Tallulah Bankhead

Tallulah Bankhead

Bankhead in 1941
Born Tallulah Brockman Bankhead
January 31, 1902
Huntsville, Alabama, U.S.
Died December 12, 1968 (aged 66)
New York City, New York, U.S.
Cause of death
 Pneumonia complicated by emphysema and malnutrition
Resting place
 Saint Paul's Churchyard, Kent, Maryland
Nationality American
Occupation Actress
Years active 1918–1968
Spouse(s) John Emery (m. 1937–41)
Parent(s) William B. Bankhead
Adelaide Eugenia "Ada" Bankhead
Relatives John Hollis Bankhead (grandfather)
John Hollis Bankhead II (uncle)

Tallulah Brockman Bankhead (January 31, 1902 – December 12, 1968) was an American actress of the stage and screen, talk-show host, and reputed libertine.[1][2] Bankhead was also known for her deep voice, flamboyant personality and support of liberal causes, which broke with the tendency of Southern Democrats at the time to support a more conservative agenda. She was inducted into the Alabama Women's Hall of Fame in 1981.[3]

Early life and family

Bankhead was born in Huntsville, Alabama, to William Brockman Bankhead and Adelaide Eugenia "Ada" Bankhead (née Sledge). She was born on the second floor of what is now known as the Isaac Schiffman Building; a marker was erected to commemorate the site and, in 1980, the building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.[4] "Tallu" was named after her paternal grandmother. Her mother died of blood poisoning (septicemia) on February 23, 1902, three weeks after Bankhead's birth. She had an elder sister, Evelyn Eugenia.[5]

She came from the powerful Bankhead-and-Brockman political family, active in the Democratic Party in the South in general and Alabama in particular. Her father was the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1936 to 1940. She was the niece of Senator John H. Bankhead II and granddaughter of Senator John H. Bankhead.[5]

She and her sister were mostly reared by their paternal grandmother, Tallulah James Brockman Bankhead, at Sunset in Jasper, Alabama.[5] Bankhead's family sent her to various schools in a vain attempt to keep her out of trouble - including several years at a Roman Catholic convent school (although her father was a Methodist and her mother an Episcopalian).[6] She also attended Mary Baldwin College. The young Bankhead was described as "an extremely homely child", overweight, and with a deep, husky voice resulting from chronic bronchitis.[7] However, others described her as an exhibitionist, performer, personality, and star from the very beginning.[8]

Career

Early years

In her autobiography, Bankhead claimed that her "first performance" was witnessed by none other than the Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur. Her Aunt Marie gave the famous brothers a party at her home near Montgomery, Alabama, in which the guests were asked to entertain. "I won the prize for the top performance, with an imitation of my kindergarten teacher", Bankhead wrote. "The judges? Orville and Wilbur Wright."[9]

At 15, Bankhead won a movie-magazine beauty contest and persuaded her family to let her move to New York. She quickly won bit parts, first appearing in a nonspeaking role in The Squab Farm. During these early New York years, she became a peripheral member of the Algonquin Round Table and was known as a hard-partying girl-about-town. During this time, she began to use cocaine and marijuana, going as far as saying, "Cocaine isn't habit-forming and I know because I've been taking it for years."[10]

In 1918, she made her stage debut at the Bijou Theatre in New York. In 1923, she made her debut on the London stage at Wyndham's Theatre. In London, she was to appear in over a dozen plays over the next eight years, most famously, The Dancers. Her fame as an actress was ensured in 1924 when she played Amy in Sidney Howard's They Knew What They Wanted. The show won the 1925 Pulitzer Prize. She was famous not only as an actress but also for her many affairs, compelling personality and witticisms like, "There is less to this than meets the eye." and "I'm as pure as the driven slush."[11][12]

Welsh artist Augustus John with Bankhead and her portrait (1929)

While in London, Bankhead bought herself a Bentley, which she loved to drive. She was not very competent with directions and constantly found herself lost in the London streets. She would telephone a taxi-cab and pay the driver to drive to her destination while she followed behind in her car.[13] During her eight years on the London stage, Bankhead earned a reputation for making the most out of inferior material. For example, in her autobiography, Bankhead described the opening night of a play called Conchita:

