His own parts there included the title role in Othello (1965) and Shylock in The Merchant of Venice (1970).Īmong Olivier's films are Wuthering Heights (1939), Rebecca (1940), and a trilogy of Shakespeare films as actor-director: Henry V (1944), Hamlet (1948), and Richard III (1955). From 1963 to 1973 he was the founding director of Britain's National Theatre, running a resident company that fostered many future stars. In the 1950s Olivier was an independent actor-manager, but his stage career was in the doldrums until he joined the avant garde English Stage Company in 1957 to play the title role in The Entertainer, a part he later played on film. There his most celebrated roles included Shakespeare's Richard III and Sophocles's Oedipus. In the 1940s, together with Richardson and John Burrell, Olivier was the co-director of the Old Vic, building it into a highly respected company.
In 1935 he played in a celebrated production of Romeo and Juliet alongside Gielgud and Ashcroft, and by the end of the decade he was an established star. In 1930 he had his first important West End success in Noël Coward's Private Lives, and he appeared in his first film. After attending a drama school in London, Olivier learned his craft in a succession of acting jobs during the late 1920s. His family had no theatrical connections, but Olivier's father, a clergyman, decided that his son should become an actor. Late in his career, he had considerable success in television roles. He also worked in films throughout his career, playing more than fifty cinema roles. Sir Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM ( / ˈ l ɒr ə n s ˈ k ə ˈ l ɪ v i eɪ / – 11 July 1989) was an English actor and director who, along with his contemporaries Ralph Richardson, Peggy Ashcroft and John Gielgud, dominated the British stage of the mid-20th century.
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