Olivia de Havilland

As of de Havilland's 103 birthday (July 1, 2019), she is the earliest surviving recipient of a Best Actress Oscar nomination. She was nominated in 1942 for Hold Back the Dawn (1941).

In celebration of her 100th birthday, she was honored as Turner Classic Movies Star of the Month for July 2016.

As of December 15 2014, the 75th anniversary of the premiere of Gone with the Wind (1939), she is the only surviving major cast member. She has been the only survivor of the four principal leads since 1967. The only other surviving cast member who received screen credit is Mickey Kuhn.

" Joan died in 2013.

Attended the funeral of Charlton Heston in April, 2008.

[July 2006] Celebrated her 90th birthday at her daughter's home in Malibu.

Visited New York in the spring of 2004 to film a special commentary programme for the upcoming DVD of Gone with the Wind (1939), to be released in November that year.

She made a special appearance at the The 75th Annual Academy Awards (2003) and received a standing ovation.

It was reported in October 2001 that she was among 40 prominent French residents who were victims of hoax anthrax attacks (the attacks were proven to be hoaxes after a woman was arrested in Paris for sending out envelopes containing a powdery substance).

She is only the third Oscar-winning actor to celebrate a 100th birthday. The others are George Burns, who died less than two months after passing the 100-year mark in 1996, and Luise Rainer, who lived to be 104.

De Havilland's son, Benjamin Briggs Goodrich, a statistical analyst, died at his mother's Paris home in 1991, aged 42, after a long battle with Hodgkin's disease. He had first been diagnosed with the disease when he was 19 years old.

During the hoopla surrounding the 50th anniversary of GWTW in 1989, Olivia graciously declined requests for all interviews as the last of the four main stars.

Is portrayed by Lee Purcell in My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Legend of Errol Flynn (1985).

Her last screen appearance was in The Fifth Musketeer (1979), and her last career appearance was in the TV movie The Woman He Loved (1988).

Her turbulent relationship with her only sibling, Joan Fontaine, was press fodder for many decades, with the two reported as not speaking and permanently estranged since the death of their mother in 1975, when Joan claimed she had not been invited to the memorial service; which event she claimed she only managed to hold off until she could arrive by threatening to go public. Joan also wrote in her memoir that her elder sister had been physically, psychologically and emotionally abusive when they were young. And the iconic photo of Joan with her hand outstretched to congratulate Olivia backstage after the latter's first Oscar win and Olivia ignoring it because she was peeved by a comment Joan had made about Olivia's new husband, Marcus Goodrich, remained part of Hollywood lore for many years. Nonetheless, late in life, Fontaine gave an interview in which she serenely denied any and all claims of an estrangement from her sister. When a reporter asked Joan if she and Olivia were friends, she replied, "Of course!" The reporter responded that rumors to the contrary must have been sensationalism and she replied, "Oh, right - they have to. Two nice girls liking each other isn't copy. " Asked if she and Olivia were in communication and spoke to each other, Joan replied "Absolutely. " When asked if there ever had been a time when the two did not get along to the point where they wouldn't speak with one another, Joan replied, again, "Never. Never. There is not a word of truth about that. " When asked why people believe it, she replied "Oh, I have no idea. It's just something to say. . . Oh, it's terrible. " When asked if she had seen Olivia over the years, she replied, "I've seen her in Paris. And she came to my apartment in New York often. " The reporter stated that all this was a nice thing to hear. Joan then stated, "Let me just say, Olivia and I have never had a quarrel. We have never had any dissatisfaction. We have never had hard words. And all this is press.

The role of Lisolette Mueller in The Towering Inferno (1974) was originally offered to her. It was eventually played by Jennifer Jones.

In 1965 she became the first female president of the jury at the Cannes Film Festival.

Showed flair as a writer when "Every Frenchman Has One," a lighthearted autobiographical account of her attempts at adapting to French life, was published in 1962.

Gave birth to her second child at age 40, daughter Giselle Galante, on July 18, 1956. The child's father was her second husband, Pierre Galante; they divorced in 1979, and he died in 1998.

After a three-year hiatus, Olivia returned to star in My Cousin Rachel (1952). From that point on, she made few appearances on the screen but was seen on Broadway and in some television shows.

Turned down the role of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), reportedly saying that "a lady just doesn't say or do those things on the screen". De Havilland set the record straight in a 2006 interview, saying that she had recently given birth to her son when offered the part and was unable to relate to the material.