"In the second act ... I came on carrying a monkey ... On opening night the monkey went berserk ... (he) snatched my black wig from my head, leaped from my arms and scampered down to the footlights. There he paused, peered out at the audience, then waved my wig over his head ... The audience had been giggling at the absurd plot even before this simian had at me. Now it became hysterical. What did Tallulah do in this crisis? I turned a cartwheel! The audience roared ... After the monkey business I was afraid they might boo me. Instead I received an ovation."[14]

Hollywood and Broadway

Bankhead returned to the United States in 1931 but Hollywood success eluded her in her first four films of the 1930s. She rented a home at 1712 Stanley Street, in Hollywood and began hosting parties that were said to "have no boundaries". Bankhead's first film was Tarnished Lady (1931), directed by George Cukor and the pair became fast friends. Bankhead behaved herself on the set and filming went smoothly but she found film-making to be very boring and did not have the patience for it. She didn't like Hollywood either; when she met producer Irving Thalberg, she asked him, "How do you get laid in this dreadful place?" Thalberg retorted, "I'm sure you'll have no problem. Ask anyone."[15] Although Bankhead was not very interested in making films, the opportunity to make $50,000 per film was too good to pass up. Her 1932 movie Devil and the Deep is notable for the presence of three major co-stars, with Bankhead receiving top billing over Gary Cooper, Charles Laughton and Cary Grant, it is the only film with Cooper and Grant as the film's leading men. She later said, "Dahling, the main reason I accepted [the part] was to fuck that divine Gary Cooper!"[16]

Portrait by Carl Van Vechten (1934)

In 1933, Bankhead nearly died following a five-hour emergency hysterectomy due to venereal disease. Only 70 pounds (32 kg) when she left the hospital, she stoically said to her doctor, "Don't think this has taught me a lesson!"[39]. In 1934, after recuperating in Alabama, she returned to England. After only a short stay, she was called back to New York to play in Dark Victory. Although Bette Davis played the leading character in the 1939 film version, she openly admitted in later years that she had emulated Bankhead in the role. Bankhead continued to play in various performances over the next few years, gaining excellent notices for her portrayal of Elizabeth in a revival of Somerset Maugham's The Circle.

David O. Selznick, producer of Gone with the Wind (1939) called her the "first choice among established stars" to play Scarlett O'Hara.[17] Although her screen test for the role in black-and-white was superb, she photographed poorly in Technicolor. Selznick also reportedly believed that at age 36, she was too old to play Scarlett, who is 16 at the beginning of the film (the role eventually went to Vivien Leigh). Selznick sent Kay Brown to Bankhead to discuss the possibility of Bankhead playing prostitute Belle Watling in the film, which she turned down.[18] The search for Scarlett O'Hara was documented in the The Scarlet O'Hara Wars episode of the mini-series Moviola where the very similar Carrie Nye played Bankhead, being nominated for an Emmy Award. Among the many other actors who have played Tallulah (mostly on stage) are Helen Gallagher, Tovah Feldshuh, Kathleen Turner and Valerie Harper.

Returning to Broadway, Bankhead's career stalled at first in unmemorable plays. When she appeared in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra with her husband, John Emery, the New York Evening Post critic John Mason Brown wrote "Tallulah Bankhead barged down the Nile last night as Cleopatra – and sank."[19] However, her memorable portrayal of the cold, ruthless Regina Giddens in Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes (1939) won her the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Performance. During the run, she was featured on the cover of Life magazine. Bankhead and playwright Hellman, both formidable women, feuded over the Soviet Union's invasion of Finland. Bankhead (a staunch anti-Communist) was said to want a portion of one performance's proceeds to go to Finnish relief, while Hellman (who had defended the Moscow Trials of 1936, and was a member of the Communist Party USA in 1938-40) objected strenuously, and the two women did not speak for the next quarter of a century.[20]

More success and another New York Drama Critics' Circle Award followed her 1942 performance in Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth, in which Bankhead played Sabina, the housekeeper and temptress, opposite Fredric March and Florence Eldridge (Mr. and Mrs. Antrobus, and also husband and wife offstage). During the run of the play, some media sources accused Bankhead of conducting a running feud with Elia Kazan, the play's director, which Kazan confirmed in his autobiography, Elia Kazan: A Life, published by Doubleday in 1988. Kazan stated that Bankhead was one of the few people in his life that he ever actually detested.[21]

