Anecdotes

Appeared with her future husband Michael Wilding in the Hitchcock film Les amants du Capricorne (1949), in which their characters hated each other. After their marriage in 1964, they worked together several more times, but, by his own admission, Wilding preferred retirement and was happy just to be a supportive audience member for his wife.

Appears in Une belle tigresse (1972) (a.k.a. "Zee and Co.") with Elizabeth Taylor. Taylor had been married at one time to Leighton's husband Michael Wilding.

Won two Tony Awards for Broadway performances as Best Actress (Dramatic): in 1957 for "Separate Tables" and in 1962 for Tennessee Williams' "The Night of the Iguana." She also received two other nominations in the same category: in 1960 for Shakespeare's "Much Ado About Nothing" and in 1963 for "Tchin-Tchin."

Her frequent co-star on both stage and screen was Ralph Richardson. She played Roxane to his Cyrano in the 1946 London stage revival of "Cyrano de Bergerac", one of Richardson's greatest stage successes.

She was awarded the CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in the 1974 Queen's Birthday Honours List for her services to drama.

Died in Chichester Hospital of multiple sclerosis.

The only actress to ever receive an Oscar nomination in a movie directed by Joseph Losey.

The barrister who represented her in her divorce from Laurence Harvey was John Mortimer, also a well-known writer; according to a popular theatrical legend, he waived his usual fee in return for her appearing in one of his plays.