Ellie Lambeti
Encyclopedia
Ellie Lambeti was a Greek actress.
Family
Born in 1926 in GreeceGreece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
,her father owned a Greek tavern
Tavern
A tavern is a place of business where people gather to drink alcoholic beverages and be served food, and in some cases, where travelers receive lodging....
in the village of Vilia
Vilia
Vilia is a village and a former municipality of West Attica, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Mandra-Eidyllia, of which it is a municipal unit....
Attikis. She had six siblings. Her maternal grandfather was a Captain Stamatis who fought together with Kolokotronis against the Turks in 1821, when the modern Greek democracy was created. In 1928, the family moved to Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
.
Early career
In 1941, she was rejected from two theatre schools: the state one (Ethniko) and a private one named for the Greek actress Marika KotopouliMarika Kotopouli
-Biography:Kotopouli was born on 3 May 1887 in Athens, to Dimitris and Eleni. Her parents were also actors, and Marika's first stage appearance came during one of their tours, in the play "The Coachman of the Alps"...
, who recognized Lambeti's talent and hired her. Kotopouli reportedly allowed her to read the letters that Ion Dragoumis
Ion Dragoumis
Ion Dragoumis was a Greek diplomat, writer and revolutionary.Born in Athens, Dragoumis was the son of Stephanos Dragoumis who was foreign minister under Charilaos Trikoupis. The family originated in Vogatsiko in Kastoria...
, a Greek politician, wrote to Kotopouli during their love affair in the beginning of the 20th century. Loukou adopted the professional surname Lambeti and became a female lead actress.
She starred in Hanneles Himmelfahrt by Hauptmann
Gerhart Hauptmann
Gerhart Hauptmann was a German dramatist and novelist who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1912.-Life and work:...
. In 1945, she met Marios Ploritis, her future husband, during the filming one of her first films, Adoulotoi sklavoi (1946). In 1946 Lambeti became one of the actresses that played for the famous modern theatre director Karolos Koun
Karolos Koun
Karolos Koun was a Greek theater director, widely known for his lively staging of ancient Greek plays. He had been praised all over Europe for his bawdy, colorful stagings of the 5th century BC political comedies of Aristophanes...
; she was the female lead in the Greek
productions of the following plays:
- The Glass MenagerieThe Glass MenagerieThe Glass Menagerie is a four-character memory play by Tennessee Williams. Williams worked on various drafts of the play prior to writing a version of it as a screenplay for MGM, to whom Williams was contracted...
by Tennessee WilliamsTennessee WilliamsThomas Lanier "Tennessee" Williams III was an American writer who worked principally as a playwright in the American theater. He also wrote short stories, novels, poetry, essays, screenplays and a volume of memoirs...
(1946) - AntigoneAntigone (Anouilh play)Jean Anouilh's play Antigone is a tragedy inspired by Greek mythology and the play of the same name from the fifth century B.C...
by AnouilhJean AnouilhJean Marie Lucien Pierre Anouilh was a French dramatist whose career spanned five decades. Though his work ranged from high drama to absurdist farce, Anouilh is best known for his 1943 play Antigone, an adaptation of Sophocles' Classical drama, that was seen as an attack on Marshal Pétain's...
(1947) - Bodas de sangreBodas de sangreBlood Wedding is a tragedy by the Spanish dramatist Federico García Lorca. It was written in 1932 and first performed in Madrid in March 1933 and later that year in Buenos Aires...
by LorcaFederico García LorcaFederico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca was a Spanish poet, dramatist and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27. He is believed to be one of thousands who were summarily shot by anti-communist death squads...
(1948)
1950s/1960s
In August 1950, she married Marios Ploritis, but their marriage collapsed in 1952 when she had a love affair with Dimitris HornDimitris Horn
Dimitris Horn was a Greek theatrical and film performer. He is regarded probably as the greatest Greek actor of modern times.-Biography:...
. Together they produced and played in theatre in Libelei in 1953, in La Cuisine des Anges in 1953, in L'Invitation au Château
L'Invitation au Château
Invitation to the Castle is a 1947 satirical play by the French playwright Jean Anouilh. It was adapted in 1950 by Christopher Fry as Ring Round the Moon. The play concerns two twins, a cold, manipulative playboy Hugo, and his sensitive brother Frédéric. Frédéric is madly in love with Diana, the...
in 1955, in Quality Street
Quality Street (play)
Quality Street is a comedy in four acts by J. M. Barrie, written before his more famous work Peter Pan. The story is about two sisters who start a school "for genteel children"....
in 1956, in The Rainmaker
The Rainmaker (1956 film)
The Rainmaker is a 1956 film directed by Joseph Anthony and adapted by N. Richard Nash from his play The Rainmaker. The film tells the story of a middle-aged woman, suffering from unrequited love for the local town sheriff; however, she falls for a con man who comes to town with the promise that he...
by Richard Nash
Richard Nash
Richard Nash may refer to:*Richard Nash , Australian Senator*Major General Richard C. Nash, US Army, former commander of the 34th Infantry Division and current Adjutant General of the Minnesota National Guard...