Lobbycard from Alfred Hitchcock's Lifeboat (1944)

In 1944, Alfred Hitchcock cast her as cynical journalist Constance Porter in her most successful film, both critically and commercially, Lifeboat. Her performance was acknowledged as her best on film and won her the New York Film Critics Circle Award. A beaming Bankhead accepted her New York trophy and exclaimed, "Dahlings, I was wonderful!"[22] After World War II, Bankhead appeared in a revival of Noël Coward's Private Lives, taking it on tour and then to Broadway for the better part of two years. The play's run made Bankhead a fortune. From that time, Bankhead could command 10% of the gross and was billed larger than any other actor in the cast, although she usually granted equal billing to Estelle Winwood, a frequent co-star and close friend from the 1920s until Bankhead's death in 1968.[20]

Bankhead circulated widely in the celebrity crowd of her day and was a party favorite for outlandish stunts, such as doing cartwheels in a skirt while wearing no underwear or entering a soirée stark naked. Always extravagant, upon leaving the theater one evening she encountered a Salvation Army band passing around the tambourine. Reaching into her purse, Bankhead withdrew a twenty dollar bill, tossed it into the tambourine and exited into a taxi with the remark, "There darlings, I know it's been a rough winter for you Spanish dancers."[13]

Later years

Though Bankhead's career slowed in the mid-1950s, she never faded from the public eye. Although she had become a heavy smoker (reportedly 150 cigarettes/day), heavy drinker, and consumer of sleeping pills (she was a lifelong insomniac), Bankhead continued to perform in the 1950s and 1960s on Broadway, in the occasional film, as a highly popular radio show host, and in the new medium of television.

In 1950, in an effort to cut into the rating leads of The Jack Benny Program and The Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy Show which had jumped from NBC radio to CBS radio the previous season, NBC spent millions over the two seasons of The Big Show starring "the glamorous, unpredictable" Tallulah Bankhead as its host, in which she acted not only as mistress of ceremonies, but also performed monologues and songs. Despite Meredith Willson's Orchestra and Chorus and top guest stars from Broadway, Hollywood, and radio, The Big Show, which earned rave reviews, failed to do more than dent Jack Benny's and Edgar Bergen's ratings.

The next season, NBC installed her as one of a half-dozen rotating hosts of NBC's The All Star Revue on Saturday nights. Bankhead's most popular television appearance was her December 3, 1957, appearance on The Ford Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Show. Bankhead played herself in the classic episode titled "The Celebrity Next Door". The part was originally slated for Bette Davis, but Davis had to bow out after cracking a vertebra. Lucille Ball was reportedly a fan of Bankhead and did a good impression of her. By the time the episode was filmed, however, both Ball and Desi Arnaz were deeply frustrated by Bankhead's behavior during rehearsals. It took her three hours to "wake up" once she arrived on the set and she often seemed drunk. She also refused to listen to the director and she did not like rehearsing. Ball and Arnaz apparently did not know about Bankhead's antipathy to rehearsals or her ability to memorize a script quickly. After rehearsals, the filming of the episode proceeded without a hitch and Ball congratulated Bankhead on her performance.

In 1956, Bankhead appeared as Blanche DuBois in a revival of Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire (1956), but reviews were poor. She received a Tony Award nomination for her performance of a bizarre 50-year-old mother in the short-lived Mary Coyle Chase play, Midgie Purvis (1961). Her last theatrical appearance was in another Williams play, The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore (1963), directed by Tony Richardson.[23] Although she received good notices for her last performances, her career on the American stage was coming to an end.

Her last motion picture was a British horror film, Fanatic (1965), co-starring Stefanie Powers, which was released in the U.S. as Die! Die! My Darling!. Her last appearances onscreen came in March 1967 as the villainous Black Widow in the Batman TV series, and on the December 17, 1967, episode of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour comedy-variety TV series, in the "Mahta Harry" skit.[24] She also appeared on NBC's famous lost Tonight Show Beatles interview that aired on May 14, 1968.[25] Sitting behind the interview desk and beside Joe Garagiola, who was substituting for an absent Johnny Carson, she took an active role during the interview, questioning Paul McCartney and John Lennon.[26] George Harrison and Ringo Starr were not present and were in England at the time, as noted during the interview.

