Love Is a Many Splendored Thing

[dc11786]

I found this linked to the write-up on Mark and Laura at WeLoveSoaps. I thought some here might find it interesting.

http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/shows/love-is-a-many-splendored-thing

[DRW50]

Thanks so much for finding that.

[danfling]

Han Suyin, who wrote the book on which the soap opera Love Is a Many Splendored Thing was based, has died. Below is a news article about the death from msn.com.

'Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing' author dies

Renowned Chinese-born writer Han Suyin, whose autobiographical novel was turned into the popular American film "Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing", has died in Lausanne, Switzerland, Chinese and Swiss media said Sunday. She was 95.

Han, the author of about 40 books on modern China, died Friday, the Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported, citing her family.

The frail-looking and charismatic Han was branded both as a "Chinese revolutionary" in the West and "bourgeois" in communist China, with her work, often based on her own life straddling the two worlds.

The thrice-married Han's numerous novels and essays, as well as her meetings with Indira Gandhi, Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, earned her a worldwide reputation.

The writer's biggest work was a five-volume autobiography, while other writings included biographies of Mao and Zhou, and a study on Tibet.

She had been one of the few foreigners to be able to visit communist China in the early years of the regime. In a 1968 interview with France's Le Figaro newspaper, she said Mao was "the greatest man China has known".

Born Matilda Rosalie Elizabeth Chow in Henan province on September 12, 1917, Han was the daughter of a Chinese railway engineer and his Belgian wife. She studied medicine in China before continuing her studies in Belgium in the 1930s and later in London.

She later changed her name to Rosalie Elizabeth Comber and chose Han Suyin as a pen name. "Suyin" means ordinary voice in Chinese.

She was criticised for supporting Chairman Mao Zedong's Great Leap Forward in the 1950s and the later Cultural Revolution.

Han's work as a nurse in China during the war against the Japanese occupation in 1938 stoked her patriotic feelings.

She qualified as a doctor in London in 1948, meantime having a disappointing marriage with her first husband, Dang Baoyang, an anti-communist engineer.

He was killed during China's civil war, after which Han abandoned medicine and started writing, in Chinese, English and French.

She wrote "A Many-Splendored Thing" in Hong Kong based on her romance with British war correspondent Ian Morrison, who was killed in the Korean War in 1950.

The book was adapted for the silver screen in 1955.

She married a British anti-espionage specialist, Leon Comber, and worked as a doctor in Malaysia and Singapore, during which time she grew increasingly sympathetic with communism.

She returned to China in 1956, when she was greeted with great fanfare by then premier Zhou.

Having divorced Comber, she later married a third time, to Indian engineer named Vincent Ruthnaswany, with whom she had lived in Lausanne.

Han frequently returned to China and in 1984 wrote a historical novel set in China and Switzerland, "The Enchantress".

Funeral services for Han are planned for Thursday in Lausanne, the Swiss news agency ATS reported.

[DRW50]

Sorry to hear that.

[Paul Raven]

1967 press release for Donna Mills as Sister Cecilia on the upcoming LIAMST

[Khan]

So fresh-faced, so virginal, so...not Abby Ewing.

[DRW50]

That's sort of like First Lady hair. I'm glad she ditched it.

[danfling]

Martha Greenhouse, the original actress to play Sarah Hanley (before the late Sasha von Schurler assumed the role) died on January 5.

Here is an obituary:

New York stage, film and TV actor Martha Greenhouse, who served as a SAG and AFTRA leader for more than four decades, has died. Greenhouse passed away Saturday at the age of 91, according to a statement from SAG-AFTRA. Greenhouse appeared in many plays on and off Broadway, including Summer Brave; Dear Me, The Sky Is Falling; and Jose Quintero’s Our Town. Her TV and film credits included Law & Order; Ryan’s Hope; The Jackie Gleason Show; The Stepford Wives; Car 54, Where Are You?; Woody Allen’s Bananas; and the original production of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella.

Greenhouse joined AFTRA in 1941 and Screen Actors Guild in 1955, serving five terms as the president of AFTRA’s New York Local, from 1977-1982, and two terms on SAG’s National Board, from 1981-87. More recently she served as an AFTRA Foundation Board member and was president of the AFTRA Heller Memorial Foundation for more than a decade. She also served on the board of the N.Y. Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and was an AFTRA representative to the Associated Actors and Artistes of America. She remained active on the national and local AFTRA boards until 2005 and 2010 respectively. During her tenure, Greenhouse received the Founder’s Award, the N.Y. Local’s Ken Harvey Award, and the George Heller Gold Card, the highest honor given by national AFTRA for service to the union. She continued to work as an activist and leader, ensuring that plans for Manhattan Plaza included low-income housing for performers.

[DRW50]

Thanks. Who was Sarah?

[saynotoursoap]

Sarah Hanley was the roommate to Julie Richards (Beverlee McKinsey) seen in the infamous vacumming episode I have on my Youtube channel. Sasha von Scherler was the real-life wife of writer Paul Avila Mayer. Their daughter Daisy is a fillmmaker best known for the Parker Posey feature Party Girl in which Sasha played Parker's godmother, Judy the librarian.

[DRW50]

Thanks. I remember that now.

[Susan Hunter]

Why is that episode infamous?

[saynotoursoap]

I received an unusual amount of correspondence chastising me for placing an episode online in which the great Iris Carrington/Alexandra Spaulding vacuums the carpet. Go figure.

[Khan]

Seriously? That's just...stupid. It's so stupid, in fact, I can't even come up with a word to describe their behavior except, well, "stupid."

[edgeofnight]

I'm in LIAMST heaven. My wife and I are watching an old Magnum, P.I. episode with the divine Andrea Marcovicci playing a ballet dancer.

Edited February 1, 2013 by edgeofnight