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Next Time We Live: James Cagney, Olivia de Havilland, Jeffrey Lynn Blind Alley: Edward G. Robinson, Joseph Calleia, Isabel Jewell, Leatrice Joy Winter in Paris: Maureen O'Sullivan, Warren William, Don Ameche Olivia Mary de Havilland (born 1 July 1916) is a British-American film and stage actress who was born in Japan. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1946 and 1949. She is the elder sister of actress Joan Fontaine. The sisters are among the last surviving leading ladies from Hollywood of the 1930s. De Havilland appeared as Hermia in A Midsummer Night's Dream, her first stage production, at the Hollywood Bowl. The stage production was later turned into a 1935 movie, her film debut.[8] Although the stage cast was largely replaced with Warner Bros. contract players, she was hired to reprise her role as Hermia. After appearing with Joe E. Brown in Alibi Ike and James Cagney in The Irish in Us, she played opposite Errol Flynn in such highly popular films as Captain Blood, The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), and as Maid Marian to Flynn's Robin Hood in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). Overall, she starred opposite Flynn in eight films. Allegedly, Joan Fontaine, de Havilland's sister, was approached by George Cukor to audition for Gone with the Wind (1939). He had just directed her in No More Ladies. She was excited until she learned he wanted her for the part of Melanie and not Scarlett. She reportedly turned him down flatly by saying, "Why don't you ask my sister!" Olivia de Havilland went on to play Melanie Hamilton Wilkes in Gone with the Wind and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance. In 1941, de Havilland became a naturalized citizen of the United States.[9] De Havilland was becoming increasingly frustrated by the roles assigned to her. She felt she had proven herself capable of playing more than the demure ingénues and damsels in distress that were quickly typecasting her, and began to reject scripts that offered her this type of role. When her Warner Bros. contract expired, the studio informed her that six months had been added to it for times she had been on suspension; the law then allowed for studios to suspend contract players for rejecting a role and the period of suspension to be added to the contract period. In theory, this allowed a studio to maintain indefinite control over an uncooperative contractee. Most accepted this situation, while a few tried to change the system. Bette Davis had mounted an unsuccessful lawsuit against Warner Bros. in the 1930s. De Havilland mounted a lawsuit in the 1940s, supported by the Screen Actors Guild and was successful, thereby reducing the power of the studios and extending greater creative freedom to the performers. The California Court of Appeal's decision was one of the most significant and far-reaching legal rulings in Hollywood[10] and the statute on which it is based is still known as the De Havilland Law. Her victory won her the respect and admiration of her peers, among them her own sister Joan Fontaine, who later commented, "Hollywood owes Olivia a great deal".[11] The studio, however, vowed never to hire her again. The ruling interpreted the already existing California Labor Code Section 2855.[12] That code section imposes a 7-year limit on contracts for service unless the employee agrees to an extension beyond that term. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivia_de_Havilland