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David Niven is a Actor, Scriptwriter and Producer British born on 28 february 1910 at London (United-kingdom)

David Niven

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Birth name James David Graham Niven
Nationality United-kingdom
Birth 28 february 1910 at London (United-kingdom)
Death 29 july 1983 (at 73 years) at Château-d'Œx (Suisse)
Awards Academy Award for Best Actor

James David Graham Niven (1 March 1910 – 29 July 1983) was an English actor and novelist who was popular in Europe and in the United States. He may be best known for his roles as Squadron Leader Peter Carter in A Matter of Life and Death, as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and as Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther. He was awarded the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Separate Tables (1958).

Born in London, Niven attended Heatherdown Preparatory School and Stowe before gaining a place at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. After Sandhurst he was gazetted a lieutenant in the Highland Light Infantry. Having developed an interest in acting, he left the Highland Light Infantry, travelled to Hollywood and had several minor roles in film. He first appeared as an extra in the British film There Goes the Bride (1932). From there, he hired an agent and had several small parts in films from 1933 to 1935, including a non-speaking part in MGM's Mutiny on the Bounty. This brought him to wider attention within the film industry and he was spotted by Samuel Goldwyn. Upon the outbreak of the Second World War, Niven returned to Britain and rejoined the army, being re-commissioned as a lieutenant.

Niven resumed his acting career after his demobilisation, and was voted the second most popular British actor in the 1945 Popularity Poll of British film stars. He appeared in A Matter of Life and Death (1946), The Bishop's Wife (1947) and Enchantment (1948), all of which received critical acclaim. Niven later appeared in The Elusive Pimpernel (1950), The Toast of New Orleans (1950), Happy Go Lovely (1951), Happy Ever After (1954) and Carrington V.C. (1955) before scoring a big success as Phileas Fogg in Michael Todd's production of Around the World in 80 Days. Niven appeared in nearly a hundred films, and many shows for television. He also began writing books, with considerable commercial success. In 1982 he appeared in Blake Edwards' final "Pink Panther" films Trail of the Pink Panther and Curse of the Pink Panther, reprising his role as Sir Charles Lytton.

Biography

In 1928 (the year he turned age 18), David Niven seduced the 15-year-old Margaret Whigham, during a holiday at Bembridge on the Isle of Wight. To the fury of her father, she became pregnant as a result. Margaret was rushed into a London nursing home for a secret termination. "All hell broke loose," remembered her family cook, Elizabeth Duckworth. Margaret did not mention the episode in her 1975 memoirs, but she continued to adore Niven until the day he died. She was among the VIP guests at his London memorial service.

After a whirlwind two-week romance in 1940, Niven married Primula Susan Rollo (18 February 1918, London – 21 May 1946), the aristocratic daughter of British barrister William Hereward Charles Rollo, who was a grandson of the 10th Lord Rollo, and Lady Kathleen Nina Hill, daughter of the 6th Marquess of Downshire. The couple had two sons: David, Jr. and Jamie. Primula, whom he called Primmie, died at age 28, only six weeks after moving to the U.S., of a fractured skull and brain lacerations from an accidental fall in the Beverly Hills, California home of Tyrone Power. While playing "sardines", she walked through a door believing it led to a closet. Instead, it led to a stone staircase to the basement.

Niven recalled this as the darkest period of his life, years afterwards thanking his friends for their patience and forbearance during this time. He claimed to have been so grief-stricken that he thought for a while that he had gone mad. Following a suicide attempt involving a handgun which failed to fire, he eventually rallied and returned to filmmaking.

In 1948 Niven met Hjördis Paulina Tersmeden (née Genberg, 1919–1997), a divorced Swedish fashion model. He recounted their meeting:I had never seen anything so beautiful in my life—tall, slim, auburn hair, up-tilted nose, lovely mouth and the most enormous grey eyes I had ever seen. It really happened the way it does when written by the worst lady novelists ... I goggled. I had difficulty swallowing and had champagne in my knees.

They married six weeks later. However, Niven's second marriage was as tumultuous as his first marriage was content. In an unsuccessful effort to bring harmony to the marriage, he and his wife adopted two girls, Kristina and Fiona. Kristina later told biographer Graham Lord that she was convinced that she was Niven's secret child by another fashion model, Mona Gunnarson. All four of Niven's children, as well as many of his friends, told Lord that Hjördis, unable to achieve an acting career, had affairs with other men and became an alcoholic. In October 1951, while pheasant shooting with friends in New England, Hjördis was shot in the face, neck and chest by a member of the hunting party. Local doctors wished to operate immediately to remove the birdshot. However, another doctor advised Niven to allow the swelling of the face to go down. In this way, his wife avoided disfigurement.

While she was convalescing in the Blackstone Hotel in New York, Niven and Hjördis were next-door neighbours with Audrey Hepburn, who made her début on Broadway that season. In 1960, while filming Please Don't Eat the Daisies with Doris Day, Niven and Hjördis separated for a few weeks, but later reconciled. Hjördis stopped drinking alcohol for a time after Niven's death in 1983, but returned to it before her own death of a stroke in 1997 at age 78. Niven's friend Billie More noted: "This is not kind, but when Hjördis died I can't think of a single soul who was sorry".

Throughout the 1970s, Niven spent much of his time at his home in Chateau d'Oex in Switzerland, near the ski resort of Gstaad. He had a close group of friends there including actor Roger Moore, writer William F. Buckley, Jr. and former US Ambassador to France Evan G. Galbraith.