in 1956, in Gigi
Gigi
Gigi is a 1944 novella by French writer Colette. The plot focuses on a young Parisian girl being groomed for a career as a courtesan and her relationship with the wealthy cultured man named Gaston who falls in love with her and eventually marries her....
in 1957, in the Fourposter in 1957, in Two for the Seesaw
Two for the Seesaw
Two for the Seesaw is a 1962 romance-drama film directed by Robert Wise and starring Robert Mitchum and Shirley MacLaine. It was adapted from the Broadway play written by William Gibson.-Plot:...
by Gibson
William Gibson (playwright)
William Gibson was an American playwright and novelist. He graduated from the City College of New York in 1938.He was of Irish, French, German, Dutch and Russian ancestry...
in 1958 and in 1959 in Dans sa Candeur Naive.
In 1959 she met her American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
husband, Frederic Wakeman, Sr.
Lambeti starred in Michael Cacoyannis's Greek masterpieces like Kyriakatiko xypnima
Windfall in Athens
Windfall in Athens is a 1954 Greek comedy film directed by Michael Cacoyannis. It was entered into the 1954 Cannes Film Festival.-Plot:Mina, a beautiful, care-free salesgirl for a milliner's shop, is robbed by two urchins while she is enjoying a Sunday morning swim...
(1954), To Koritsi me ta mavra
The Girl in Black
A Girl in Black is a 1956 Greek dramatic film by Cypriot director Michael Cacoyannis starring Dimitris Horn and Ellie Lambeti. The film takes place on the Greek island of Hydra, where two Athenian visitors become entangled in local feuds after one of them falls in love with a local girl.It was one...
(1956), and To Telefteo psema (1957). She starred also in Kalpiki lira
The Counterfeit Coin
Κάλπικη λίρα is a Greek comedy film produced in 1955, written and directed by Giorgos Tzavellas and starring Dimitris Horn, Ilya Livikou and Vassilis Logothetidis...
(1955) by George Tzavellas
George Tzavellas
George Tzavellas, also rendered Giorgos Tzavellas, Yiorgos Tzavellas, or Yorgos Javellas , was a Greek film director, screenwriter, and playwright, considered "a key figure in Greek cinema after WWII". In 1964 he was a member of the jury at the 14th Berlin International Film Festival.-External...
. Lambeti continued her theatrical career, in 1962 came The Heiress
The Heiress
The Heiress is a 1949 American drama film. It was written by Ruth and Augustus Goetz, adapted from their 1947 play of the same title that was based on the 1880 novel Washington Square by Henry James. The film was directed by William Wyler, with starring performances by Olivia de Havilland as...
, in 1965 as Blanche
Blanche DuBois
Blanche DuBois is a fictional character in Tennessee Williams' 1947 Pulitzer Prize-winning play A Streetcar Named Desire...
in A Streetcar Named Desire
A Streetcar Named Desire (play)
A Streetcar Named Desire is a 1947 play written by American playwright Tennessee Williams for which he received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1948. The play opened on Broadway on December 3, 1947, and closed on December 17, 1949, in the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. The Broadway production was...
.
Late life and career
In the 1970s Lambeti starred in The Little FoxesThe Little Foxes
The Little Foxes is a 1939 play by Lillian Hellman. Its title comes from Chapter 2, Verse 15 in the Song of Solomon in the King James version of the Bible, which reads, "Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes." Set in a small town in Alabama in...
(1973), Irma La Douce
Irma la Douce
Irma la Douce/Irma la Dolce is a 1963 romantic comedy starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine, directed by Billy Wilder.It is based on the 1956 French musical Irma La Douce by Marguerite Monnot and Alexandre Breffort.-Plot:...
(1972), Miss Margarita (1975) and Filoumena Martourano (1978).
Last years
The subsequent years were a fight against cancer. She successfully starred in theatre productions like Thornton WilderThornton Wilder
Thornton Niven Wilder was an American playwright and novelist. He received three Pulitzer Prizes, one for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and two for his plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth, and a National Book Award for his novel The Eighth Day.-Early years:Wilder was born in Madison,...
's Hello, Dolly!
Hello, Dolly! (musical)
Hello, Dolly! is a musical with lyrics and music by Jerry Herman and a book by Michael Stewart, based on Thornton Wilder's 1938 farce The Merchant of Yonkers, which Wilder revised and retitled The Matchmaker in 1955....
in 1980 and in 1981 as Sarah in Mark Medoff
Mark Medoff
Mark Medoff is an American playwright, screenwriter, film and theatre director, actor, and professor. His play Children of a Lesser God received both the Tony Award and the Olivier Award...
's Children of a Lesser God
Children of a Lesser God
Children of a Lesser God is a 1986 American romantic drama film directed by Randa Haines and written by Hesper Anderson and Mark Medoff. An adaptation of Medoff's Tony Award-winning stage play of the same name, the film stars William Hurt and Marlee Matlin as two employees at a school for the deaf:...
, but her health was poor. She lost her voice and died in 1983 from cancer in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, aged 57. In the 1990s her biography was written by Fredy Germanos.