Speaker 1: In the early days of Hollywood's Golden Age, German immigrant
Speaker 1: Marlena Dietrich electrified audiences around the world. She defied the
Speaker 1: expectations of traditional women's roles in her films and in
Speaker 1: her life. But it wasn't her acting that led Adolf
Speaker 1: Hitler to label her a traitor to the quote unquote fatherland.
Speaker 1: It was her patriotic support for her adopted homeland. When
Speaker 1: the United States went to war, so did Marlena Dietrich.
Speaker 1: It was the beginning of a lifelong dedication to American
Speaker 1: soldiers that never wavered. I hope you enjoy hearing her story,
Speaker 1: which I recorded for the audio version of my obituary's book,
Speaker 1: Marlena Dietrich was one hundred percent. In nineteen seventy two,
Speaker 1: the German born screen legend and internationally known cabaret artist
Speaker 1: was in London rehearsing for a concert. She was seventy
Speaker 1: years old. As with everything related to her image, Dietrich
Speaker 1: knew exactly how she wanted to be lighted. Her trusted
Speaker 1: longtime lighting designer, Joe Davis, was on hand to make
Speaker 1: sure her expectations were met. Dietrich's twenty two year old
Speaker 1: grandson Peter Reva was also there. He remembers the scene vividly.
Speaker 1: I'm standing next to her on the London stage with
Speaker 1: Joe Davis and way up in the clouds at the
Speaker 1: top of the theater. There's a guy pointing a spotlight
Speaker 1: on her face. She kept telling him, waving a hand
Speaker 1: where to move the light. The man called down. I
Speaker 1: think that's perfect, Miss Dietrick. Joe Davis called up Doe
Speaker 1: exactly as Miss Dietrich says. Marlena gestured again a few
Speaker 1: times and then turned to Joe and said that's fine.
Speaker 1: So I asked Joe how she knew it was fine.
Speaker 1: His reply, when it begins to burn her eyes, she
Speaker 1: knows it is dead center. Like Elizabeth Taylor, Marlena Dietrich
Speaker 1: is today remembered by many for her beauty, but Dietrich's
Speaker 1: persona cool, husky voiced at times androgynous, was always more daring.
Speaker 1: As the theater critic Kenneth Tynan wrote, her masculinity appeals
Speaker 1: to women and her sexuality to men. In the Western
Speaker 1: Destrie Rides, again, Dietrich gets into a bar fight, a
Speaker 1: real knockdown drag out with another woman rolling around the
Speaker 1: floor before Jimmy Stewart dumps a bucket of water on
Speaker 1: both of them, then Dietrich attacks him with a bottle,
Speaker 1: a chair, and her fists. Incidentally, this is the movie
Speaker 1: where she sings Boys in the back Room brilliantly parodied
Speaker 1: by Madeline Kahn as I'm Tired in Blazing Saddles. Turns
Speaker 1: out Dietrich wasn't afraid of a good fight in real life.
Speaker 1: Destri came out in nineteen thirty nine, the year Hitler's
Speaker 1: Germany invaded Poland, commencing World War Two, and Dietrich stepped
Speaker 1: right into the breach to help her new beloved homeland,
Speaker 1: the United States of America, defeat the country of her birth.
Speaker 1: I don't think she was ever happier, more fulfilled than
Speaker 1: when she was serving the Allied troops, Peter Reva told me.
Speaker 1: Perhaps that's because she knew well what was at stake.
Speaker 1: Born in Berlin as Marie Magdalena Dietrich in nineteen oh one,
Speaker 1: Dietrich lost her father when she was just five. While
Speaker 1: still a girl, she came up with the name Marlena
Speaker 1: by fusing her first and second names. It was her
Speaker 1: first act of self creation. She embarked on a career
Speaker 1: in entertainment as a chorus girl in Berlin reviews and
Speaker 1: then as an actress in the city's vibrant cinema scene.
Speaker 1: Her breakout performance came as a cabaret singer in Joseph
Speaker 1: von Sternberg's Blue Angel. Immediately, Paramount Studios came calling, and
Speaker 1: Dietrich moved to Hollywood to star in a series of
Speaker 1: six films in the early nineteen thirties, all directed by Sternberg.
Speaker 1: She was usually cast in the role of a vamp
Speaker 1: or femme fatale, but fast won a reputation for breaking
Speaker 1: the rules. In nineteen thirty three, while sailing from New
Speaker 1: York to France, she received a warning from Paris's chief
Speaker 1: of police that should she arrive in the city wearing
Speaker 1: men's trousers, she would be arrested, and so naturally, she
Speaker 1: made sure to wear a white pantsuit when she disembarked.
