 Olivier 's stage roles in 1934 included Bothwell in Gordon Daviot 's Queen of Scots , which was only a moderate success for him and for the play , but led to an important engagement for the same management ( Bronson Albery ) shortly afterwards . In the interim he had a great success playing a thinly disguised version of the American actor John Barrymore in Edna Furber 's Theatre Royal . His success was vitiated by his breaking an ankle two months into the run , in one of the athletic , acrobatic stunts with which he liked to enliven his performances . 
