Margaret Tallichet

Margaret Tallichet (March 13, 1914 – May 3, 1991) was an American actress and the wife of film director William Wyler. Born in Dallas, Texas, she was a descendant of Albert Tallichet, a Swiss émigré who had settled in Demopolis, Alabama, before the Civil War, where he operated a grocery store. Her parents relocated from Alabama to Texas prior to her birth. Tallichet attended Southern Methodist University, where she was a member of Alpha Omicron Pi sorority.

In 1936, Tallichet traveled from Texas to California to pursue an acting career. While working in the publicity department at Paramount Pictures, she was befriended by actress Carole Lombard, who introduced her to producer David O. Selznick. Selznick arranged a screen test for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind and initially cast her as Scarlett's sister Careen O'Hara, though that role ultimately went to Ann Rutherford. Selznick also placed her in a minor uncredited part in A Star is Born in 1937. Her early film appearances included A Desperate Adventure and Girls' School, both in 1938. She went on to appear in Stand Up and Fight in an uncredited role in 1939, followed by Stranger on the Third Floor in 1940, in which she starred opposite Peter Lorre in what became her best-known screen role. She subsequently appeared in It Started with Eve and The Devil Pays Off, both in 1941.

In 1940, Tallichet appeared on Broadway in Every Man for Himself, her sole credited stage production. That same year marked the release of Stranger on the Third Floor, making 1940 a period of activity across both stage and screen.

An agent introduced Tallichet to William Wyler, who had been divorced from actress Margaret Sullavan since 1936, in 1938. Three weeks after meeting, the two were married on October 23, 1938, at the lakeside home of actor Walter Huston. They became parents to five children: Catherine Wyler, born July 25, 1939; Judy Wyler, born May 21, 1942; William Wyler Jr., born April 4, 1946, who died November 27, 1949; Melanie Ann Wyler, born November 25, 1950; and David Wyler, born in September 1952. Tallichet and Wyler remained married for 42 years, until his death.

During her husband's wartime service with the United States Army Air Corps, in which he flew missions over Europe to produce documentary films, Tallichet accepted his Academy Award for Best Director on his behalf at the 1943 Academy Awards ceremony. The award recognized his direction of Mrs. Miniver, a 1942 film depicting an English family during the Battle of Britain. Tallichet was also the sister of aviator and restaurateur David Tallichet Jr.

She died on May 3, 1991, at the age of 77. Her obituary in the New York Times reported that the cause of death was cancer.