Born Tokyo, Japan
In the 1948 motion picture The Snake Pit, Olivia de Havilland portrayed a woman who appeared to have schizophrenia. This remarkable film, directed by Anatole Litvak, unflinchingly examined mental illness and the treatments available at the time, including electroshock therapy. Because the role was so challenging, it was one of the actor’s favorites.
To celebrate de Havilland’s performance, Boris Chaliapin created this double portrait for the Time magazine cover of December 20, 1948. He was of one mind with the cover story writer, who noted, “One of the most striking things in The Snake Pit is its faces—the blanched, defenseless, suspicious, suffering faces, oddly but not artily assembled, which form the tragic chorus to the story.”
De Havilland had achieved her first great success with Gone with the Wind in 1939. Afterward, she hoped to receive more complex roles from Warner Bros., her home studio. In general, however, Warner Bros. tried to make her play more formulaic parts. She kept refusing and was suspended multiple times without pay. Shocked to discover that the periods of her suspension did not count toward fulfilling her seven-year contract, she risked her career in 1943 by suing the studio. In 1945, she won her case, and what became known as the de Havilland decision prevented performers’ contracts from being extended without their consent.
Overall, Olivia de Havilland starred in forty-nine feature films. She was nominated for five Academy Awards and won two, both for Best Actress, for To Each His Own (1946) and The Heiress (1949).
