Gertrude Lawrence (July 4 1898 - September 6, 1952) was an actress and musical performer popular in the
1930s and 1940s, appearing on stage in London and on Broadway, and in several films. She is
particularly associated with the light comedy of Noel Coward.
She was born Gertrude Alexandria Dagmar Lawrence-Klasen, of English and Danish extraction, in London, England, and was a professional performer by the age of ten.
She was sent to Catholic convent schools and attended the Italia Conti Academy,
presumably to keep her out of trouble. She understudied Beatrice Lillie in the Andre
Charlot London revues in the 1920s. In the 1921 revue "A to Z", she co-introduced with Jack
Buchanan Furber and Braham's "Limehouse Blues." She achieved stardom when the revues were brought to Broadway in 1924 and
1926.
Gertrude Lawrence was one of the foremost comediennes of her day, capable of playing both
slapstick clowns and elegant ladies. Her great charisma is attested to by those who saw her on stage, but her films struggle to
convey her charm. The only one of her movies in which she acted alongside stars whom most people recognize today was a poorly
made Hollywood treatment of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie. The film, featuring the ensemble cast of Lawrence, Kirk Douglas and Jane Wyman, failed at the box office. Lawrence's
charisma and energy are more evident, albeit for just a few minutes, in Stage Door
Canteen in which a Hollywood studio recreated the New York nightclub where World War II soldiers danced with famous
actresses and enjoyed all-star entertainment. In the uncut DVD version of the film that runs two hours and 15 minutes, unique
musical talent is displayed by Gertrude Lawrence, Al Jolson, Peggy
Lee, Benny Goodman and many others who make the silly plot unimportant.
Personal Life And Activities During World War II
Lawrence married Francis Gordon-Howley, a director in the theaters of London's West End,
during World War I, and they divorced in 1928, having had one daughter, Pamela (1918-2005). In 1928, she announced her engagement
to Bertrand L. Taylor Jr., a New York stockbroker but the marriage was eventually called off. Lawrence then married Richard
Aldrich, an American legitimate theater owner and producer from a blueblood family in Massachusetts, on July 4, 1940, and they remained married until her death. A Harvard graduate, he became a naval officer during World War II, during which time Lawrence became
one of the most active entertainers at the club portrayed in the Hollywood film Stage Door
Canteen and at many other venues for enlisted men all over the world, including the South Pacific. The couple spent a lot
of time apart, but Gertrude enjoyed sending Richard telegrams from thousands of miles away.
In addition to an affair with film star Douglas Fairbanks Jr., she also
allegedly had lesbian affairs, including possible ones with the British novelist Dame Daphne
du Maurier, and with Beatrice Lillie who, when referring to Lawrence, said: "I
knew her better than her husband." Passionate letters written between Lawrence and du Maurier were published in a 1993 biography
of du Maurier, who long outlasted her one-time love interest but died four years before the letters were published. Lawrence also
appears to have had a much earlier affair with du Maurier's own father, Sir Gerald du
Maurier; in fact, Daphne du Maurier referred to Lawrence as "the last of Daddy's actress loves."
Only Lawrence's two marriages were reported by newspapers and magazines during her lifetime. Her affairs with the du Maurier
family and with Beatrice Lillie were not even hinted at by journalists. They were known only to a few people until many decades
later. In a best-selling posthumous biography by her widower Richard Aldrich, which is known to have been read by
Marilyn Monroe [1]
and other stars, he gives no hint as to whether he ever suspected her of infidelity with either sex. A few years after the 1954
publication of his book he remarried and moved to Spain, where he became the minister of the
Embassy for Economic Affairs for that country's government. From 1962 to 1965 he held a U.S. government post in Morocco. [2] Thereafter, Aldrich, his second wife and four children (none of
them from Lawrence) moved to Charlottesville, Virginia, where there is no
record of anyone interviewing him about his legendary first wife before his death in 1986.
Legendary Performances
Lawrence's onstage persona inspired composers and writers. George and
Ira Gershwin wrote the musical Oh, Kay! for her,
which included the well-loved song "Someone to Watch Over Me." She was the first British actress to have a lead role on Broadway.
