Public Places: My Life in the Theater, with Peter O'Toole and Beyond

“Magnificent” (The Sunday Times)—a fascinating portrait of one of the great love affairs of show business and a compelling account of a woman coming into her own

Siân Phillips and Peter O’Toole were one of the theater’s most fabulous couples—a marriage perhaps rivaled only by that of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor in terms of glamour, power, and public fascination. In her exceptional memoir, Phillips reveals in thoughtful detail their tumultuous life together. She describes the mad and impulsive times with the infamous hellraiser alongside the tempestuous, insecure, and often lonely periods in their marriage. When O’Toole’s career took off with Lawrence of Arabia, Siân found life increasingly difficult in her parallel roles as wife, mother, and actress, and watched as her own career became progressively sidelined. Against all expectations, though, their union endured for twenty years. When it ended, incredibly, even to herself, Siân plunged straight into another marriage, to a much younger man. Ultimately she emerges alone—triumphant and unrepentant—and the story she recounts here ranks alongside the very best in show business.