Who is tallulah bankhead

She did not act in the film. Bankhead with her father, Speaker of the House William B. Bankhead, at a cocktail party. She never knew her mother, who died of sepsis three weeks after Bankhead's birth in The tragedy devastated her father, who was consumed by depression and alcoholism. Consequently, Bankhead and her sister Eugenia were primarily raised by their paternal grandmother. Though she did star in several films in the early s, Bankhead returned to the stage for much of the decade.

She was photographed here for Vogue. Here is Bankhead dining with Alfred Hitchcock in Hollywood. In , he cast her in her most successful film, both critically and commercially, Lifeboat. Bankhead's famously husky voice was the result of chronic bronchitis from a childhood illness, but she was also a heavy smoker, and said to consume cigarettes per day.

Bankhead enjoyed a lively social life—she once dove into the pool at the Garden of Allah hotel in Hollywood in a beaded dress.

Weighed down by the gown, she removed it before emerging naked and soaking wet. Senator Richard Nixon and his wife Pat second left speak with Bankhead at the same party given by Hedda Hopper second right. Though Bankhead's career slowed in the mids, she remained a society fixture.

She is seen here signing autographs from the back of her car. Carol Channing, Gloria Swanson. The award for that year went to Swanson. Two years earlier, NBC had cast her on "The Big Show," a radio variety program where she acted as the host, but also performed monologues and songs.

She also published a best-selling autobiography that year. In , Bankhead signed up for a stage act at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas, reciting scenes from famous plays, reading poetry and letters, and even singing. Though it was expected to tank, the crowds loved it. Here she is playing the character in a revival of the play. Bankhead was quite political throughout her life, and though her family were Southern Democrats, she differed from them in her support for Harry Truman's reelection in Bret hints she was more interested in his daughter , Daphne.

Bankhead had a signature party trick she pulled at all hours, at home and work and everywhere else. Naked cartwheels, missing underpants, and stripping—she did them all for fun. Wild antics made Bankhead a sensation in and of herself, even when her plays got lackluster reviews.

She quickly became the toast of London and was determined to enjoy every minute. Bankhead might have continued as such indefinitely, until news arrived that her father, by then Speaker of the House, was ill without much time left.

Marriage, however, was reluctantly doable. And not in a good way. She kept that secret until his death, and Bankhead headed to Reno for a divorce not long after. Tallulah Bankhead: A Scandalous Life. Brian, Denis. New York: Macmillan, Bryars, Dianne. Fleming, E. Jefferson, NC:MacFarland, Lambert, Lane. Patrick, Pamela Cowie. Tallulah Bankhead: The Darling of the Theater.

Huntsville: Writers Consortium Books, Smith, Helen C. Walker, Marideth. Tallulah Brockman Bankhead Miss Tallulah Bankhead. Boston: G. Hall, Rawls, Eugenia.