A full-time resident of Paris, France, since the mid-1950s, Olivia resided at her home on Rue Benouville. She used to read the Scriptures at the American Cathedral, Paris, at Christmas and Easter until around 2012.

As in the two previous years, she made only one film in 1949, but she again won a nomination and the Academy Award for Best Actress for The Heiress (1949).

In 1948 she turned in another strong showing in The Snake Pit (1948) as Virginia Cunningham, a woman suffering a mental breakdown.

The end result was another Oscar nomination for Best Actress, but she lost to Jane Wyman in Johnny Belinda (1948).

Was the 28th actress to receive an Academy Award; she won the Best Actress Oscar for To Each His Own (1946) at The 19th Academy Awards on March 13, 1947.

Returning to screen in 1946, Olivia made up for lost time by appearing in four films, one of which finally won her the Oscar that had so long eluded her.

It was To Each His Own (1946), in which she played Josephine Norris to the delight of critics and audiences alike.

Was considered for the title role in Mildred Pierce (1945).

In 1941 she played Emmy Brown in Hold Back the Dawn (1941), which resulted in her second Oscar nomination, this time for Best Actress.

Again she lost, this time to her sister Joan for her role in Suspicion (1941). After that strong showing, Olivia now demanded better, more substantial roles than the "sweet young thing" slot into which Warners had been fitting her. The studio responded by placing her on a six-month suspension, all of the studios at the time operating under the policy that players were nothing more than property to do with as they saw fit. As if that weren't bad enough, when her contract with Warners was up, she was told that she would have to make up the time lost because of the suspension. Irate, she sued the studio, and for the length of the court battle she didn't appear in a single film. The result, however, was worth it. In a landmark decision, the court said not only that Olivia did not have to make up the time, but that all performers were to be limited to a seven-year contract that would include any suspensions handed down. This became known as the "de Havilland decision"; no longer could studios treat their performers as chattel.

Olivia was the strongest performer in Hollywood for the balance of the 1940s.

In 1939 Warner Bros. loaned her to David O.

Selznick for the classic Gone with the Wind (1939). Playing sweet Melanie Hamilton, Olivia received her first nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, only to lose out to one of her co-stars in the film, Hattie McDaniel. After GWTW, Olivia returned to Warner Bros. and continued to churn out films.

Is a 15th cousin twice removed of Errol Flynn, her co-star in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938).

film version in 1935. She again was so impressive that Warner executives signed her to a seven-year contract.

No sooner had the ink dried on the contract than Olivia appeared in three more films: The Irish in Us (1935), Alibi Ike (1935) and Captain Blood (1935), the latter with the man with whom her career would be most closely identified, heartthrob Errol Flynn. He and Olivia starred together in eight films during their careers.

Was romantically involved with James Stewart, Howard Hughes, John Huston in the late 1930s.

Olivia Mary de Havilland was born July 1, 1916, in Tokyo, Japan, to British parents, Lilian Augusta (Ruse), a former actress, and Walter Augustus de Havilland, an English professor and patent attorney. Her sister, Joan, later to become famous as Joan Fontaine, was born the following year. Her surname comes from her paternal grandfather, whose family was from Guernsey in the Channel Islands. Her parents divorced when Olivia was just three years old, and she moved with her mother and sister to Saratoga, California. After graduating from high school, where she fell prey to the acting bug, Olivia enrolled in Mills College in Oakland. It was while she was at Mills that she participated in the school play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and was spotted by Max Reinhardt. She so impressed Reinhardt that he picked her up for both his stage version and, later, the Warner Bros.

One of her cousins, Capt. Sir Geoffrey de Havilland (1882-1965), was a British aviation pioneer, aircraft designer and owner of the de Havilland Aircraft Co. Its wooden bomber Mosquito has been considered the most versatile warplane ever built. The ill-fated de Havilland Comet was the first commercial jet airliner in 1952.

Elder daughter of Walter Augustus de Havilland (1872-1968), a patent attorney in Japan and also the author of the 1910 book "The ABC of Go", which provides a detailed and comprehensive description of the Japanese board game, and his wife, actress Lilian Fontaine. Elder sister of actress Joan Fontaine. Ex-sister-in-law of Collier Young, Brian Aherne and William Dozier. Aunt of Debbie Dozier.