page_title: Laurence Harvey
section_title: International stardom
hierarchical_section_title: Laurence Harvey / Career / International stardom
caption_attribution_description: English: Laurence Harvey (left) and Frank Sinatra (right) filming a scene from The Manchurian Candidate in Central Park, New York. Harvey just walked off the pier.
context_page_description: Laurence Harvey was a Lithuanian-born British actor and film director. He was born to Lithuanian Jewish parents and emigrated to South Africa at an early age, before later settling in the United Kingdom after World War II. In a career that spanned a quarter of a century, Harvey appeared in stage, film and television productions primarily in the United Kingdom and the United States.
  Known for his clipped, posh accent and cool, debonair screen persona; his performance in Room at the Top resulted in an Academy Award nomination. That success was followed by the roles of William Barret Travis in The Alamo and Weston Liggett in BUtterfield 8, both films released in the autumn of 1960. He also appeared as the brainwashed Raymond Shaw in The Manchurian Candidate. He made his directorial debut with The Ceremony. He continued acting well into the 1970s, until his death in 1973 of cancer.
context_section_description: Harvey's breakthrough to international stardom came after he was cast by director Jack Clayton as the social climber Joe Lampton in Room at the Top (1959), produced by British film producer brothers John and James Woolf of Romulus Films. For his performance, Harvey received a BAFTA Award nomination and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. Simone Signoret and Heather Sears co-starred as Lampton's married lover and eventual wife respectively. It was the third most popular movie at the British box office in 1959 and a hit in the U.S. Harvey followed it with the musical Expresso Bongo (1959), a film best remembered for introducing Cliff Richard.
  Room at the Top led to Hollywood offers starting with John Wayne's epic The Alamo (1960). Harvey was John Wayne's personal choice to play Alamo commandant William Barret Travis. He had been impressed by Harvey's talent and ability to project the aristocratic demeanor Wayne believed Travis possessed. Harvey and Wayne later expressed their mutual admiration and satisfaction at having worked together. The Alamo was a hit (although the enormous cost meant the film lost money). Even more successful was MGM's BUtterfield 8 (1960), which won Elizabeth Taylor her first Oscar.
  Back in Britain, Harvey was cast in the film version of The Long and the Short and the Tall (1961) in a role originally performed by Peter O'Toole during the play's West End run. In the U.S., he supported Shirley MacLaine in MGM's Two Loves (1961) and co-starred with Geraldine Page in the film adaptation of Tennessee Williams's Summer and Smoke (1961).
  In Walk on the Wild Side (also 1962), he was cast with Barbara Stanwyck, Jane Fonda and Capucine. Fonda was not positive about the experience of working with him: "There are actors and actors – and then there are the Laurence Harveys. With them, it's like acting by yourself." The same year, he recorded an album of spoken excerpts from the book This Is My Beloved by Walter Benton, accompanied by original music by Herbie Mann. It was released on the Atlantic label.
  Harvey's portrayal of Wilhelm Grimm in the MGM film The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (1962) earned him a nomination for Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. The movie was a box office disappointment.
  Harvey appeared as the brainwashed Raymond Shaw in the Cold War thriller The Manchurian Candidate (1962). Film critic David Shipman wrote: "Harvey's role required him to act like a zombie and several critics cited it as his first convincing performance". The movie was a hit and is one of Harvey's better remembered films. Less successful was A Girl Named Tamiko (1962) and The Running Man (1963). Harvey made his directorial debut with The Ceremony (1963), in which he also starred.
  Harvey played King Arthur in the 1964 London production of the Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe musical Camelot at Drury Lane.
caption: Harvey (left) with Frank Sinatra, during filming of The Manchurian Candidate
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