‘Just call me Joan’: Beloved star of stage and screen Dame Joan Plowright
Share:
Dame Joan Plowright, whose already glittering stage career reached even greater heights after the death of her husband, Laurence Olivier, was one of the greatest actresses of her generation. Her marriage in 1961 to the then Sir Laurence (later Lord Olivier) after they had co-starred in John Osborne’s hit play The Entertainer, was the showbusiness sensation of the year.
Throughout their marriage, until his death in 1989, after a long series of painful illnesses, Olivier implored his wife to “internationalise” her career. “You should be more international, and to be international you have got to be a success in America,” he told her.
She wasted no time in following his advice and within weeks, Hollywood was crying out for her. Such was her success that, relatively late in her career, she won the annual Crystal Award, and two Golden Globes. Afterwards she said: “It has been a rebirth, a blossoming. America makes a big fuss of you if you’re good. It’s very invigorating. It sets you off again. Larry would have been so thrilled by all the fuss the Americans are making of me.”.
In her earlier career in the West End and on Broadway she had starred in many classics, including Shakespearean productions. In the later stages of her career she played imposing matriarchal figures in many television dramas. Joan Ann Plowright was born in Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire, on October 28, 1929. Her father was editor of the Scunthorpe and Frodingham Gazette.
