Sydney Guilaroff; Leading Hollywood Hairdresser

Sydney Guilaroff, 89, the Hollywood hairdresser who turned Lucille Ball into a redhead. Creating “the look” for MGM’s major female stars, Guilaroff was the first hairdresser to have screen credit for his work. In addition to transforming the natural blond Lucy, Guilaroff gave Claudette Colbert her distinctive bangs. The English-born and Canadian-raised Guilaroff was discovered working in New York by Joan Crawford. He began his Hollywood career in the 1930s doing Greta Garbo’s hair for “Camille,” and followed that with coiffeurs for Norma Shearer as “Marie Antoinette,” Marlene Dietrich in “Kismet,” Vivien Leigh in “Gone With the Wind” and Debbie Reynolds in “Singin’ in the Rain.” Guilaroff’s most recent work was hair designs for Ann-Margret in “A Streetcar Named Desire” and “The Two Mrs. Grenvilles.” He befriended several of his celebrity clients and wrote about them in his recently published memoirs, “Crowning Glory.” Guilaroff was the hairdresser of choice for such stars as Ava Gardner, Shirley MacLaine, Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor and Natalie Wood. He also tended to hair of such male stars as Marlon Brando, James Dean, Cary Grant and Robert Wagner. On Wednesday in Beverly Hills.