Cole Porter wrote Nymph Errant for her to star in, and it opened in London in 1933. Noel Coward wrote Private Lives and
Tonight at 8:30 (a cycle of nine one-act musicals and plays) for her. She starred
as Liza Elliot in Moss Hart, Kurt Weill, and
Ira Gershwin's psychoanalytical musical Lady in the
Dark (played in the film version by Ginger Rogers).
In her 1976 memoir My Heart Belongs, Mary Martin recalled going out with Lawrence
and a group to a New York nightclub in the late 1940s. Martin described her as "a star with a capital 'S' of whom I was in
awe."
In 1946 Lawrence saw the film version of the book Anna and the King of
Siam, which she decided would make a perfect musical. She persuaded the American team of Rodgers and Hammerstein to write it for her. The result
was The King and I, which introduced such memorable songs as: "Hello Young
Lovers," "Getting to Know You" and "Shall We Dance."
The King and I opened on Broadway in 1951, with Lawrence in the role of Anna and became her greatest success. Also that
year she received the prestigious "Woman of the Year" award from Harvard University's
famed performance troupe, the Hasty Pudding Theatricals. In 1952, she won the
Tony Award for Best Actress for her role as Anna Leonowens. From the fall of 1950 to the
spring of 1952 she was a professor of theater at Columbia University.
Unexpected Death And Funeral
Lawrence died of liver cancer, which caused her to suffer jaundice, in what
was then New York Hospital, today known as Weill Medical
Center, at the age of 54. The hospital, located on York Avenue, was a mile away from her home, which was on Manhattan's
East 54th Street. Newspapers reported incorrectly that she was 52 and that her cancer was confined to the liver. The ex - husband
of her daughter Pamela was a doctor whom Lawrence's husband Richard Aldrich summoned by telephone to her bedside. The former
son-in-law said more than 25 years later that her cancer had spread considerably, but nobody knew that until an autopsy was
performed. The hospital staff, knowing she had performed in The King and I less
than three weeks earlier, expected her to recover. [3] Over
many years Gertrude Lawrence was known to suffer bouts of severe illnesses, including pleurisy,
that contrasted with her high energy level and optimistic attitude. Her mental condition was never affected. Her former
son-in-law recalled that moments before her death she opened her eyes and seemed puzzled as to why he was standing at her
bedside. Lawrence did not realize that, though he was divorced from Pamela, his office was across the street from the hospital
and Richard had telephoned him at home minutes earlier begging him to hurry to her bedside. Before the hospital staff could
transfer her to intensive care, Lawrence suddenly entered a coma in the "big private room" where she had been confined for almost
three weeks. Pamela's ex - husband and other doctors and nurses "managed to get [Lawrence] out of shock," she opened her eyes,
seemed puzzled by his presence and then she died. [4]
Gertrude Lawrence's funeral was described by the New York Times as follows. "Five
thousand persons jammed the area of Fifth Avenue and Fifty-fifth Street yesterday [Tuesday, Sept. 9] as 1,800 others filled the
flower-banked auditorium of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church for the funeral of Gertrude Lawrence." [5]
In the eulogy he delivered, Oscar Hammerstein II quoted from an essay on death
written by the poet / novelist Rabindranath Tagore. [6] The 1,800 inside the church included Yul
Brynner, her co-star in The King And I, many child actors who played the Siamese king's children, John Davis Lodge, who was then governor of Connecticut, Marlene
Dietrich, Tom Ewell, Phil Silvers,
Luise Rainer, Moss Hart and his wife Kitty Carlisle. Daphne du Maurier was not in the long list of attendees reported by the Times.
