I DO know that he not only had lots of sex with women, he also ENJOYED IT! This I know in my bones to be true!!!"

R43: I agree with you in principle. But I was a little surprised to see how [hetero]sexually voracious Olivier comes across in his private letters to Vivian Leigh.

I am willing to accept them as proof that he liked the hole.

That, of course, has nothing to do with whether he liked the pole, too.

[quote]Part of the archives include 'camp' correspondence from Fairbanks, with a set of pornographic drawings of a well-endowed man.

OP: Where are those?

I've only seen the letters between Olivier and Leigh.

Where are the ones between him and Fairbank?

Oh, thank god we finally have closure !

For those of you who are titillated by the news, why don't you go 'dig' Larry up ? See what kind of a blowjob he'll give you now !

"Oh, Dougie! I'm having a Barclays just thinking of your luscious balls! How I long to hear them slapping against my posterior once more! One is quite overcome!"

Larry Olivier was quite friendly with Joan Crawford because of his friendship with Douglas Jr

........

Douglas and Joan:

Kaye's wife was a lesbian. Marriage worked out well for them. The Larry stories have been around forever, or at least to the 80's. I had no doubt Kaye was gay when he died because it was reported that a condition of his children being a beneficiary of his will was that they could not write a book about him or collaborate with anyone. There is something he wanted hidden that he had to blackmail his children to hide.

Donald Spoto was Not the only biographer to claim Olivier had an affair with Danny Kaye.....Another earlier biographer called Anthony Holden hinted at Olivier/Danny affair but without the expletive exaggerated stories of Spoto.

Anthony Holden' book "Olivier" released in 1988 while Larry was still alive.

Anthony Holden' book "Olivier" 1988, that hinted at Larry/Danny Kaye affair

"Common sense? Experience of the world and of people? A higher than single-digit IQ?"

How does any of that prove that Laurence Olivier was really in to cock? You sound like somebody believes unsubstantiated gossip. That is so dumb.

Olivier' earlier biographer Anthony Holden interview confirming Olivier' gay affairs with Kaye among others ( who just hinted at Larry/Danny Kaye affair without details in his book 1988) :

""Olivier was still alive, though his acting career was over, when my biography appeared. So the laws of libel combined with my sense of decorum to persuade me not to publish the evidence in my possession of his gay relationship with, among others, Danny Kaye. Self-respect saw me sow clues into my book, spotted by those in the know, but not until after Olivier's death did his next biographer reveal what was common knowledge in the profession.""

" I had no doubt Kaye was gay when he died because it was reported that a condition of his children being a beneficiary of his will was that they could not write a book about him or collaborate with anyone. There is something he wanted hidden that he had to blackmail his children to hide."

That is total conjecture on your part. Assuming what you say is true (and it well may not be) , maybe he didn't want his daughter (he had only one child) to have anything to do with a book about him because he was a private man who didn't want her taking part in an exercise that would violate his privacy. By all accounts he was eccentric; maybe the idea of a book chronicling his odd behavior was an offensive notion to him. What did you think he died of, AIDS? You seem to imply that. For the record he died Kaye died of heart failure brought on by internal bleeding and complications of hepatitis C. Kaye had quadruple bypass heart surgery in February 1983; he contracted hepatitis C from a blood transfusion.

Who is Anthony Holden and what makes him the end all and be all of Laurence Olivier's sexuality? Is he a serious biographer or a gossipmonger who offers little proof to back up his assumptions? He sounds like the latter.

Why do people like r55 post at gossip sites?

Who are all these weirdos upset that Kaye is gay, which was known and obvious, and Larry also had sex with men? Do you know where you are? A place where that is not a bad thing! You act like we are talking sacrilege! And don't claim to be gay. That is bullshit. DUMBVIDA admitted she came on here swearing she was a gay man and lying that she knew for a fact that Jackman was gay. Those type of posts are so obvious. Joan already said he liked guys too. WTF?

There was an old joke circulating in the old days that Larry and Vivien usually fell in love with the same men.

"Who are all these weirdos upset that Kaye is gay, which was known and obvious?"

Uh no, it wasn't. Why would anybody think Danny Kaye was gay? Because he camped it up in the "Sisters" song in "White Christmas? I don't see anything about him that screams gay. And the whole Laurence Olivier/Danny Kaye love affair thing just seems bizarre to me. Why would anybody think those two had sex? Because they were friends and of course if two actors are friends that means they're having sex? I guess it makes a good gossipy story. But Producer Perry Lafferty reported: "People would ask me, 'Is he gay? Is he gay?' I never saw anything to substantiate that in the time I was with him."[73] Kaye's last girlfriend, Marlene Sorosky, reported that he told her, "I've never had a homosexual experience in my life. I've never had any kind of gay relationship. I've had opportunities, but I never did anything about them."

