And That's Not All: The Memoirs of Joan Plowright

Joan Plowright first met Laurence Olivier in the mid-1950's when he was still married to Gone With the Wind star Vivien Leigh. Joan was the daughter of a north country newpaper editor and his wife who was an amateur actor of note. She went to drama school, worked at the Royal Court at the height of it Look Back in Anger celebrity, starred in plays by Arnold Wesker and John Osbourne, and then Olivier came into her life. They started an affair- she had been married briefly to a young actor. Then Vivien Leigh, a manic depressive, suddenly consented to Olivier divorcing her. Her marriage to Olivier coincided with the launch of two companies directed by Olivier. She confesses that he was 'not the easiest man to be married to' but they stayed together and she nursed him through ten years of fighting illness. At the core of this book is the relationship with Olivier and it contains their love letters. Joan also refutes the wilder claims that have been made questioning Olivier's sexuality in several unauthorised biographies. She has always enjoyed writing, as these feisty, poignant and funny memoirs show.