Born Lauruska Mischa Skikne in Joniskis, Lithuania, Laurence Harvey
changed his name after emigrating to South Africa. After serving in
Egypt and Italy during WWII, he returned to Johannesburg to continue
his theatrical career. He moved to Britain in 1946, and enrolled at
the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) and spent time with the Manchester
Library Theatre. In 1948 Harvey made his feature debut in the thriller
House of Darkness
(1948), this resulted in lead roles in Cairo Road (1950) and There is
Another Sun (1950). Harvey continued to languish in second features
until cast in the noir thriller The
Good Die Young (1954). After a sequence of co-star roles including
Romeo and Juliet (1954) and I Am a Camera (1955), in 1956 he appeared
opposite comedian Jimmy Edwards in Three Men in a Boat.
After a series of disappointments, Harvey earned universal fame for
his role as the ruthless social climber Joe Lampton in Room
at the Top (1959), for which he received a Best Actor Oscar nomination.
He followed it with varied roles in John Wayne’s The Alamo (1960) and
The Long
and the Short and the Tall (1960). Later, Harvey was to achieve
his greatest success as the brainwashed assassin in John Frankenheimer's
The Manchurian Candidate (1962). In 1963, Harvey made his debut as a
writer and director with The Ceremony, a disappointingly lacklustre
drama. A small role in John Schlesinger's
Darling (1965)
and Life at the Top (1965), the belated sequel to Room at the Top, followed
as Harvey’s career began to dry up and focus on European productions.
His final film as actor and director was Welcome to Arrow Beach (1974),
released after Harvey died of cancer in 1973 aged just 45.