R55 R57 R58 Go to bed fondling Terry Coleman' book!

So any biographer who says Larry boy had gay affairs is just a gossip writer and not to be taken seriously!

Joan Plowright who acknowledged Larry/Kaye affair was just kidding!

GTFO

R62 et al = Vivien Pussy

R63 and R64 seem obsessed with making Laurence Olivier out to be a homo. I guess it's important to them. It's very strange. I think something must be lacking in their lives.

It was like an open secret in Hollywood circles that Larry Olivier had been bisexual and had gay affair with Danny Kaye among others.

Larry, we hardly know you!

It isn't easy to find a real man behind the many masks. Olivier was every inch an actor, onstage and off. His third wife, Joan Plowright, remarked: "Larry? Oh, he's acting all the time." Ken Tynan, Olivier's literary manager at the National Theatre, once told novelist Terry Southern: "Now what you've got to realize about Olivier is that he's like a blank page and he'll be whatever you want him to be."

Anthony Holden, who produced a dignified, standard biography 17 years ago, claimed that Olivier's life was "one long disappearing trick."

Now, Terry Coleman book, being an "authorized" biography, his book cannot delve freely into areas that Olivier's family deems forbidden. Accordingly, the issue of the actor's possible bisexuality gets a tastefully soft treatment, despite the use of some explicit letters from Henry Ainley, a handsome actor, who referred to Olivier as "Larry Kin Mine," and signed himself, "Your sweet little kitten, Henrietta."

Olivier once said of his acting: "Every member of the audience should want to fuck you." Coleman doesn't even consider the implications of such a sentence. He writes of Olivier's sometimes tender or fumbling affairs with Dorothy Tutin, Sarah Miles and others, and he takes a salacious delight in describing how Olivier sent carnations he had worn in his underwear to Vivien Leigh, with whom he cultivated a romantic legend that he finally disavowed.

However, at the end, this fat biography is hollow. Is that all we have waited 16 years for? Coleman sees fit to end his book with a chapter on Olivier's 'androgyny', or bisexuality, dismissing longstanding suggestions of liaisons with Kaye and others revealing a youthful one with an older, long-forgotten actor named Henry Ainley. And that is that. The result is less a whitewash than a pedestrian end to a woefully pedestrian account of a far from pedestrian life.

Also, there were times when I wondered how much the depiction of Plowright's saintly forbearance before her husband's infidelities wasn't also part of the price Coleman paid for being "authorised".

Yawn.

R53 R54 I've read Anthony Holden' book about Olivier in 2008 when it was reissued, It is very well researched biography . Although it was first written during Olivier's lifetime, Mr. Holden is quite fair and not in awe of his subject. and it's true that he only gave a hint of Olivier and Danny Kaye affair and left it to the reader to catch it or not. (and this was before Donald Spoto' book)

As i read in one of the previous posts that Mr.Holden said he didn't want to reveal openly Olivier gay affairs with Kaye and others (which was a common knowledge among his profession circle) and only hinted because Larry was still alive and the author didn't want to be sued.

If it was "common knowledge among his profession circle" then why didn't his myriad gay lovers come out of the woodwork after his death to brag about their fuck sessions with Larry? Why haven't people who knew of the supposed affair between Larry and Danny come forward to spill the beans? I think "Mr. Holden" didn't "reveal openly" gay affairs because he didn't have any hard evidence to support his claims. The fact that he probably would have been sued was secondary. At any rate, this subject is tiresome. It's obvious from what is known about Olivier's life that he lusted after women, not men. But he was a handsome British actor who was legendary; why, of COURSE he must have been a closet gay! I'm pretty sure that's the consensus of all the "Larry is gay and he fucked Danny Kaye!" twats on this thread: "He was British, handsome, immensely talented...how could he NOT have been gay? He was gay I tell you, gay, gay, gay!"

[quote] then why didn't his myriad gay lovers come out of the woodwork after his death to brag about their fuck sessions with Larry?

Because they were men, not women.

R52

KAYE might also thought that he didn't want his peccadilloes turned in a DADDIE DEAREST of sorts.

During their short marriage, Crawford was too busy fucking Clark Gable to care that her hubby was chasing boys.