Personal life

Bankhead was an avid baseball fan whose favorite team was the New York Giants.[27] This was evident in one of her famous quotes, through which she gave a nod to the arts: "There have been only two geniuses in the world, Willie Mays and Willie Shakespeare. But, darling, I think you'd better put Shakespeare first."[28]

Religion and politics

Bankhead expressed some interest in spirituality, but in general did not pursue this interest outwardly. In 1932 she met the Indian spiritual teacher Meher Baba.[29]

Like her family, Bankhead was a Democrat but broke with many Southerners by campaigning for Harry Truman's reelection in 1948. While viewing the Inauguration parade, she booed the South Carolina float which carried then-Governor Strom Thurmond, who had recently run against Truman on the Dixiecrat ticket, splitting the Democratic vote.[30] She is credited with having helped Truman immeasurably by belittling his rival, New York's Governor Thomas E. Dewey.[31]

Marriage

Bankhead married actor John Emery, the son of stage actors Edward Emery (circa 1861–1938) and Isabel Waldron (1871–1950), on August 31, 1937, at her father's home in Jasper, Alabama.[32] Bankhead filed for divorce in Reno, Nevada, in May 1941.[33] It was finalized on June 13, 1941. The day her divorce became final, Bankhead told a reporter, "You can definitely quote me as saying there will be no plans for a remarriage."[34]

Bankhead had no children but was the godmother of Brook and Brockman Seawell, children of her lifelong friend, actress Eugenia Rawls, and Rawls's husband, Donald Seawell.[35]

Sexuality and sexual exploits

An interview that Bankhead gave to Motion Picture magazine in 1932 generated controversy. In the interview, Bankhead ranted wildly about the state of her life and her views on love, marriage, and children:

"I'm serious about love. I'm damned serious about it now ... I haven't had an affair for six months. Six months! Too long ... If there's anything the matter with me now, it's not Hollywood or Hollywood's state of mind ... The matter with me is, I WANT A MAN! ... Six months is a long, long while. I WANT A MAN!"[36]

Time ran a story about it, and, back home, Bankhead's father and family were perturbed. Bankhead immediately telegraphed her father, vowing never to speak with a magazine reporter again. However, following the release of the Kinsey Reports, she was once quoted as stating, "I found no surprises in the Kinsey Report. The good doctor's clinical notes were old hat to me ... I've had many momentary love affairs. A lot of these impromptu romances have been climaxed in a fashion not generally condoned. I go into them impulsively. I scorn any notion of their permanence. I forget the fever associated with them when a new interest presents itself."[37]

In 1933, Bankhead nearly died following a five-hour emergency hysterectomy due to venereal disease. Only 70 pounds (32 kg) when she left the hospital, she stoically said to her doctor, "Don't think this has taught me a lesson!"[38]

Rumors about Bankhead's sex life have lingered for years, and she was linked romantically with many notable female personalities of the day, including Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Eva Le Gallienne, Hattie McDaniel, and Alla Nazimova, as well as writer Mercedes de Acosta and singer Billie Holiday.[22] Actress Patsy Kelly claimed she had a sexual relationship with Bankhead when she worked for her as a personal assistant.[39] John Gruen's Menotti: A Biography notes an incident in which Jane Bowles chased Bankhead around Capricorn, Gian Carlo Menotti's and Samuel Barber's Mount Kisco estate, insisting that Bankhead needed to play the lesbian character Inès in Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit (which Paul Bowles had recently translated). Bankhead locked herself in the bathroom and kept insisting "That lesbian! I wouldn't know a thing about it."[40]

Bankhead never publicly described herself as being bisexual. She did, however, describe herself as "ambisextrous".[41]

Death

On December 12, 1968, Bankhead died in St. Luke's Hospital in Manhattan at 7:45 a.m., aged 66. The cause of death was pleural pneumonia, complicated by emphysema, malnutrition, and possibly a strain of the Hong Kong flu which was running worldwide at that time. Her last coherent words reportedly were, "Codeine ... bourbon."[42]

A private funeral was held at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Kent County, Maryland on December 14. A memorial service was held at St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church in New York City on December 16.[43] She was buried in Saint Paul's Churchyard, near Chestertown, Maryland, where her sister lived.[2]

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Bankhead has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6141 Hollywood Blvd.[44]

