Modern Screen (Dec 1931 - Nov 1932 (assorted issues))

What's REALLY happened to ♦ ♦ ♦ Miles and miles of type have been used saying that Greta Garbo is going to do this or going to do that, and why. Here, garnered from various sources— all of them reliable — is the real truth at last about her contract, her visit to her native Sweden and her future plans By RILLA PAGE PALMBORG Keystone-Underwood Garbo arriving in Sweden. WHEN Garbo's contract came to an end with the completion of her last picture, "As You Desire Me," and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer pulled down the blue and yellow flag that for over five years — to the envy of all Hollywood — fluttered from their highest turret, Garbo fans the world over eagerly waited to hear her next move. The film colony expected her to shake the Hollywood dust from her brogues as soon as the "last shot" had been taken. As spring melted into summer the Swedish star was glimpsed here and there about town giving rise to all sorts of fantastic stories. One had it that Garbo was already on the high seas while her double, appearing occasionally along the boulevard, fooled the public. Another rumor persisted that Garbo had given up her home and was hiding somewhere along the coast. Few gave any credence to the story that the tall, straight-haired blonde garbed in brown masculine corduroy trousers and blouse, seen occasionally on the boulevard, was Garbo. The fact of the matter is that it was Garbo and that she had not left town nor given up her home. Garbo did originally intend to leave Hollywood earlv in June — at the completion of her picture — and had booked passage on the "Gripsholm," her favorite boat, through G. Eckdahl & Son. steamship agents in Los Angeles. These reservations were cancelled when it was found that Garbo's business affairs could not be settled by that time. When the press all over the world precipitated a spectacular controversy on Garbo's plans, Garbo — clever show woman and business head that she is — became more mysterious than ever. HER usual routine of spending a great deal of time with her two friends, Mercedes d'Acosta, a scenario writer who was at that time busy on the script "Rasputin" which was being prepared for Ethel, Lionel and John Barrymore, and Mrs. Berthold Viertel, wife of the German motion picture director who came to Hollywood under contract to Fox, was clothed in secrecy. Miss d'Acosta lived in the plain two-story green frame house that squatted comfortably behind a trim hedge about a city block up the country road from Garbo's — a place that Garbo herself found for her friend. Mrs. Viertel dwelt with her husband and three children in Santa Monica, a good Garbo walk away from the Swedish star. But Garbo, that past mistress in mystery, knew how to keep the public guessing. No longer were she and her friend Mercedes seen hiking over country roads. The canvas-inclosed tennis court inside of the high iron gates that guarded her grounds was silent. No longer did her limousine glide in and out of the driveway. Reporters and cameramen] haunting her gates got no glimpse of Garbo. Garbo's colored chauffeur went around wailing that his) mistress had left town and that he was looking for a newjob. The gardener who worked for ZaSu Pitts next door vowed that the Swedish star had moved away. But Garbo's household, secure from intrusion behind a closely woven high wire fence screened with thick shrubs,! was going about its daily routine as usual. Garbo was simply out-Garboing herself. FOR instance, she was so cautious that instead of i revelling in a rare, unexpected early morning rain that drenched Hollywood a short time before she left, Garbo wouldn't risk walking even that short distance between Miss d'Acosta's house and her own. Around eight o'clock of that particular morning, a fresh young blonde of some eighteen summers was seen to skip out the front door of Mercedes' house and into the garage, out of which she drove a small closed car into the circular driveway, stopping directly opposite the front entrance. When she jumped out to go inside shei left the motor running and the car door open. It was all of fifteen minutes before the blonde reappeared with Garbo — blue trousered legs showing beneath a tightly buttoned brown trench coat and blue beret tilted! jauntily over straight blonde hair — following close behind. I Both girls hurried into the car, which glided swiftly down the road turning through the wide-swung gates at Garbo's place. When the car stopped at the side of the house the Swedish star jumped out and hurriedly disappeared through her front door. The young girl turned and drove back to the green frame house a block up the road. And when Garbo visited her friends, the Viertels, she went under cover of darkness. With her estate bordering on two roads (Rockingham Drive at the front and Beverly Boulevard on the rear) the star was able to slip out unobserved. If Garbo hadn't signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer or with some other studio why was she staying in Hollywood ? For the simple reason that she, like many of her predecessors, was arguing over a contract. ON good authority I have it that Garbo first was approached with a contract guaranteeing fifteen thousand dollars per week with a schedule calling for several pictures to be made during the year. Well aware of her high box (Continued on page 96)