Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne
Broadway couple who reigned for 55 years
Called the greatest husband and wife team in theater history, Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne appeared in their first play together, A Young Man's Fancy, in 1919. They were married in 1922. Rarely has a theatrical love affair been so enduring, or such a creative triumph.
For the next 55 years, the Lunts were virtually inseparable. They dazzled Broadway with their roles in sophisticated comedies by George Bernard Shaw, Terrence Rattigan, and Noel Coward, whose 1933 masterpiece, Design for Living, was written for the Lunts.
When they left the stage in 1958, New York's venerable Globe Theater was renamed the Lunt-Fontanne Theater. They retired to their Wisconsin farmhouse.
In 1965 the Lunts won Emmy Awards for appearing in Magnificent Yankees on TV. A few years later, Fontanne appeared in another television movie, Anastasia, the first time she had acted without her husband since 1928.
Famous Love Stories in History
Anthony and Cleopatra
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One of the earliest romances in the American colonies
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A half-century love affair during the Revolutionary War
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert
English royalty who mourned her husband's death for 40 years
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Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne
Broadway couple who reigned for 55 years
Love, romance and relationship quotes for your soul
- 'I have been astonished that men could die martyrs for their religion - I have shudder'd at it. I shudder no more.
I could be martyr'd for my religion. Love is my religion.
And I could die for that. I could die for you.'
~ John Keats - 'The first duty of love is to listen.'
~ Paul Tillich - 'To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides.'
~ David Viscott