LEIGH

In 1960, considering her marriage to be over, Leigh began a relationship with actor Jack Merivale, who knew of Leigh's medical condition and assured Olivier that he would care for her. She and Olivier divorced and Olivier soon married actress Joan Plowright. In his autobiography, Olivier discussed the years of strain they had experienced because of Leigh's illness: Throughout her possession by that uncannily evil monster, manic depression, with its deadly ever-tightening spirals, she retained her own individual canniness—an ability to disguise her true mental condition from almost all except me, for whom she could hardly be expected to take the trouble. Merivale proved to be a stabilising influence for Leigh, but despite her apparent contentment, she was quoted by Radie Harris as confiding that she would rather have lived a short life with Larry than face a long one without him. It is strange that she signed as Mrs Olivier when she had been divorced from him for six years.From the collection of Sir Michael Stewart (1911-1994, KCMG, OBE, HM Ambassador to Greece and Minister at the British Embassy in Washington)