“I knew how to dance as soon as I was able to walk,” Rita Hayworth once confessed, looking back on the first dance steps of …
Zarah Leander: The Unforgotten
“Zarah, we’ll never forget you!“ read a graffiti inscription on the Berlin Wall in June 1981, a few days after the death of the famous …
Greta Garbo: The Divine (2.)
Continued from part one After Greta Garbo lost her patron Mauritz Stiller, the situation initially seemed hopeless for the actress: although she was under contract …
Greta Garbo: The Divine (1.)
Part one When her name was mentioned, every filmmaker of the last century froze in awe: her acting is considered groundbreaking for an entire generation …
Carole Lombard: Between Screwball and Drama
“Carole, don’t take that plane,” Elizabeth Peters, Lombard’s mother, reportedly said to her daughter shortly before the fateful TWA Flight 3. Lombard decided by coin …
Judy Garland: Born As a Star
Show business was in the family: Judy Garland’s parents were both vaudeville performers and ran a cinema in northern Minnesota: in 1922, when Frances Ethel …
Romy Schneider: La Grande Dame
Because of her role in the film series of the same name from the fifties, she was identified by a large audience as the young …
Hildegard Knef: The Berlin Snout
Ella Fitzgerald once said she was the best singer who actually had no voice: Hildegard Knef is one of the most famous German actresses and …
Gloria Swanson: The Pictures Got Small
“If she were thirty-five instead of twenty-five, she could run for president. There is no one like her,” said Hollywood director Allan Dwan about Gloria …
Audrey Hepburn: fashion icon, actress, dancer (2.)
Continued from part one Audrey Hepburn was fluent in French: that predestined her for a role in the French production Monte Carlo Baby (1951): The …