Biography of leslie howard
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Leslie Howard Steiner was born in London to Lilian (Blumberg) and Ferdinand "Frank" Steiner. His father was a Hungarian Jewish immigrant, and his English mother was of German Jewish and mostly English descent. Leslie went to Dulwich College, then worked as a bank clerk until the outbreak of World War I, when he went into the army. In , diagnosed as shell-shocked, he was invalided out and advised to take up acting as therapy. In a few years, his name was famous on the stages of London and New York. He made his first movie in (The Heroine of Mons ()). He became known as the perfect Englishman (slim, tall, intellectual, and sensitive), a part that he played in many movies which set women to dreaming about him. His first sound movie came out in Outward Bound (), an adaptation of the stage play in which he starred. In Never the Twain Shall Meet () and Smilin' Through (), he played the Englishman role to the hilt. His screen persona could perhaps best be summed up by his r
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Though he would spend much of his career specialising in roles that conveyed a certain type of gentle, civilised Englishness, Leslie Howard not only came from immigrant stock but his first language was German. His Hungarian-Jewish father, Ferdinand Steiner, anglicised his name to Frank Stainer when he moved to London and married barrister's daughter Lilian Howard (née Blumberg). Though born in Forest Hill (on 3 April ), their son initially grew up in Vienna, returning to London and a Dulwich College education when his father joined a City stockbroking firm. Intending Leslie to follow in his footsteps, he secured him a job as a bank clerk, but the acting bug had already bitten thanks to his mother's fondness for amateur dramatics, and Leslie would take on her adopted maiden name as his own. He first appeared onscreen in the film The Heroine of Mons, directed by his uncle Wilfred Noy.
When the First World War began shortly afterwards, Howard joined the 20th Hussars (despite the
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Leslie Howard
British actor (–)
For other people named Leslie Howard, see Leslie Howard (disambiguation).
Leslie Howard Steiner (3 April &#;&#; 1 June ) was an English actor, director, producer and writer.[1] He wrote many stories and articles for The New York Times, The New Yorker, and Vanity Fair and was one of the biggest box-office draws and movie idols of the s.
Active in both Britain and Hollywood, Howard played Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind (). He had roles in many other films, including Berkeley Square (), Of Human Bondage, The Scarlet Pimpernel (both ), The Petrified Forest (), Pygmalion (), Intermezzo (), "Pimpernel" Smith (), and The First of the Few (). He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for Berkeley Square and Pygmalion.
Howard's Second World War activities included acting and filmmaking. He helped to make anti-German propaganda and shore up support for the Allies; two years after his death, t