Bankhead, Tallulah [key], 1903–68, American actress, b. Huntsville, Ala.; daughter of William Brockman Bankhead. After her debut in 1918, Bankhead had great success on the London stage, where she appeared (1923–30) in 16 plays. She was particularly acclaimed for her performance on Broadway as Regina in The Little Foxes (1939) and, in film, as a shipwrecked journalist in Lifeboat (1944). In the latter, she brought to the role the wit, sophisticated aplomb, and uninhibited behavior that made her a legend.
See her autobiography (1952); memoir by E. Rawls (1979); biographies by B. Gill (1972), L. Israel (1972), K. Tunney (1973), and J. Lobenthal (2004); J. Mackrell, Flappers (2014).
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