Rex Harrison
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (March 5, 1908 - June 2, 1990) was a British theatre and film actor.
Harrison was born in Huyton on Merseyside and was educated at Liverpool College. He first appeared on the stage in 1924 in Liverpool. He acted in various stage productions until 11 May 1990. He acted in the West End of London when he was young, appearing in the Terence Rattigan play French Without Tears, which proved to be his breakthrough role.
He continued to appear in London, in George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House, Pirandello's Henry IV, and in 1984 he appeared at the Haymarket Theatre with Claudette Colbert in Frederick Lonsdale's Aren't We All?. He again appeared at the Haymarket in J. M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton with Edward Fox.
Harrison was best known for his portrayal of Professor Henry Higgins in the musical My Fair Lady, based on the George Bernard Shaw play Pygmalion, especially after he reprised the role in the 1964 film version, for which he won an Best Actor Oscar. This was a revival of the highly acclaimed 1956 Broadway play, in which Harrison appeared with the young Julie Andrews, and for which he won his second Tony Award for the Best Actor. He revived the role on stage in the early 1980s. He also starred in 1967's Doctor Dolittle. Harrison could not sing, and so the music in both these musicals had to be carefully written. Harrison "spoke" the words to the music, and it sounded, more or less, like singing. Although Harrison's acting was often described as limited, he attracted favourable notices for his portrayal of Julius Caesar in Cleopatra (1963) and as Pope Julius II in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965), opposite Charlton Heston as Michelangelo.
Harrison was married six times. In 1942 he divorced his first wife, Colette Thomas, and married actress Lilli Palmer the next year; the two later appeared in numerous plays and films. After several years in film, he achieved wide acclaim starring in the adaptation of Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit (1945). He followed that with his first major American film, starring as King Mongkut in Anna and the King of Siam.
Harrison's affair with young actress Carole Landis, which is suspected to have played some part in her suicide, caused a scandal but failed to derail his career. Harrison and Palmer divorced in 1957. He soon remarried, to actress Kay Kendall. According to Palmer, Harrison requested a divorce to marry Kendall because he knew that she was dying from leukaemia. After Kendall's untimely death, it was rumoured that he tried unsuccessfully to reconcile with Lilli. He was later married to Welsh-born Rachel Roberts, who later, like Landis, committed suicide by taking sleeping pills; to Elizabeth Rees-Williams (the first wife of Irish actor Richard Harris); and to Mercia Tinker, who would become his widow in 1990.
The chronology of Harrison's six marriages is as follows:
* Colette Thomas (1934-1942), (one son, the actor/singer Noel Harrison)
* Lilli Palmer (1943-1957), (one son, the novelist/playwright Carey Harrison)
* Kay Kendall (1957-1959)
* Rachel Roberts (1962-1971)
* Elizabeth Harris (1971-1975), (three stepsons, Damian Harris, Jared Harris and Jamie Harris)
* Mercia Tinker (1978-1990)
On 25 July 1989, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace, while an orchestra played the music of songs from My Fair Lady.
Having retired from films in the late 1970s, he had continued to act on Broadway until the very end, despite suffering from glaucoma, painful teeth and a failing memory. In 1990 he was appearing on Broadway in The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham, opposite Glynis Johns, when he fell ill. It was discovered that he had pancreatic cancer but had been unaware of it, and he died peacefully three weeks later in New York City at the age of 82, causing the show to end prematurely.
For his contribution to motion pictures, Rex Harrison has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6906 Hollywood Boulevard. and for his contribution to the television industry at 6380 Hollywood Boulevard.
Trivia
The effete English accented-voice of Stewie Griffin, the evil baby character in the animated TV show Family Guy, was partially based on Sir Rex's voice.
He was the spokesman for the Dodge Aspen.
He was blind in one eye as the result of a childhood illness.
In episode #9F13 of The Simpsons, "I Love Lisa," the class actor, a dramatist with a slight British accent, is named "Rex," a reference to Rex Harrison.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rex_Harrison
Why can't the English? My fair lady
Henry
Look at her, a prisoner of the gutter,
Condemned by every syllable she ever uttered.
By law she should be taken out and hung,
For the cold-blooded murder of the English tongue.
Eliza
Aaoooww!
Henry imitating her
Aaoooww!
Heaven's! What a noise!
This is what the British population,
Calls an elementary education.
Pickering
Oh, Counsel, I think you picked a poor example.
Henry
Did I?
Hear them down in Soho square,
Dropping "h's" everywhere.
Speaking English anyway they like.
You sir, did you go to school?
Man
Wadaya tike me for, a fool?
Henry
No one taught him ?'take' instead of ?'tike!
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
This verbal class distinction, by now,
Should be antique.
If you spoke as she does, sir,
Instead of the way you do,
Why, you might be selling flowers, too!
Hear a Yorkshireman, or worse,
Hear a Cornishman converse,
I'd rather hear a choir singing flat.
Chickens cackling in a barn
Just like this one!
Eliza
Garn!
Henry
I ask you, sir, what sort of word is that?
It's "Aoooow" and "Garn" that keep her in her place.
Not her wretched clothes and dirty face.
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
This verbal class distinction by now should be antique.
If you spoke as she does, sir,
Instead of the way you do,
Why, you might be selling flowers, too.
An Englishman's way of speaking absolutely classifies him,
The moment he talks he makes some other Englishman despise him.
One common language I'm afraid we'll never get.
Oh, why can't the English learn to set
A good example to people whose English is painful to your ears?
The Scotch and the Irish leave you close to tears.
There even are places where English completely disappears.
In America, they haven't used it for years!
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
Norwegians learn Norwegian; the Greeks have taught their Greek.
In France every Frenchman knows his language fro "A" to "Zed"
The French never care what they do, actually, as long as they pronounce
in properly.
Arabians learn Arabian with the speed of summer lightning.
And Hebrews learn it backwards, which is absolutely frightening.
But use proper English you're regarded as a freak.
Why can't the English,
Why can't the English learn to speak?