Tallulah Bankhead

Tallulah Bankhead was romantically and sexually linked with many notable female personalities including actresses Marlene Dietrich and Greta Garbo, writers like Mercedes de Acosta and Eva Le Gallienne, and singer Billie Holiday.

Actress Patsy Kelly also confirmed that when she worked as her personal assistant, she had a sexual relationship with Bankhead.

In 1933, Bankhead had a critical five-hour long emergency hysterectomy due to venereal disease.

Tallulah Brockman Bankhead was born in Huntsville, Alabama, on January 31, 1902. Her parents were William Brockman Bankhead and Adelaide Eugenia ‘Ada’ Bankhead. She had an elder sister, Eugenia. Her father belonged to the Bankhead-and-Brockman political family and was the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1936 to 1940.

Her mother died of blood poisoning just three weeks after Tallulah’s birth. After her mother’s death, her father suffered from depression and alcoholism. As a result, her paternal grandmother took care of her and her sister.

As the girls grew up, her grandmother found it difficult to handle them. They were then sent to the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Manhattanville, New York, in 1912. The girls were frequently moved from one school to another, as their father’s political career required him to move from place to place.

When Tallulah Bankhead was 15, she sent her photo to a ‘Picture Play’ contest, which promised a trip to New York and a role in a movie to the winners. Although she forgot to send her name and address with her photo, later she came to know that she was one of the winners.

She contacted the magazine and soon arrived in New York. She was given a minor role in ‘Who Loved Him Best’. Not satisfied with the role, she started looking for other ways to venture into the entertainment industry in New York.

Soon she found her way to the Algonquin Hotel and used her charm to enter The Algonquin Round Table, a group of New York City writers, actors, and critics. She also started attending Algonquin's wild parties, which introduced her to drugs.

At the Algonquin group, she befriended some actresses and got offers for three silent films—‘When Men Betray’ and ‘Thirty a Week’ in 1918 and ‘The Trap’ in 1919.

Around this time, she made her stage debut in ‘The Squab Farm’ at the Bijou Theatre. In 1919, she appeared in two more plays, ‘39 East’ and ‘Footloose’.

Critics highly praised Tallulah Bankhead’s brilliant portrayal of the ruthless Regina Giddens in the play ‘The Little Foxes’, which was considered as one of the strongest performances in American theater’s history. She was also featured on the cover of ‘Life’ during the play’s run.

Her superb performance as journalist Constance Porter in the film ‘Lifeboat’ was critically applauded. The film was commercially a hit. She won the New York Film Critics Circle award for best actress of the year for her outstanding performance.