It is common knowledge Larry and Johnny Gielgud had to crempie double penetrate the Duke of Gloucester to secure their knighthoods.

R74 LAMO

There was a gal in the Guy Madison thread who kept on demanding PROOF that Guy engaged in the sinful act of homosex and listed as proof of his heterosexuality the claim on his wiki page that he had an affair with Gia Scala and that she'd made him the beneficiary of her actor's pension. She obviously didn't require any kind of proof for this claim and took it on face value. The only problem is that the source for the claim is a book which can be read online and the book actually says that it was Guy WILLIAMS who she had an affair with and who became the beneficiary of her pension. The book makes absolutely no claim about her ever even knowing Guy Madison and no such claim is made anywhere else. It's still on Guy Madison's wiki page but it's bogus.

That's the problem with these people. They demand absolute incontrovertible proof of gay sex but always accept unquestioningly every claim made about said actor's heterosexuality.

R70 Your personal investment and agitation over the issue only speaks to your psyche; not to Olivier's sexuality.

Olivier preserved among his papers fifteen letters from Ainley. There are also a telegram and a card. Nine of the letters are explicitly homosexual. The most explicit are not quoted here. What seems to be the first is undated and is on the writing paper of a private hotel in Broad-stairs, Kent. It says, in part:

Larry darling. My pretty. Please. This is very serious:—who told you I was one of those? Have you seen my Osric? Haven't you? O. Dear old boy, I really must pull myself together. How are you? I have been tossing (now now) about at night thinking of you. No dammit, really, I am serious. I would like to hear from you if you are well and happy. How Jill must hate me, taking you away from her! I've fallen for a very nice curate down here. He is very High Church ... I should like to run my fingers through your hair. Yes I am a Psod. And what is more, so are you . . . Your sweet little kitten, Henrietta

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Olivier apparently tried to hit on Kenneth Tynan but was rather discouraged :

Olivier talking about Tynan ""Ken had an absolute dread of any hint of homosexuality. I greeted him tremendously warmly, I remember, and I found him very reserved, as if to say 'Keep your place, just in case you think I'm a sucker.' "

"Your personal investment and agitation over the issue only speaks to your psyche; not to Olivier's sexuality."

Seems to me that it's types like you who demonstrate "personal investment and agitation" over Olivier's supposed homosexuality. This whole thread was started to portray Olivier once and for all as the slavering, drooling lover of cock that so many of you poor things wish him to have been. I think this says quite a bit about you and your ilk's tormented psyches. An obsession with making Laurence Olivier into a closet homosexual...that can't be a healthy thing.

r81 If his own wife admitted Olivier was fond of gobbling cock yet you continue to try and deny it as something shameful, then the unhealthy investment is yours, doll. Sorry.

"Nine of the letters are explicitly homosexual."

How can a letter be "homosexual?!" Does the letter like to suck cock? Boy, you sound retarded.

As for the "homosexual" letters...if the "explicit" ones weren't quoted than there's no real reason to believe that they contain graphic descriptions of homosex between Larry and a male lover, which is the implication. As the the one that was quoted....well, how could anyone take THAT seriously? Olivier had a sense of humor and that letter definitely demonstrates it. Seems to me you "LAURENCE OLIVIER WAS GAY, GAY, GAY!" queens are really grasping at straws.

R82, if you consider Joan Plowright's exasperated, throwaway line about Danny Kaye proof positive that Olivier liked cock then you are indeed one of the queens here who have a desperate need to for Laurence Oliver to have been a homosexual. The unhealthy investment is most definitely yours, sweetie. Sorry.

R79, if you consider The Daily Mail an impeachable source of information then it is you who are the silly person, a very silly person. By the way, the article at that link reads like a Darwin Porter tome.

r84 Oh, I take the fact that Olivier's gayness was visible from space to anyone with an above single-digit IQ and some small degree of life experience as proof positive of his penchant for cock. The well-documented same sex relationships, the gay letters, and the several times that Joan Plowright has confirmed his homosexuality are mere corroboration of the blatantly obvious.

The problem is someone on here is way too invested in Danny Kay, DANNY KAYE, being straight! I don't even know anyone who thinks he is straight. I don't even remember that scene from the movie. I was thinking, oh you know, it was pretty obvious in all his movies and interview. We have had threads on the subject of these two for the last decade, but I swear, this is the first time someone questioned whether Kaye was gay instead of Larry! You think Liberace is straight too, don't you?

I think Tarquin Olivier is posting in this thread!

