Vivien Merchant Trailers
The Man in the Iron Mask TrailerThe Maids TrailerThe Homecoming Trailer
Vivien Merchant (born Ada Thompson 22 July 1929 – 3 October 1982) was a British actress. She performed in many stage productions and several films, including Alfie (1966) and Frenzy (1972). Her performance in Alfie earned her Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actress, and the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress.
She was the first wife of the playwright Harold Pinter, whom she met when working as a repertory actress and married in 1956. Their son, Daniel, was born in 1958. Having performed the role of Rose in a production of his first play, The Room (1957) at the Hampstead Theatre in 1960, she also appeared in many of Pinter's subsequent works, including as Ruth in The Homecoming (1964) on stage (1965) and screen (The Homecoming, 1973). The last of his plays in which she performed was Old Times (1971) as Anna.
Their marriage began disintegrating in the mid-1960s. From 1962 to 1969, Harold Pinter had a clandestine affair with Joan Bakewell, which informs Pinter's play Betrayal and his film adaptation, also called Betrayal.
In 1975 Pinter began a serious affair with the historian Lady Antonia Fraser, the wife of Sir Hugh Fraser, which he confessed to his wife that March. At first, Merchant took it very well, saying positive things about Fraser, according to her friend artist Guy Vaesen (as cited by Billington); but, Vaesen recalled, after "a female friend of Vivien's trotted round to her house and poisoned her mind against Antonia ... Life in Hanover Terrace [where the Pinters then lived] gradually became impossible". Pinter left, and Vivien Merchant filed for divorce and gave interviews to the tabloid press, expressing her distress.The Frasers' divorce became final in 1977 and the Pinters' in 1980. In 1980 Pinter married Antonia Fraser.
Vivien Merchant never overcame her grief and bitterness at losing Pinter, dying at the age of 53 on 3 October 1982, from acute alcoholism
Most Popular Vivien Merchant Trailers
Total trailers found: 20
29 March 1966
A young man leads a promiscuous lifestyle until several life reversals make him rethink his purposes and goals in life.
02 January 1967
Impressions of contemporary British arts and fashion. Summary of art through the ages taking in every thing from Mary Quant to the Marat/Sade production.
20 March 1966
An adaptation Turgenev's play of the same name.
21 July 1960
The plot focuses on a man returning home from prison to find his room being rented out to a tenant.
24 April 1960
Against the wishes of his domineering mother, Albert Stokes attends a work party. But the evening is not the escape he was hoping for.
25 May 1972
London is terrorized by a vicious sex killer known as The Necktie Murderer. Following the brutal slaying of his ex-wife, down-on-his-luck Richard Blaney is suspected by the police of being the killer.
08 October 1969
While Old England is being ransacked by roving Danes in the 9th century, Alfred is planning to join the priesthood.
17 July 1977
Years have passed since the Three Musketeers, Aramis, Athos and Porthos, have fought together with their friend, D'Artagnan.
11 January 1973
A burned-out British police detective finally snaps while interrogating a suspected child molester.
09 February 1967
Stephen is a professor at Oxford University who is caught in a rut and feels trapped by his life in both academia and marriage.
27 January 1972
The delightful if peculiar story of a day in the life of a small, Welsh fishing village called "Llareggub" in which we meet a host of curious characters (and ghosts) through the 'eyes' of Blind Captain Cat.
26 August 1968
Pringle, leader of the Brotherhood, recieves an anonymous letter accusing his wife of adultery. He employs a private investigator, Caulfield, who discovers things are not quite that straightforward.
21 October 1973
A social comedy about the relationship between two couples with different political beliefs. Edward and Jane Noble are right wing, but with some liberal leanings, whereas Sean and Marcia are more radical and left wing.
28 March 1963
A sophisticated suburban couple try to enliven their marriage with erotic role-playing, but find their new games even more repressive than before.
29 October 1973
In a dreary North London flat, the site of perpetual psychological warfare, a philosophy professor visits his family after a nine-year absence and introduces the four men - father, uncle and two brothers - to his wife.
05 December 1972
A Protestant and a Catholic family's friendship is threatened by the sectarian violence in Belfast. When the daughter of the Catholic family falls in love with a British soldier, the situation worsens .
15 September 1964
'To the May sun of a September life', wrote Henrik Ibsen on the photograph of himself that he gave to 19-year-old Emilie Bardach in Gossensass in September 1889.
21 April 1975
A film version of Genet's play. Two maids, Solange and Claire, hate their employers and, while they are out, take turns at dressing up as Madame and insulting her.
25 March 1965
Mysteries abound. What is going on between the wife and her brother? Are they indeed brother and sister? Sisson has his doubts about that … .
23 May 1966
Edwin and Arthur resolve to thrash out their situation with Ella over dinner.
