Biography

She studied theatre at Marika Kotopouli's drama school. She worked with Karolos Koun Art Theatre. She played at "Blood Wedding" (Federico García Lorca) and "The glass Menagerie" (Tennessee Williams) in the late forties. She also worked with Mrs Katerina (famous Greek actress at that time) and with Kostas Mousouris's group in the early fifties. In the mid fifties she created a group with two Greek actors, Dimitris Horn and Giorgos Pappas. In the sixties she gave unforgettable performances with her own group. One of these performances was "A streetcar named desire" where she played Blanche du Bois. In 1967 she suffered the onset of cancer. Although she was seriously ill, she continued to appear on stage until 1982 (one year before her death). Her last appearance was as Sarah in a play which is widely known from the movie Children of a Lesser God (1986). At that time she no voice at all, the cancer having deprived her of it.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: <od1@dolnet.gr>

Ellie Lambeti was born in 1926 in Greece, her father was Kostas Loukos, who owned a Greek tavern in the village of Villia, her mother was Anastasia Stamati, Ellie had 6 siblings. Her grandfather (her mother's father) was a well known man known as Captain Stamatis who fought together with Kolokotronis against the Turks in 1821, when the modern Greek democracy was created. In 1928 the family moved in Athens, in 1941 she was rejected from two theatre schools the state one, named Ethniko and one private named after one great Greek female actress Marika Kotopouli. But Kotopouli herself recognized Ellie's talent and hired Ellie, soon she was her favorite one, and she even let her read the letters Ion Dragoumis, one Greek politician, had wrote to Kotopouli during their love affair in the beginning of the 20th century. This year Ellie adopts the surname Lambeti, from a book named Astrapogiannos by the author Aristotelis Valaoritis.

Soon, Ellie became the female lead actress, and she starred in plays like "Hanneles Himmelfahrt" by Gerhart Hauptmann. Kotopouli did not let Lambeti fix her pronunciation, although Ellie could not pronounce the letter 'r' of the Greek alphabet. In 1941 her twin brother died, in 1944 her mother also - by a bullet. In 1945 she met Marios Ploritis during the filming one of her first films, that she really hated, the film Unsubdued Slaves (1946).

In 1946 she became one of the actresses that played for the famous modern theatre directors Karolous Koun, she was the female lead in the following productions. The "Glass Menagerie" by Tennessee Williams in 1946, "Antigone" by Jean Anouilh in 1947, "Bodas de sangre" by Federico García Lorca in 1948 and there she gained critical acclaim, and was recognized as one of the greatest actresses in Greece. In 1948 she was directed by Kostas Mousouris, the big enemy of Koun, a traditional director, in the same year she fell in love with Alekos Alexandrakis, a younger actor who gained popularity in the following decades, a handsome and talented young man.

During August 1950 she married Marios Ploritis, but their marriage collapsed in 1952 when she worked and fell in love with Dimitris Horn. Her love affair lasted for many years, and they are one of the most loved theatre couples in Greece even now, that both have died. Together they produced and played in theatre in "Libelei" in 1953, in "La Cuisine des Anges" in 1953, in "L'Invitation au Chateau" in 1955, in "Quality street" in 1956, in the "Rainmaker" by N. Richard Nash in 1956, in "Gigi" in 1957, in the "Fourposter" in 1957, in "Two for the seesaw" by William Gibson in 1958 and in 1959 in "Dans sa Candeur Naive". By then, their affair was dead, and they followed different paths, although they used to claim that they would work again soon, something that tragically never happened.

The following years was dramatic for Ellie, her sister Koula died from cancer in 1955, her sister Eirini by a road accident in 1958 and she lost a baby by Horn in 1956. The only sunshine came in 1959 when she met the American author, Frederic Wakeman, who became her next husband. By then, Ellie was also the star of Michael Cacoyannis Greek masterpieces like A Girl in Black (1956), Windfall in Athens (1954) and A Matter of Dignity (1958). She will be always remembered for another film of the 50s directed by Giorgos Tzavellas named The Counterfeit Coin (1955) in 1954, when she starred together with Dimitris Horn. Lambeti continued her theatrical career, in 1962 came the Heiress, in 1965 as one of the best Blanches in Streetcar named desire, but in 1960 her sister Foteini also died from cancer, leading Ellie to fear she would also die from the same illness.

The 70s was a tough decade for Ellie, although she gained critical acclaim and massive popularity in "Little foxes" in 1973, in "Irma La Douce" in 1972, "Miss Margarita" in 1975, and "Filoumena Martourano" in 1978. Ellie was involved in a legal procedure about the adoption of a girl named Eliza, from Spring 1970 till 1974, when she lost and gave the child back to its parents.

The following years were a fight, or a war against cancer. She successfully starred in theatre productions like Thornton Wilder's "Hello, Dolly!" in 1980 and in 1981 as Sarah in Mark Medoff's "Children of a lesser God", but her health was poor, and soon she lost her voice. Ellie died from cancer in the United States, leaving the theatre life of Greece poorer without her.

In the decade of 1990 her career was revalued and Lambeti, together with other Greek actresses,like Melina Mercouri, Jenny Karezi, Katina Paxinou etc, is really missed. Her life was written as a book by her good friend Freddie Germanos, and was a best seller.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: capamaroux@yahoo.gr