Speaker 1: The Paris papers hailed it as a revolution in fashion,
Speaker 1: and the next day the chief of police showed up
Speaker 1: with a bracelet inscribed with an apology. During the same
Speaker 1: years that Dietrich was conquering Hollywood, Adolf Hitler was coming
Speaker 1: to power back in Germany. Dietrich watched political developments in
Speaker 1: her home country warily. Although the German government had banned
Speaker 1: Blue Angel in nineteen thirty three, Sternberg was Jewish. Hitler
Speaker 1: loved the film. He wanted Dietrich to return to Germany
Speaker 1: to continue her career. As her grandson Peter Reva told me,
Speaker 1: Marlena was staunchly opposed to autocrats and fascists. When she
Speaker 1: got to that position of security and fame, she took
Speaker 1: every opportunity she could to oppose the Nazis. German foreign
Speaker 1: minister von Riebintroff came to visit her in nineteen thirty
Speaker 1: seven at the Lancaster Hotel in Paris, bearing a mother's
Speaker 1: cross to woo Marlena back to Germany. It would have
Speaker 1: essentially made her Queen of Germany with the promise of
Speaker 1: a care free life. She said no then and many
Speaker 1: other times. Hitler never asked again, just labeled her a
Speaker 1: traitor to the fatherland. Instead, Dietrich worked with Jewish emigrat
Speaker 1: director Billy Wilder. Jews had been leaving Germany since the
Speaker 1: Nazis came to power in nineteen thirty three, but in
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty eight, with Krystelnacht, a nationwide pogrom against Jewish homes, businesses, synagogues,
Speaker 1: and schools. The refugee problem became a crisis. Dietrich and
Speaker 1: Wilder started a fund to spawn refugees, and Dietrich escrote
Speaker 1: her entire salary from nineteen thirty seven's Night Without Armor
Speaker 1: at four hundred and fifty thousand dollars per film, she
Speaker 1: was one of Hollywood's highest paid stars to support the cause.
Speaker 1: And then in nineteen thirty nine, this woman, who was
Speaker 1: culturally German to the core, publicly renounced her home country
Speaker 1: and became an American citizen. She made sure the cameras
Speaker 1: were there when she was sworn in. She wanted the
Speaker 1: oath of American citizenship to be captured on film, says Reva,
Speaker 1: in order to send a message to the Third Reich
Speaker 1: and good Germans for them to know she was taking
Speaker 1: that stand. This didn't go over well back home. The
Speaker 1: Nazi newspaper Dar Stormer wrote that she had been corrupted
Speaker 1: from her years spent among the Jews of Hollywood, calling
Speaker 1: her decision a betrayal of the fatherland. Dietrich didn't care,
Speaker 1: but the bombing of Pearl Harbor she went further. In
Speaker 1: nineteen forty two, she traveled throughout the United States to
Speaker 1: promote the purchase of war bonds. Some estimates credit her
Speaker 1: with raising a million dollars in sales. I am delighted
Speaker 1: to have the opportunity to help my country in any
Speaker 1: way I can, she told The New York Times that year.
Speaker 1: I consider it a privilege, not a duty. She also
Speaker 1: supported the government's wartime propaganda, which used German language radio
Speaker 1: to demoralize the Nazi troops, but Dietrich's greatest efforts were
Speaker 1: for the USO. In nineteen forty four and nineteen forty five,
Speaker 1: she volunteered for multiple tours entertaining troops and prisoners of
Speaker 1: war in Algeria, Italy, France, and Germany for eighteen straight months,
Speaker 1: with more time at the front, Billy Wilder said, than
Speaker 1: General Eisenhower. She earned a reputation for abiding the rough conditions,
Speaker 1: a lack of electricity, sleeping intents, and for being willing
Speaker 1: to tour near enemy lines. The closer the better, as
Speaker 1: far as Dietrich was concerned. Riva recalls Danny Thomas, who
Speaker 1: was a young comic at the time touring with Dietrich,
Speaker 1: once said to me, your grandmother, laughing and shaking his head.
