Branden, a native of Canada, was a fan of Rand, famed for her best-selling novels, “The Fountainhead” and “Atlas Shrugged,” and known for her embrace of laissez-fair capitalism and her opposition to what she called “ethical altruism.” Her relationship with Rand was complicated, not least because Rand began an affair with Branden’s husband, Nathaniel, which Branden discussed in her 1986 biography of Rand, “The Passion of Ayn Rand.” That book spurred an eponymous movie starring Helen Mirren released in 1999.
Branden and her husband were part of a group in Los Angeles that included Alan Greenspan, who was later to become the chairman of the Federal Reserve, and her cousin, Leonard Peikoff, that met regularly with Rand to discuss philosophy. She and her husband in 1958 created the Nathaniel Branden Institute to promote Rand’s philosophy.
Branden, who married Nathaniel in 1953, reluctantly agreed to his relationship with Rand, which began in 1954 and ended in 1957. Nathaniel began an affair with one of his students in 1964, which he and Barbara kept secret from Rand. When Rand discovered it she condemned Barbara and Nathaniel Brandon and ended her relationship with them.
I was very close to Barbara and cls is correct. Barbara met Ayn while they were in Los Angeles, but the group that formed was later, in New York. Barbara returned to Los Angeles when she left the group. Barbara also didn’t live at the Terraces at La Cienega; mass data sources aren’t always accurate.
Correction: There were NOT part of a group “in Los Angeles.” While they knew Ayn in Los Angeles, these meetings with the others only took place in New York City, not LA. This was after the Brandens moved to study at NYU, after finished their bachelor degrees at UCLA. After 1968 the Brandens moved back to LA. Barbara stayed a resident in West Hollywood except for a few years when living in Santa Fe.