Those are the type of crazy responses we get from the fangirls of Jackman and Cruise. And used to get over Bomer and Wentworth before they came out. But Danny Kaye!?

Leave me the fuck alone!

Hi. I'm R22, the "YOU'RE OBSESSED AND STOP POSTING WHAT I DON'T WANT TO READ AND WHY IS THERE GAY CONTENT ON A GAY SITE" asshole.

And here's my picture.

"Oh, I take the fact that Olivier's gayness was visible from space to anyone with an above single-digit IQ and some small degree of life experience as proof positive of his penchant for cock. The well-documented same sex relationships, the gay letters, and the several times that Joan Plowright has confirmed his homosexuality are mere corroboration of the blatantly obvious.'

So every intelligent person with "life experience" believes without a doubt that Olivier was gay? If you believe that, then you must be really retarded.

The supposed gay relationships were never "well documented." His supposed gay life is mostly ascertained from gossip and speculation. There are a lot of stupid people in the world who believe gossip and rumors; you are definitely one of them.

"The gay letters?" So letters can be gay? I didn't know letters had sexual orientations. So there are heterosexual letters and bi letters too? What idiocy. At any rates the so-called gay letters are obvious attempts at humor. I guess you're too dumb to get that.

I think if anyone said to Joan Plowright "well, you certainly cleared up matters about your husband's sexual preference when you confirmed his love for cock" she'd probably spit in said person's face. She never did anything of the kind. Her Danny Kaye comment is regarded by queens like you as "confirming" his homosexuality but it's nothing of the sort. It's just desperation on your part and your fellow "OLIVIER WAS GAY, GAY, GAY!" types.

Yes indeed, you are obsessed. There have been several threads about poor Larry's sex life. He continues to fascinate. No doubt a lot of the pro-LAURENCEOLIVIERWASGAYGAYGAY! queens have erotic fantasies of him with his gay lovers. And erotic fantasies of being with him themselves. They SO want him to be gay, so their fantasies will be even more real in their fevered imaginations.

[quote]"The gay letters?" So letters can be gay? I didn't know letters had sexual orientations.

She's here all week, guys. Please tip your waitress!

R91 is one of the "LAURENCE OLIVIER IS GAY, GAY, GAY!" queens. It hurts him that not everyone believes Larry was a homo. It hurts him so badly. He's a very sad queen.

[quote]It hurts him that not everyone believes Larry was a homo

To be fair, I think it's mostly disbelief and bemusement that anyone could still doubt Olivier and Kaye's gayness. It's like if someone came on here demanding proof of Richard Simmons's homosexuality. I'm sure one or two such gals exist but to meet one in real life, as it were, is quite a novelty.

[quote]I think Tarquin Olivier is posting in this thread!

This made me laugh.

We do have someone on here who is just like one of those "He loved women and NEVER touched a child!!!!" Michael Jackson fan/loons.

Stop it! Larry was a raging heterosexual

Christ, even Joan Plowright would be startled and bemused by R92's refusal to believe Larry also liked sex with men! Poor, poor woman having sexual fantasies about a dead man who got it on with Danny Kaye.

Robin Williams "Hey Larry, how's Danny Kaye!"

It was said that Olivier fell in love with Peter finch first before his wife eventually did. Finch had become a fixture at Notley, Vivien' friends said she was jealous of the strong friendship bet Larry and Finch and she decided to come between them by seducing Peter.

Definitely a homophobic straight chick. She gave herself away with "sexual preference"

Larry liked Peter Finch too much that he allowed him to fuck his wife under the same roof he was living and then Larry and Peter would get drunk together in the library of Notley.

From Sir Larry : The Life of Laurence Olivier book (1981)

"Olivier's efforts to imprint his own acting views on Shakespeare came to a climax in February of 1938 when he agreed to play lago in the Old Vic's next production, Othello. To be directed by Tyrone Guthrie, with Ralph Richardson as Othello

Olivier and Guthrie decided to treat lago as a man motivated not by conventional envy of Othello but by homosexual jealousy: lago poisons Othello's mind against Desdemona not because he lusts after Desdemona, but because unconsciously he lusts after Othello himself.

The traditionalist Richardson, who had played lago five years before, was appalled to learn of their plans. He was particularly shocked one day early in rehearsals when Olivier, experimenting with how far he could go to personify lago's "queerness," planted a soulful kiss on his mouth.

