Éva Márta Szőke Ivanovics (18 June 1927 – 1 August 1998), known professionally as Eva Bartok, was a Hungarian-British actress. She began acting in films in 1950, and her last credited appearance was in 1966. She acted in more than 40 American, British, German, Hungarian, French, and Israeli films. She is best known for appearances in Blood and Black Lace, The Crimson Pirate, Operation Amsterdam, and Ten Thousand Bedrooms.
Bartok was born Éva Márta Szőke Ivanovics in Kecskemét, Hungary, to a Jewish father and a Catholic mother. As a young child, she performed in school productions from the age of six, and later in charity events and for wounded soldiers during the Second World War.
Following the outbreak of the war, her father stayed in Budapest. Bartok and her mother moved to live in Kecskemét, to the south of the city, where her mother had relatives. Her father would visit them on Sundays, but later disappeared without a trace during the Nazi period.
To avoid persecution as the daughter of a Jewish father, the teenage Bartok was forced aged 15 to gain protection by marrying Géza Kovács, a Hungarian officer who had Nazi connections.
Kovács disappeared following the occupation of Hungary by the Communists. Bartok was able to get her marriage annulled, on the grounds of coercion of a minor.
Following the end of the Second World War, Bartok decided to enter the acting profession, and successfully sat an examination at the Drama Centre in Budapest. One of the examiners was the director of the prominent Belvárosi Szinház theatre, and he was impressed enough to, in 1945, offer Bartok a three-year contract. She made her professional debut in a performance of J. B. Priestley's A Conway család (Time and the Conways), which ran at the Belvárosi Szinház for three months. She also performed at the Nemzeti Kamara in 1947.
She then performed in Gáspár Margit's Új Isten Thébában (New God in Thebes) in 1946, followed by Áron Tamási's drama Hullámzó vőlegény in 1947, George Bernard Shaw's Androkles és az oroszlánok (Androcles and the Lion), and Jean-Paul Sartre's A tisztességtudó utcalány (The Respectful Prostitute).
She first appeared in front of the camera in the 1947 Hungarian film Prophet of the Fields which was banned by the communist censors for political reasons.
Feeling threatened and persecuted by the new Communist regime in Hungary, she asked for help from Hollywood-based Hungarian producer Alexander Paal, who had been a friend of her father. Paal arranged a "passport marriage", and took her to London. Bartok was later able to smuggle her mother out of Hungary, via Austria and Germany, to eventually settle her in France. As one of its producers, Paal was able to arrange for Bartok to appear in the British-Italian international co-production drama film A Tale of Five Cities (which was released as A Tale of Five Women in the US). It was filmed in 1948, but due to financial difficulties, it was not released until 1951. As her surname would have been an hindrance to Western audiences, she changed her professional name to "Bartok", after the well-known Hungarian composer Béla Bartók. After divorcing Paal, Eva was introduced though the Hungarian expatriate community to fellow emigre Alexander Korda, who arranged for her to be put under contract to London Films. She received a small salary of £80 a month, and received the opportunity to audition for the studio's various film projects. At the same time, she undertook English language lessons.
To assist in gaining parts on the advice of theatrical publicity agent William Wordsworth (who later became her third husband), she attracted attention by attending theatre premieres. As she had little money, she made most of her own dresses, displaying a flair for doing much with little.
Bartok came to the attention of an Italian stage producer who was in London looking for an English actress. He asked her to join his company with the provision that she could learn enough Italian in three weeks to perform a monologue in a variety show that incorporated singing, dancing, comedians, magicians, acrobats and novelty acts. With Korda's permission Bartok flew to Rome to join the show's rehearsals prior to the show opening in December 1951 at the Teatro Manzoni in Milan. The show was a success and over the following four months there were performances in Florence, Venice, Genoa and other cities, ending with a six-week long run in Rome at the Teatro Quirino.
In 1951, A Tale of Five Cities was finally released in the United Kingdom. It was seen by actor-producer Burt Lancaster and director Robert Siodmak, who were visiting England, looking for an actress to play opposite Lancaster as his romantic interest, Consuelo, in the upcoming production of the comedy-adventure film The Crimson Pirate. Impressed by Bartok's performance and appearance, they telegraphed her in Italy, asking for her to attend a screen test. Bartok, by now wary of countless unsuccessful auditions, replied: "No test. Send script." To her surprise, she was offered the role, and was asked to report for location shooting on the island of Ischia. In total, she spent over three months working on the project.
Also in 1952, Bartok appeared alongside Richard Todd in The Venetian Bird.
The success of The Crimson Pirate bought Bartok numerous role offers, though most were either in "B" movies or German-language movies. In 1953, Bartok made her first German film, Rummelplatz Der Liebe (Circus of Love), starring opposite actor Curd Jürgens. Their on-screen chemistry led to a demand for more collaborations, which came one after another in rapid succession: Der letzte Walzer, Meines Vaters Pferde I. Teil Lena und Nicoline, and Orient Express.
In 1955, Bartok acted on the stage in The Lovers, at the Opera House in Manchester, England. Directed by Sam Wanamaker, it was an adaptation and translation of Émile Zola's novel, Thérèse Raquin, by Marcelle Maurette.
In 1957, Bartok appeared in the musical Ten Thousand Bedrooms, opposite Dean Martin. The movie was filmed in Italy and in Hollywood, and for a time, she resided in Los Angeles.
She made Operation Amsterdam in England.
Following that production, her best-known roles were in The Doctor of Stalingrad, which was released in 1958, and in 1961's It Can't Always Be Caviar, opposite O. W. Fischer.