Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo (September 18, 1905 – April 15, 1990) was a Swedish-born actress during Hollywood's silent film period and part of its Golden Age.

Regarded as one of the greatest and most inscrutable movie stars ever produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and the Hollywood studio system, Garbo received a 1955 Honorary Oscar "for her unforgettable screen performances" and in 1999 was ranked as the fifth greatest female star of all time by the American Film Institute.

Garbo and her MGM colleagues

Norma Shearer

Edith Norma Shearer (1900 – 1983) was an Academy Award–winning Canadian-American actress. Shearer was one of the most popular actresses in the world from the mid-1920s until her retirement in 1942.

Her early films cast her as the girl-next-door but after her 1930 film The Divorcee, she played sexually liberated women in sophisticated contemporary comedies and dramas, as well as several historical and period films.

Unlike many of her MGM contemporaries, Shearer's reputation went into steep decline after her retirement. By the time of her death in 1983, she was in danger of being known only for her "noble" roles in the regularly-revived The Women and Romeo and Juliet or, at worst, as a forgotten star.

The Garbo Connection

 On   September 30, 1926,  Greta Garbo  attended  the  premiere  of the  King  Vidor  film  Bardelys  the  Magnificent  with  Howard
    Strickling, Norma Shearer, Irving Thalberg, and John Gilbert.

 During  a pool party from  Emil Jannings,  Norma Shearer  remembered holding  Garbo's attention, for about fifteen minutes, by
    diving gracefully into the pool and swimming vigorous laps: "I could tell she admired the way I swam, so I kept on swimming for
    Garbo.  Later that day we  posed together for a photograph with  Jannings.  She was really very cordial with me – and then,  after
    clasping my hand, she was suddenly gone."

Garbo and Shearer attending the premiere
of the King Vidor film Bardelys the Magnificent

 Norma Shearer  turned down the lead in  Torrent. Bell wanted Norma Shearer for the lead role of Leonora, the Spanish peasant
    who becomes an opera star. He had begun to cultivate Shearer (both on-screen and off) in a series of highly individual films but
    Shearer declined the part.

 She was offered of the part of Flaemchen in Grand Hotel.

 Norma Shearer  told biographer  Gavin Lambert  that she was  "doing a Garbo"  in  Idiot's Delight (1939), which was directed by
    none other than Clarence Brown..

Idiot's Delight (1939)

 When Greta arrived in Hollywood on September 1, 1925, the press titled her: Greta Garbo, the Norma Shearer of Sweden.

Lilian Gish

Lillian Diana Gish ( 1893 – 1993), was an American stage, screen and television actress whose film acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912 to 1987. She was a prominent film star of the 1910s and 1920s, particularly associated with the films of director D.W. Griffith, including her leading role in Griffith's seminal Birth of a Nation (1915).

Her sound-era film appearances were sporadic, but included a memorable role in the 1955 cult thriller Night of the Hunter. She did considerable television work from the early 1950s into the 1980s, and closed her career playing opposite Bette Davis in the 1987 film The Whales of August.

The Garbo Connection

 On April 21, 1927, Garbo  was visiting silent actress Lillian Gish on the set of Victor Seastrom's The Wind.

 
The photos were used and made for publicity reasons.

 Gish about the day  Garbo  lost her sister:  “I heard one day that she had lost her only sister,”  wrote Gish,  “and I sent her flowers
    and a note. Garbo [later] came to thank me, but she could not speak English.

    Tears came to her eyes, but I could not speak Swedish so I put my arms around her and we both cried. I knew how I would feel if
    I had lost my darling sister and could not get to her from a strange, far land.”

Alva Lovisa Gustafson

 Stiller  and  Garbo  visited Victor Seastrom's on the  The Wind set. Stiller thought Garbo might learn from watching Gish perform,
    and maybe even from watching Sjöström. Garbo did learn a lot.

    Gish  was an education for  Garbo.  There could have been no more professional role  model  than  Gish,  carefully studying and
    rehearsing her role, always attentive to how the camera angles and lighting would most enhance each scene.

 Equally revealing to Garbo was the way Gish dealt with MGM, declining bad projects and eschewing publicity nonsense.

 As Garbo studied and spoke with  Gish  at work, a personal friendship was developing as well.  Gish seemed to understand the
    girl. "Garbo's temperament", she wrote later, "reflected the rain and gloom of the long, dark Swedish winters...."

 Gish was originally conceived for MGM's production of Anna Karenina which later became the Gilbert/Garbo classic, Love.

Gilbert/Garbo in Love

 Gish  suggested that camerman  Henrik Sartov  shoot a new screentest of  Garbo,  after Stiller's first one in Hollywood failed to
    impress. Thalberg agreed to this idea.

Jean Harlow

Jean Harlow (March 3, 1911 – June 7, 1937) was an American film actress and sex symbol of the 1930s. Known as the "Platinum Blonde" and the "Blonde Bombshell" due to her famous platinum blonde hair and ranked as one of the greatest movie stars of all time by the American Film Institute.

Harlow starred in several films, mainly designed to showcase her magnetic sex appeal and strong screen presence, before transitioning to more developed roles and achieving massive fame under contract to MGM. Harlow's enormous popularity and "laughing vamp" image were in distinct contrast to her personal life, which was marred by disappointment, tragedy, and, ultimately, her sudden death from renal failure at age 26.

The Garbo Connection

Joan Crawford

Joan (1905 - 1977) was an Academy Award-winning American actress. Crawford is named as the tenth Greatest Female Star of All Time by the American Film Institute. Starting as a dancer on Broadway, Crawford was signed to a motion picture contract by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios in 1925 and initially played small parts.

By the end of the '20s she became a famous flapper. Beginning in the 1930s, Crawford's fame rivaled fellow MGM colleagues Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo. She often played hardworking young women who find romance and financial success. These "rags to riches" stories were well-received by Depression-era audiences and were popular with women.

By the end of the decade, Crawford remained one of Hollywood's most prominent movie stars, and one of the highest paid women in the U.S. For her performance in Mildred Pierce, Crawford won an Academy Award and in the following years, achieved some of her best reviews. In 1955, she became involved with PepsiCo, the company run by her last husband, Alfred Steele.

After his death in 1959, Crawford was elected to fill his vacancy on the board of directors but was forcibly retired in 1973. She continued acting regularly into the 1960s, when her performances became fewer, and after the release of the horror film Trog in 1970, retired from the screen.

The Garbo Connection

Jeanette MacDonald

Jeanette MacDonald ( 1903 –  1965) was an American singer and actress best remembered for her musical films of the 1930s with Maurice Chevalier  and Nelson Eddy.

During the 1930s and 1940s she starred in 29 feature films, four nominated for Best Picture Oscars (The Love Parade, One Hour With You, Naughty Marietta and San Francisco), and recorded extensively, earning three gold records.

She later appeared in grand opera, concerts, radio, and television. MacDonald was one of most influential sopranos of the 20th century, introducing grand opera to movie-going audiences and inspiring a generation of singers.

The Garbo Connection