Marlene Dietrich
(December 27, 1904 - May 6, 1992) Germany - U.S.A.
Actress
 Stage-name of the actress Maria Magdalene von Losch, born in a small town outside Berlin, her father was an army officer who had served in the Franco-Prussian War. Because of his constant absences from the family due to his army duties, Marlene and the rest of the family had to rely on themselves. When he died, while she was 11, Marlene's mother married Eduard von Losch and he adopted the Dietrich children. Marlene was known in school for "bedroom eyes" and her first affairs were at this stage in her life - a professor at the school was terminated.
She entered the cabaret scene in 1920s Germany, first as a spectator then as a cabaret singer. In 1924 she married, and although she and Rudy lived together only 5 years they remained married until his death.
 In 1921, Marlene applied for an acting school run by Max Reinhardt. She was accepted. She appeared in several stage production, but never had more than a couple of spoken lines. In short, she wasn't setting the stage world on fire.
She was in over a dozen silent films in increasingly important roles. In 1929 she was seen in a Berlin cabaret by Josef von Sternberg and after a screen test captured the role of the cabaret singer in Der Blaue Engel, and became von Sternberg's lover. With the success of this film, von Sternberg immediately took her to Hollywood, introducing her to the world in Morocco, and signing an agreement to produce all her films.
 A series of successes followed, and Marlene became the highest paid actress of her time, but her later films in the mid part of the decade were critical and popular failures. She returned to Europe at the end of the decade, with a series of affairs with former leading men (she had a reputation of romancing her co-stars), as well as other prominent artistic figures.
In 1939 an offer came to star with James Stewart in a western, and after initial hesitation she accepted. The film was Destry Rides Again - the siren of film could also be a comedienne and a remarkable comeback was reality.
When Hitler importuned her to come back to Germany and make pro-Nazi films, she not only refused but went back to Europe, entertaining American troops with the USO! She toured extensively for the allied effort in WW II (she had become a US citizen), and after the war limited her cinematic life. But a new career as a singer and performer appeared, with reviews and shows in Las Vegas, touring theatricals, and even Broadway. New success was accompanied by a too close acquaintance with alcohol, until falls in performance eventually resulted in a compound fracture of the leg.
 Although the last 13 years of her life were spent in seclusion in her apartment in Paris, with the last 12 years in bed, she had withdrawn only from public life and maintained active telephone and correspondence contact with friends and associates. She died in Paris for kidney failure. She is interred at Friedhof III, Berlin-Friedenau, Germany.
A well cultivated enigma in life as well as on celluloid, she was known as "the world most glamorous grandmother" in 1948. Her numerous affairs with both men and women were ill-kept secrets, yet she managed to avoid scandal with more success than most, and was content to have her private persona shaped by her public one. There was talk of an affair with the artist Mercedes De Acosta. Her aura remained indolently bisexual.
 Her films include:
- So sind die Männer (The Little Napoleon, 1922)
- Der Blaue Engel (The Blue Angel, 1930)
- Morocco (1930)
- Dishonored (1931)
- Shanghai Express (1932)
- Destry Rides Again (1939)
- Manpower (1942)
- The Spoilers (1942)
- The Lady Is Willing (1942)
- And Pittsburgh (1942)
- Judgment At Nuremberg (1961)
- Schöner Gigolo, armer Gigolo (Just a Gigolo, 1979)
Excerpts from: Denny Jackson's mini-biography - and others
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