Elissa Landi
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Elissa Landi (born Elisabeth Marie Christine von Kühnelt;<ref name="fdb.cz/158804"/><ref>
- O'Brien, Scott (2020). Elissa Landi: Cinema’s Empress of Emotion. Orlando, FL: BearManor Media. Template:ISBN.
- See also:
- "Elissa Landi (1904-1948) Object Details". Smithsonian Institution Archives, Accession 90-105, Science Service Records, Image No. SIA2008-5056.
- Blum, Heiko R. (2001). Meine zweite Heimat Hollywood: deutschsprachige Filmkünstler in den USA. Henschel. p. 230. Template:ISBN.
- Quinlan, David (1997). The Film Lover's Companion: An A to Z Guide to 2,000 Stars and the Movies They Made. Carol Publishing Group. p. 277. Template:ISBN.
- Quigley, Martin S.; Monush, Barry (1995). First Century of Film. New York: Quigley Publishing Company. p.172. Template:ISBN.
- Ulrich, Rudolf (1993). Österreicher in Hollywood: ihr Beitrag zur Entwicklung des amerikanischen Films. Österreichische Staatsdruckerei. p. 158. Template:ISBN.
- Jarvis, Everett Grant (1992). Final curtain : deaths of noted movie and TV personalities, 1915-1992. Secaucus, NJ : Carol Pub. Group. p. 228. Template:ISBN.
- Butler, Ivan (1987). Silent Magic: Rediscovering the Silent Film Era. Columbus. p. 186. Template:ISBN.</ref> December 6, 1904 – October 21, 1948) was an Austrian-American actress born in Venice, who was popular as a performer in Hollywood films of the 1920s and 1930s.<ref>Obituary Variety, October 27, 1948, page 55.</ref> She "claims descent from Empress Elizabeth of Austria-Hungary",<ref name="gettyimages/502327509">Template:Cite news</ref> and was noted for her alleged aristocratic bearing.<ref>Template:In lang "La vie que tu t’étais imaginée", Nelly Alard, Collection Blanche, Gallimard, 03-01-2020.</ref>
Biography
Landi was born Elizabeth Marie Christine von Kühnelt in Venice, Italy, to Austrian Richard Kühnelt and his wife Caroline (later, "Countess Caroline Zanardi Landi"<ref name="gettyimages/515143330"/>). She was raised in the village of Kleinhart in Lower Austria near Vienna until the divorce of her parents. Later on she was educated in England. From 1928 to 1936, she was married to John Cecil Lawrence,Template:Citation needed and from 1943 to 1948 to Curtis Kinney Thomas.<ref name="nytimes/1970/12/06/caroline-thomas-wed"/>
Landi's first ambition was to be an author. She wrote her first novel at the age of twenty, and returned to writing during lulls in her acting career.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite book</ref> She debuted on stage in Dandy Dick (1923).<ref name="sw">Template:Cite book</ref> She joined the Oxford Repertory Company at an early age, and appeared in many successful British and American stage productions. In 1926 she starred in Dorothy Brandon's Blind Alley in the West End.Template:Citation needed
During the 1920s she appeared in British, French, and German films before traveling to the United States to appear in a Broadway production of A Farewell to Arms (1930).<ref name=":0" /> Her other Broadway credits included Empress of Destiny (1938), Apology (1943), and Dark Hammock (1944).<ref name="ibdb">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
She was signed to a contract by Fox Film Corporation (later 20th Century Fox) in 1931. She was paired successfully with some of the major leading men, including David Manners, Charles Farrell, Warner Baxter, and Ronald Colman, in romantic dramas such as Body and Soul (1931, which also featured Humphrey Bogart).
In 1931, she starred in the Fox feature The Yellow Ticket along with a young Laurence Olivier, Lionel Barrymore, and Boris Karloff. Raoul Walsh directed. The film was based on Michael Morton's 1914 play and was about a young Jewish girl who obtains a prostitute's passport during a period when Jews were not allowed such freedom so that she can travel in Czarist Russia to visit her sick father.
Fox loaned her to Paramount in 1932 to play Mercia, the female lead in Cecil B. DeMille's The Sign of the Cross adapted from the play of the same name. DeMille said he chose her for the role because "[t]here is the depth of the ages in her eyes, today in her body and tomorrow in her spirit."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Landi traveled with Katharine Hepburn.<ref name="gettyimages/515143330">
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She starred in the box office hit The Count of Monte Cristo (1934) with Robert Donat.
Her contract with Fox was abruptly cancelled in 1936 when she refused a particular role. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer signed her, and after a couple of romantic dramas, she played the cousin of Myrna Loy in After the Thin Man (1936). She retired from acting in 1943, after making only two more films.
Landi became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1943 and dedicated herself to writing, producing six novels and a series of poems. She had published her first novel as early as age nineteen. She continued writing novels at the height of her movie fame and for the rest of her short life.
She died<ref name="cdnc/MT19481021.2.24">Template:Cite news</ref> from cancer in Kingston, New York, at age 43 and was buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Newburyport, Massachusetts.Template:Citation needed
Landi has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to Motion Pictures, at 1611 Vine Street.<ref name="projects.latimes/walk/elissa-landi">Template:Cite news</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Filmography
Radio appearances
| Year | Program | Episode/source |
|---|---|---|
| 1943 | Suspense | "Nothing Up My Sleeve"<ref>Template:Cite news Template:Open access</ref> |
References
External links
Template:Portal Template:Sister project
- Turner Classic Movies
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- Pages with broken file links
- IBDB name template using Wikidata
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- 1904 births
- 1948 deaths
- American film actresses
- Austrian film actresses
- Austrian silent film actresses
- Austrian emigrants to the United States
- Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
- 20th Century Studios contract players
- 20th-century American actresses
- 20th-century Austrian actresses
- Naturalized citizens of the United States
- Expatriates from Austria-Hungary in Italy
- Austrian expatriates in England
- Actresses from Venice
- Actresses from Lower Austria