[7] Lawrence was buried in her champagne - colored "Shall
We Dance?" gown from the second act of The King and I in the Aldrich plot
belonging to her husband Richard's family in Lakeview Cemetery in Upton,
Massachusetts. It is near the Cape Playhouse theater owned by Richard where she had often performed and where they had
strolled together in the nearby streets of Dennis, Massachusetts. This theater is
the oldest summer theater in the United States. In his posthumous biography of his wife, Richard Aldrich claimed she was always
nice to townspeople who recognized her in Dennis, and he included a photograph of her wearing sunglasses chatting with a
passerby. [8]
Legacy
In early 1953, Lawrence's name was on a list of Columbia University professors who had died the previous year and were honored
with a memorial service and flags on the campus lowered to half-staff. Another professor on the list was John Dewey, the philosopher and educational reformer. [9]
In the biographical 1968 film, Star!, loosely based on her
life, Lawrence was portrayed by Julie Andrews. Richard
Crenna played the part of Richard Aldrich while the real Richard worked as a consultant on the movie. It is possible that
the poor quality of Star! had something to do with younger generations knowing nothing
about Gertrude Lawrence. She has never been the subject of the Biography (TV
series) on the A&E Network. Ironically, The Paley Center for Media has kinescopes and written
research material proving that Lawrence was one of the very first stars of either Broadway or Hollywood to appear on the new
medium of television. As far back as 1938, when television broadcasting was limited to New York City and only a few hundred
people owned TV sets, Lawrence took a night off from performing Susan and God to a packed Broadway audience so that she
could broadcast some scenes from this play inside a primitive TV studio. When TV broadcasting resumed after World War II and
spread with the networks, Lawrence made some live appearances in 1950 and 1951, including The Ed Sullivan Show.
Her face and voice rarely have crossed the television airwaves or cable wires since her death. In 1992, the American Movie Classics basic cable channel revived a 1950 film version of The Glass Menagerie
in which Lawrence played Amanda Wingfield to Jane Wyman's Laura and Kirk Douglas' "Gentleman Caller." Scholars of the legendary Tennessee Williams play that inspired this
movie have castigated the Warner Brothers studio for substituting an inane happy ending for
Williams' sad, realistic one. Although they also have criticized Warners for miscasting Lawrence, it is a fact that immediately
after the film wrapped she was offered, but turned down, the role of Margo Channing in All About
Eve that instead went to Bette Davis, enhancing her career enormously. [10] Posterity's lack of familiarity with the name Gertrude
Lawrence has taken its toll. It is interesting to note that the Paley Center has a videocassette of a 1978 telecast of the
syndicated talk show Dinah! on which Chicago newspaper columnist Irv Kupcinet recalls how Lawrence enhanced considerably the popularity of the landmark The Pump Room, Chicago, yet her name is not one of the hundreds he mentioned in his 1988
autobiography. [11]
Lawrence's grandson is Benn Clatworthy, a jazz saxophonist born in England after Lawrence died. The son of Pamela and her
second husband, Clatworthy performs often at jazz clubs in his home base of Los Angeles. (Pamela's first husband was the New York
doctor whom she divorced a few years before he coincidentally treated Gertrude Lawrence at the very end of her life in the
hospital.)
Broadway
Films
References
- ^ Pages 59 - 60 in Randall Riese and Neal Hitchens, The Unabridged
Marilyn: Her Life From A To Z. New York: Congdon and Weed, 1987 (hardback edition).
- ^ Page About Richard Aldrich In A Web Site On Theatrical Figures.
- ^ Pages 197 - 198 in hardback edition of Sheridan Morley, Gertrude
Lawrence: A Biography. New York: McGraw Hill, 1981
- ^ Pages 197 - 198 in hardback edition of Sheridan Morley, Gertrude
Lawrence: A Biography. New York: McGraw Hill, 1981
- ^ New York Times edition of
Wednesday, September 10, 1952, page 29
- ^ New York Times edition of Wednesday, September 10, 1952, page 29
- ^ New York Times edition of
Wednesday, September 10, 1952, page 29
- ^ Richard Aldrich, Gertrude Lawrence As Mrs. A. New York: Greystone
Press, 1954
- ^ New York Times edition of
January 19, 1953, page 27
- ^ Richard Aldrich, Gertrude Lawrence As Mrs. A. New York: Greystone
Press, 1954
- ^ The Dinah! broadcast appeared in various
American cities and towns on different dates in 1978. The Paley Center for
Media lists Wednesday, March 15, 1978 as the date it aired on KCST Channel 39 in San Diego. The Kupcinet autobiography
that omits Gertrude Lawrence entirely is titled Kup: A Man, An Era, A City. Chicago: Bonus Books, 1988.
External links
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