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Monday 23 March 2015

Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo was born Greta Gustafson in Stockholm, Sweden on September 18, 1905. She studied at the Royal School of Dramatic Art in her native city, while working as a fashion model.

Garbo became a star in Sweden when Mauritz Stiller cast her in the 1924 silent movie The Atonement of Gösta Berling.

She came to the attention of Louis B. Mayer and went to Hollywood in 1925. Garbo was not yet 21, so when she signed her contracts with MGM, she needed her mother’s permission to do so.

Greta Garbo made her U.S. screen debut on February 21, 1926 with the opening of her first American film The Torrent.

Greta Garbo left her fellow silent screen actor John Gilbert standing at the altar in 1927 when she got cold feet about marrying him.

The husky-voiced Garbo shocked her legions of fans with her heavily accented first spoken line in the ‘talkies’ movie, Anna Christie, when she said, "Gimme a whiskey with ginger ale on the side and don’t be stingy, baby."

"Garbo talks!" in Anna Christie (1930).

Greta Garbo popularized trenchcoats and berets in the 1930s.

She disliked co-star Clark Gable and called his acting wooden. He responded that she was a snob.

The famous line ‘I want to be alone’ was spoken by Garbo in Grand Hotel, she never said it personally.

Notoriously private, Garbo refused to attend her own premieres or hold press conferences. She stopped giving interviews early in her career.

Garbo retired from movies in 1941 lived from then on  as a semi-recluse in New York City.

After leaving Hollywood, Greta Garbo was recruited to work for MI6 during World War II. She secretly identified influential Nazi sympathizers in Stockholm for British Intelligence.

In 1950, Garbo was voted the most beautiful woman in the world by The Guinness Book of Records.

Garbo in Inspiration (1931) publicity still

She died in New York City from renal failure and pneumonia on April 15, 1990. Her ashes were buried in Sweden.

Source Daily Mail

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