MI5 investigation of Eton school scandal

In 2000, declassified papers posthumously thrust Bankhead into the limelight of public scandal. She had been investigated by MI5 during the 1920s amid rumors she was corrupting pupils at Eton. The documents alleged that she seduced up to half a dozen private schoolboys into taking part in "indecent and unnatural" acts.[45]

The documents compiled by the British Aliens and Immigration Department allege that the investigation was blocked by a determined cover-up by Eton's headmaster, Dr. Cyril Argentine Alington. The allegations were based purely on gossip, and lacked credible evidence. It appears that they were assembled by MI5 at the urgings of a Home Office minister.[45]

Credits

Broadway

Date Production Role Notes
March 13 – April 1918 The Squab Farm
May 10 – June 1920 Footloose Rose de Brissac
March 2 – June 1921 Nice People Hallie Livingston
November 16, 1921 – January 1922 Everyday Phyllis Nolan
September 22 – October 1922 The Exciters "Rufus" Rand
March 1 – June 1933 Forsaking All Others Mary Clay
November 7 – December 1934 Dark Victory Judith Traherne
February 12 – March 1935 Rain Sadie Thompson Revival
April 29 – July 1935 Something Gay Moncia Grey
September 21, 1936 – January 1937 Reflected Glory Miss Flood
November 10 – 1937 Antony and Cleopatra Cleopatra Revival
April 18 – June 1938 The Circle Elizabeth Revival
February 15, 1939 – February 3, 1940 The Little Foxes Regina Giddens
December 27, 1941 – February 7, 1942 Clash by Night Mae Wilenski
November 18, 1942 – September 25, 1943 The Skin of Our Teeth Sabina
March 13 – June 9, 1945 Foolish Notion Sophie Wang
March 19 – April 12, 1947 The Eagle Has Two Heads The Queen
October 4, 1948 – May 7, 1949 Private Lives Amanda Prynne Revival
September 15, 1954 – January 29, 1955 Dear Charles Dolores
February 15–26, 1956 A Streetcar Named Desire Blanche Du Bois Revival
January 30 – February 9, 1957 Eugenia Eugenia, Baroness Munster
February 1–18, 1961 Midgie Purvis Midgie Purvis Nominated: Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play
January 1 – 1964 The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore Mrs. Goforth Revival

Filmography

Film
Year Title Role Notes
1918 Who Loved Him Best? Nell Alternative title: His Inspiration
1918 When Men Betray Alice Edwards Uncredited
1918 Thirty a Week Barbara Wright Uncredited
1919 The Trap Helen Carson Alternative title: A Woman's Law
1928 His House in Order Nina Graham Lost film[46]
1931 Tarnished Lady Nancy Courtney
1931 My Sin Carlotta/Ann Trevor
1931 The Cheat Elsa Carlyle
1932 Thunder Below Susan
1932 Make Me a Star Herself
1932 Devil and the Deep Diana Sturm
1932 Faithless Carol Morgan
1933 Hollywood on Parade No. A-6 Herself Short subject
1943 Stage Door Canteen Herself
1944 Lifeboat Constance "Connie" Porter Won: New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress
1945 Royal Scandal, AA Royal Scandal Catherine the Great Alternative title: Czarina
1953 Main Street to Broadway Herself
1959 Boy Who Wanted a Melephant, TheThe Boy Who Wanted a Melephant Narrator Short subject
1965 Fanatic Mrs. Trefoile Alternative title (US): Die! Die! My Darling
1966 Daydreamer, TheThe Daydreamer The Sea Witch Voice
Television
Year Title Role Notes
1952–
1953		 All Star Revue Herself 7 episodes
1953 The Buick-Berle Show Herself 2 episodes
1954 Colgate Comedy Hour, TheThe Colgate Comedy Hour Herself Episode #4.19
1954–
1962		 United States Steel Hour, TheThe United States Steel Hour Hedda Gabler 2 episodes
1955 Martha Raye Show, TheThe Martha Raye Show Herself 1 episode
1957 Schlitz Playhouse of Stars Episode: "The Hole Card"
1957 General Electric Theater Katherine Belmont Episode: "Eyes of a Stranger"
1957 Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour, TheThe Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour Herself Episode: "The Celebrity Next Door"
1965 Red Skelton Show, TheThe Red Skelton Show Mme. Fragrant Episode: "A Jerk of All Trades"
1967 Batman Black Widow 2 episodes

