Carla Gugino ‘couldn’t be more excited’ to play Vivien Leigh in director Nick Sandow’s upcoming biopic The Florist, which will be set a year before her tragic 1967 death at age 53 following a 20-year battle with chronic tuberculosis.
‘I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunity to excavate a woman as complex, contradictory, and compelling as Vivien,’ the 52-year-old SAG Award nominee told Variety on Tuesday.
‘From the moment I read the script, I knew The Florist was a journey I had to pursue.’
Carla will begin filming her role as the Indian-born Brit at the end of this summer in Philadelphia, and screenwriter Jayce Bartok ‘put the script together based on a box of love letters’ between Vivian and blue-collar florist Joseph Penn.
Leigh (born Hartley) reportedly met the WWII veteran when he delivered a bouquet to her New York City flat and ‘amidst the backdrop of madness, they become each other’s sources of truth, beauty, and love.’
Carla Gugino (L) ‘couldn’t be more excited’ to play Vivien Leigh (R) in director Nick Sandow’s upcoming biopic The Florist, which will be set a year before her tragic 1967 death at age 53 following a 20-year battle with chronic tuberculosis
The Tony winner was preparing to star in Sir John Gielgud’s Broadway adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s Ivanov at the Shubert Theatre while treating her bipolar disorder with ECT (electroconvulsive therapy) in order to dull the paranoia, outbursts, and hallucinations.
Vivian’s ex-husband #2 Sir Laurence Olivier evidently blamed her fragile mental and physical state for the end of their 20-year marriage in 1960.
‘She never stopped loving him. It would have lasted, I’m absolutely convinced, had it not been for the bipolarity, which was at its worst in the second half of their marriage,’ author Alan Strachan wrote in his 2019 biography Dark Star.
‘And he found it impossible to deal with. He couldn’t cope with dealing with Vivien’s bipolarity and looking after his own career, which he was obsessive over… He was sad that the marriage collapsed, but it was inevitable… They were both realists.’
Leigh is still regarded as one of the greatest actresses, having won Academy Awards for both her iconic performances as Southern belles – Victor Fleming’s 1939 epic Gone with the Wind and Elia Kazan’s 1951 film version of A Streetcar Named Desire.
Meanwhile, Gugino – best known for The Watchmen – is a Florida-born former child star who recently starred in Zelda Williams’ zom-rom-com Lisa Frankenstein, Netflix’s animated film Orion and the Dark, and Netflix miniseries The Fall of the House of Usher.
‘The first question that I ask when I’m reading something and figuring out if I want to do it is, “Does it scare me,” because, if I feel like it’s something I know exactly how to do, then I’m just not going to be very inspired,’ the half-Italian, half-Irish beauty told Interview on April 5.
The 52-year-old SAG Award nominee told Variety: ‘I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunity to excavate a woman as complex, contradictory, and compelling as Vivien. From the moment I read the script, I knew The Florist was a journey I had to pursue’ (pictured last Thursday)
Carla will begin filming her role as the Indian-born Brit at the end of this summer in Philadelphia, and screenwriter Jayce Bartok (pictured April 10) ‘put the script together based on a box of love letters’ between Vivian and blue-collar florist Joseph Penn
Leigh (born Hartley) reportedly met the WWII veteran when he delivered a bouquet to her New York City flat and ‘amidst the backdrop of madness, they become each other’s sources of truth, beauty, and love’ (pictured in 1961)
The Tony winner was preparing to star in Sir John Gielgud’s (L, pictured in 1966) Broadway adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s Ivanov at the Shubert Theatre while treating her bipolar disorder with ECT (electroconvulsive therapy)
Vivian’s ex-husband #2 Sir Laurence Olivier (R, pictured in 1957) evidently blamed her fragile mental and physical state for the end of their 20-year marriage in 1960
Alan Strachan wrote in his 2019 biography Dark Star: ‘She never stopped loving him. It would have lasted, I’m absolutely convinced, had it not been for the bipolarity, which was at its worst in the second half of their marriage. And he found it impossible to deal with. He couldn’t cope with dealing with Vivien’s bipolarity and looking after his own career, which he was obsessive over… He was sad that the marriage collapsed, but it was inevitable’ (pictured in 1958)
Leigh is still regarded as one of the greatest actresses, having won Academy Awards for both her iconic performances as Southern belles – Victor Fleming’s 1939 epic Gone with the Wind (pictured) and Elia Kazan’s 1951 film version of A Streetcar Named Desire
Gugino – best known for The Watchmen (pictured in 2009) – is a Florida-born former child star who recently starred in Zelda Williams’ zom-rom-com Lisa Frankenstein, Netflix’s animated film Orion and the Dark, and Netflix miniseries The Fall of the House of Usher
The half-Italian, half-Irish beauty currently plays veteran journalist Grace Gordon Greene in Amy Chozick and Julie Plec’s 10-episode political drama The Girls on the Bus, which airs Thursdays on Max
‘Some people can look at a role and go, “I know exactly how to play it and I’m jumping in and doing it.” There’s something in me that has to be open to not having the answer yet, whether that comes from a childhood where I had a lot of unknowns and instability and, therefore, functioned with some element of fear as energy, or if it’s actually just the creative.’
Carla currently plays veteran journalist Grace Gordon Greene in Amy Chozick and Julie Plec’s 10-episode political drama The Girls on the Bus, which airs Thursdays on Max.
Gugino will also appear in Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s Great Dane drama The Friend as well as Ilya Naishuller’s action comedy Heads of State for Amazon MGM Studios.