Richardson reeled away in sputtering embarrassment and refused to continue. Guthrie and Olivier apologized by saying it was just a joke and that Olivier had no intention of including the kiss in the ultimate performance. Richardson was mollified, but only barely. Thenceforth he played Othello warily and without enthusiasm, on his guard for any further expression of what he later called Olivier's "perversity.

Nevertheless, when Othello opened at the Old Vic in March, the intended perversity of Olivier's lago was all too apparent to the critics. Although some admired the chance he had taken in his unorthodox interpretation, all adjudged the performance a failure."

WILL YOU LAY WITH ME?!

"Poor, poor woman having sexual fantasies about a dead man who got it on with Danny Kaye."

Poor, poor YOU, having sexual fantasies about a dead man you so want to be a raging homo. Poor, poor you.

A quote from Olivier, the supposed insatiable lover of cock:

"I felt that the homosexual act would be a step darkly destructive to my soul."

Another quote from Olivier, the supposed raging queen:

"I had got over like a spendthrift sigh my nearly passionate involvement with the one male with whom some sexual dalliance had not been loathsome for me to contemplate."

KNOTTED PREPUCE

Tarquin Olivier has been super-busy on this thread!

Distinction without a difference: British actors and homosexuals.

R5 R6 R7 et al Knock it off Tarquin!

Get your hand off me, Dammit!

Poor, Larry boy!

The poster on this thread who denies Laurence was gay is hilarious! I loved the bit about gay letters, because of course it isn't extremely obvious what "gay letters" means.

Isn't "sexual preference" just another way of saying orientation? Semantically it doesn't seem that correct, but the general use of the term is obvious. I've heard straight men use that term as welll.

I think she/he is probably a troll.

Larry's home movies.

Olivier was also friends with Jackie Gleason. I wonder if they ever got it on?

R115 Larry is showing impressive sizemeat at the 42 second mark.

He was not a gay.

[quote]Christ, even Joan Plowright would be startled and bemused by [R92]'s refusal to believe Larry also liked sex with men! Poor, poor woman having sexual fantasies about a dead man who got it on with Danny Kaye.

R119, poor thing, thinks he was under the bed when Larry had sex with anybody. Poor, poor thing, he has total faith in unsubstantiated gossip about long dead movie stars. The poor poor thing has wet dreams about dead Sir Larry plowing his butthole. Poor, poor, poor little thing.

"Sexual preference" is a dead giveaway of the homophobe, in this time and place.

G&L people don't "prefer."

It's our inborn orientation toward our own sex, as natural as the sun rising and oceans tiding.

I once kissed sodomite Ivor Novello on an omnibus in Trafalgar Square.

R106, Alec Guinness often said and wrote the same kind of things. He was arrested for solicitation in a restroom in England.

What are Olivier's children with Joan Plowright up to? We know about Tarquin but Larry had a handful with Plowright also.

Of course, Olivier was a homosexual. All actors are. I was in the business for 35 years and never met a straight actor, though many or most dissembled. Same for actresses; all are lesbians. Re Kaye: On one of the shows I did in NYC, the famous composer of the piece brought DK to the theatre and made a point of introducing him to all of the handsome, young men (he actually had us all assemble in an unused anteroom in the house), and that seemed to have been the purpose of the visit. I found Kaye worn out and kind of sleazy; I don't know if he scored with one of the guys or not.

[quote]Of course, Olivier was a homosexual

No, he wasn't, he was bi.

[quote] I was in the business for 35 years and never met a straight actor, though many or most dissembled.

nonsense.

I watched "The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone" the other day - again. For the first time, I was struck with the possibility of an affair between Vivien Leigh and Warren Beatty. Given their flagrant desire for coupling, it seems the idea may not be so far fetched. Does anyone know if Warren fucked Viv during filming?

Marilyn was so much better than Olivier in "The Prince and the Showgirl." It's not even close.

Wow, he's really gay in those home movies. Why is this even a discussion when Joan has admitted he liked having sex with men and passed it off from his being an artistic genius or something? God, she would know.

This was the first time I ever knew a Laurence Olivier even existed. I was just a kid, and this was a good movie, too. First exposure to Tommy Lee Jones as well. "The Betsy," 1978

R42 hyphens!

"A higher-than-single-digit IQ"

R85 The Darwin Porter book, like all his others is a hoot of a read. His one on Katharine Hepburn is my favourite.

R127, I think that the Handsome Stranger at the end of Stone was played by Jeremy Spencer, who played Olivier's son in Prince, and who had a small role in Leigh's Anna Karenina. He's sort of a mystery. Left acting decades ago. His actor brother was gay.