In popular culture

Bankhead's large, charismatic personality inspired voice actress Betty Lou Gerson's work on the character Cruella De Vil in Walt Disney Pictures' One Hundred and One Dalmatians, which the studio calls "a manic take-off on famous actress Tallulah Bankhead."[47]

Fictional portrayals

Rock musician/actor Suzi Quatro portrayed Bankhead in a musical named Tallulah Who? in 1991. The musical was based on a book by Willie Rushton. Quatro co-wrote the music with Shirlie Roden. The show ran from February 14 to March 9 at The Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch, UK and received favorable reviews.[48][49]

Valerie Harper starred as Bankhead in Looped, which premiered at The Pasadena Playhouse.[50] It opened on Broadway on March 14, 2010 at the Lyceum Theatre, and closed on April 11, 2010.

Other actresses to portray Bankhead include Eugenia Rawls (in her one-woman stage show Tallulah, A Memory), Kathleen Turner (in Sandra Ryan Heyward's one-woman touring show Tallulah in the late 1990s), Carrie Nye (on television in The Scarlett O'Hara War) and Helen Gallagher in an off-Broadway musical, Tallulah![51]

In the 1969 film Goodbye, Mr. Chips, actress Siân Phillips portrays Ursula Mossbank, a character clearly inspired by the Bankhead mystique and mannerisms, but there is no suggestion in the film that that character is supposed to be Bankhead herself.

Bankhead has also been portrayed by a male actor. Jim Bailey originated the role of Bankhead in the play Tallulah and Tennessee in 1999.[52]

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Obituary Variety, December 18, 1968.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Schumach, Murray (December 13, 1968). "Tallulah Bankhead Dead at 65; Vibrant Stage and Screen Star" (PDF). The New York Times. Retrieved February 17, 2010.
  3. ↑ "Inductees". Alabama Women's Hall of Fame. State of Alabama. Retrieved February 20, 2012.
  4. ↑ The Historical Marker Database
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 (Procter Reeves 2009, pp. 83–84)
  6. ↑ (Bankhead 2004, p. 48)
  7. ↑ Current Biography 1941, p. 37
  8. ↑ Gottlieb, Robert (May 16, 2005). "Dah-Ling: The Strange Case of Tallulah Bankhead". The New Yorker: 84–85.
  9. ↑ (Bankhead 2004, p. 14)
  10. ↑ (Hellman 1973, p. 146)
  11. ↑ (Bankhead 2004, p. 82)
  12. ↑ (Wintle 1978, p. 47)
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 (Fadiman 2000, p. 39)
  14. ↑ (Bankhead 2004, p. 131)
  15. ↑ (Fleming 2005, p. 110)
  16. ↑ (Donnelley 2000, p. 51)
  17. ↑ (Haskell 2009, p. 63): "According to source: "a memo from Selznick, November 11, 1936: 'Bankhead is first choice among established stars – and many votes coming in for her. She is taking Arden treatments and preparing for Cukor's arrival in NY to test her'"
  18. ↑ (Lambert 1976, p. 53)
  19. ↑ (Lobenthal 2004, p. 273)
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Alabama Women's Hall of Fame – Tallulah Brockman Bankhead
  21. ↑ (Kazan 1997, p. 2001)
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 (Jones 2009, p. 39)
  23. ↑ (Richardson 1993, p. 147): "Directing her was totally impossible. 'Loud or soft – how do you want it?' she asked me. There wasn't any other choice. Tallulah was simply past it. She couldn't remember, she couldn't perform."
  24. ↑ SmothersBrothers.com
  25. ↑ Pdxretro.com
  26. ↑ Beatlesinterviews.org
  27. ↑ Murphy, Robert E. "The Real Villain of New York Baseball", The New York Times, Sunday, June 24, 2007.
  28. ↑ (Linge 2005, p. 181)
  29. ↑ Volume 18, #1, p. 6
  30. ↑ (Leuchtenburg 2007, p. 213)
  31. ↑ (Bankhead 2004, p. 275)
  32. ↑ "Tallulah Bankhead and Actor John Emery Wed". Lawrence Journal-World. September 1, 1937. p. 3. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  33. ↑ "Divorce to Be Sought by Tallulah Bankhead". The Milwaukee Journal. May 3, 1941. p. 9. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  34. ↑ "Tallulah Bankhead Wins Divorce". The Spokesman-Review. June 14, 1941. p. 2. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  35. ↑ Christy, Marian. "EUGENIA RAWLS; A LOOK. REMEMBERED LAUGHTER. THOSE ARE THE GENEROSITIES OF LOVE". The Boston Globe (September 15, 1985). p. 98.
  36. ↑ (Mills 2005, pp. 275–276)
  37. ↑ (Bankhead 2004, p. 312)
  38. ↑ (Lobenthal 2004, p. 224)
  39. ↑ (Monush 2003, p. 388)
  40. ↑ (Gruen 1978, p. 53)
  41. ↑ (Stern 2009, p. 39)
  42. ↑ (Lobenthal 2004, p. 533)
  43. ↑ "Tallulah Bankhead Dies at 65". Middlesboro Daily News. December 13, 1968. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  44. ↑ "Hollywood Star Walk: Tallulah Bankhead". latimes.com. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 "MI5 sex secrets of 1920s star". BBC News. March 2, 2000. Retrieved February 4, 2009.
  46. ↑ Lobenthal, Joel (2004). Tallulah: the life and times of a leading lady. HarperCollins. p. 130. ISBN 0-06-039435-8.
  47. ↑ Disney Archives – Villains History
  48. ↑ "The Queen's Theatre listing of Quatro's performance in Tallulah Who? (via Wayback)". www.queens-theatre.co.uk. Hornchurch, UK: The Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch. 2003. Archived from the original on December 16, 2004. Retrieved December 16, 2004.
  49. ↑ "Tallulah Who?". www.guidetomusicaltheatre.com. Accrington, UK: The Guide to Musical Theatre. 2012. Retrieved January 22, 2012.
  50. ↑ McNulty, Charles (July 10, 2008). "Startling secrets and risque ramblings". latimes.com. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  51. ↑ Belcher, David (February 15, 2010). "Tallulah's Back in Town, Still Famous for Her Infamy". nytimes.com. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
  52. ↑ Shirley, Don (October 16, 1999). "Flamboyant 'Tallulah,' Courtesy of Bailey". latimes.com. Retrieved January 6, 2013.