Speaker 1: She tried to get us killed. We were performing our
Speaker 1: act for five guys in a foxhole with howitzer as
Speaker 1: firing overhead. She performed for as many as half a
Speaker 1: million troops, singing and even playing the saw, which she
Speaker 1: bowed like a violin. As a teenager, she had aspired
Speaker 1: to be a concert violinist, until a severe wrist injury
Speaker 1: dashed her hopes. She did some comic bits too. In
Speaker 1: one act, she purported to be a mind reader. She
Speaker 1: would call a serviceman up on stage and state that
Speaker 1: she would tell the audience his thoughts. After a sly
Speaker 1: look at the young man, she'd quip, oh, think of
Speaker 1: something else. I can't talk about that. Actually, I think
Speaker 1: Dietrich wanted to be a soldier, and you couldn't very
Speaker 1: well be a soldier, so she fought her way, said
Speaker 1: her daughter Maria Riva, mother of Peter, in a nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety six British documentary. Maria Riva's acclaimed nineteen ninety two
Speaker 1: memoir described Dietrich as not so much a mother as
Speaker 1: a queen with her family as court. But on Dietrich's
Speaker 1: contributions to the war effort. Maria Riva is unstinting. She
Speaker 1: did a magnificent job. Certainly when she was finally overseas,
Speaker 1: she practically was a soldier. She never said I was
Speaker 1: with the USO. She was in the army. One of
Speaker 1: Dietrich's more famous paramours, the actor Douglas Fairbanks Junior, claimed
Speaker 1: that she entertained the idea of helping the Allied cause
Speaker 1: in an even grander way by killing Hitler. Dietrich biographer
Speaker 1: Charlotte Chandler quotes Fairbanks as saying that Dietrich toyed with
Speaker 1: plans to seduce and then assassinate the German leader. Back
Speaker 1: in the thirties, when Hitler still held out hopes that
Speaker 1: Dietrich would return to Germany, Morlena suggested to Fairbanks that
Speaker 1: she might accept the offer on the condition that she
Speaker 1: be granted a private audience with the fear. Her plan
Speaker 1: was to gush about Hitler, soften him up, and then
Speaker 1: strike the fatal blow. When Fairbanks expressed skepticism about the plan,
Speaker 1: surely she would be searched before being allowed to meet
Speaker 1: privately with Hitler, she countered that she would subject herself
Speaker 1: to a strip search and use a poisoned hair pen
Speaker 1: as the lethal weapon. She always felt a responsibility to
Speaker 1: do one hundred percent, says Peter Riva. If you detest
Speaker 1: Hitler enough, you're going to give that one hundred percent
Speaker 1: of your effort. After the war, the United States honored
Speaker 1: its adopted citizen with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In
Speaker 1: nineteen forty seven, France named her a Chevalier of the
Speaker 1: Legion of Honor, Belgium a Knight of the Order of Leopold.
Speaker 1: In nineteen sixty five, she became the first German and
Speaker 1: the first woman to receive the Medallion of Valor from
Speaker 1: the State of Israel. She was also honored by the
Speaker 1: Jewish veterans of World War II, but not everyone honored her.
Speaker 1: When she returned to Germany in nineteen sixty she encountered threats, protests,
Speaker 1: and chants of Marlena go home from those who still
Speaker 1: felt she had betrayed the nation. For the rest of
Speaker 1: her life, she shared a bond with the young men
Speaker 1: alongside whom she'd served. They were her boys, says Peter Reva.
Speaker 1: She felt responsible for them, She felt grateful to them.
Speaker 1: When she sang in Vegas the first time in nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty three at the Sahara, many of her boys wore uniforms.
Speaker 1: She called us the next morning, crying, happy that her
Speaker 1: boys remembered and that she was able to thank them
Speaker 1: once more. Every time I saw her perform London, Switzerland, Paris,
Speaker 1: New York, Jersey, it was always the same. She'd ask
Speaker 1: if any of her boys were in the audience. They'd
Speaker 1: whoop and holler. She'd smile, flash a leg and sing provocatively.
Speaker 1: They were hers and she was theirs. She knew their sacrifice.
Speaker 1: Never forgot she loved this country, says Peter Reva. She
Speaker 1: did loved the spirit of can do. When the first
Speaker 1: space shuttle flew in nineteen eighty one, she called everyone
Speaker 1: she knew to turn on the TV and watch. It
Speaker 1: wasn't about space travel, it was about the American ability
Speaker 1: to reach out, explore, improve try. She loved that Americans
Speaker 1: built their lives on trying, persevering, the real immigrant spirit,
Speaker 1: and she was an immigrant. This special episode of the
Speaker 1: Mobituaries podcast is also included in the audiobook edition of Mobituaries.
Speaker 1: While You Just Heard the Surprising History of Marlena Dietrich.
Speaker 1: The Mobituary's audiobook is filled with stories you won't hear
Speaker 1: on the podcast. You'll get profiles of presidents who aren't
Speaker 1: on Mount Rushmore, tributes to cars now consigned to the
Speaker 1: scrap heap of history, tales of long gone sports teams,
Speaker 1: and dragons, Yes, dragons, you see, people believed in dragons
Speaker 1: until well. Anyway, you can download the audiobook edition of
Speaker 1: Mobituaries wherever you get your audio books. Thanks for listening.