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  • Monush, Barry (2003). The Encyclopedia of Hollywood Film Actors: From the Silent Era to 1965, Volume 1. Hal Leonard Corporation. ISBN 1-55783-551-9
  • Procter Reeves, Jacquelyn (2009). Wicked North Alabama. The History Press. ISBN 1-59629-753-0
  • Richardson, Tony (1993). Long Distance Runner – A Memoir. London: Faber & Faber. ISBN 0-571-16852-3
  • Shalit, Gene (2003). Great Hollywood Wit: A Glorious Cavalcade of Hollywood Wisecracks, Zingers, Japes, Quips, Slings, Jests, Snappers, & Sass from the Stars. Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-28273-7
  • Stern, Keith; McKellen, Ian (2009). Queers in History: The Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Historical Gays, Lesbians and Bisexuals. BenBella Books. ISBN 1-935251-83-X
  • Wintle, Justin; Kenin, Richard (1978). The Dictionary of Biographical Quotation of British and American Subjects. Taylor & Francis.

Further reading

  • McLellan, Diana (2001). The Girls: Sappho Goes to Hollywood. St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-28320-2. (review)
  • Mackrell, Judith. Flappers: Six Women of a Dangerous Generation. 2013. ISBN 978-0-330-52952-5
  • Oderman, Stuart, Talking to the Piano Player 2. BearManor Media, 2009. ISBN 1-59393-320-7.
  • Israel, Lee (1973). Miss Tallulah Bankhead. Dell Publishing.
  • Not Behind Lace Curtains : The Hidden World of Evan, Viscount Tredegar by William Cross. ISBN 978190514210 ( 2013)
  • Evan Frederic Morgan: Viscount Tredegar The Final Affairs: Financial and Carnal by William Cross. ISBN 978905914234 ( 2014)
  • Lois Sturt, Wild Child. A Glance at Hon. Lois Ina Sturt, Viscountess Tredegar. by William Cross ISBN 9781905914319. ( 2014)

External links

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