Marlene Dietrich filmography

A still from Shanghai Express (1932). Josef von Sternberg used butterfly lighting to enhance Dietrich's features.

Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress.

In the 1920s, she acted on the Berlin stage and in silent films, making her film debut in 1922. She was discovered by director Josef von Sternberg, who cast her as Lola-Lola in The Blue Angel (1930). The movie's mainstream success brought her international fame and a contract with Paramount Pictures in the United States.

Paramount sought to market Dietrich as a German answer to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Swedish sensation, Greta Garbo. Her first American film, Morocco (1930), directed by Sternberg, earned Dietrich her only Oscar nomination. She would appear in several other hits mostly directed by Sternberg, including Dishonored (1931), Blonde Venus (1932), and Shanghai Express (1932).

Dietrich and Sternberg's last two film collaborations, The Scarlet Empress (1934) and The Devil Is a Woman (1935)—the most styled of their collaborations—were their least successes at the box office. Her first film without Sternberg was 1933's The Song of Songs, directed by Rouben Mamoulian, although she and Sternberg would later work together another two times.

But without Sternberg, Dietrich—along with Fred Astaire, Joan Crawford, Mae West, Greta Garbo, Katharine Hepburn, Dolores del Río and others—was labeled "Box Office Poison" after the movie Knight Without Armour (1937) proved an expensive box office failure. In 1939, however, her stardom was revived when she played a cowboy saloon girl in the light-hearted western Destry Rides Again opposite James Stewart, singing "See What the Boys in the Back Room Will Have".

While Dietrich arguably never fully regained her former screen glory, she continued performing in movies, including appearances for such distinguished directors as Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, and Orson Welles, in successful films that included A Foreign Affair (1948), Stage Fright (1950), Witness for the Prosecution (1957), Touch of Evil (1958), and Judgment at Nuremberg (1961). Her final film appearance was as herself in the 1984 documentary, Marlene.

In 1999, the American Film Institute named Dietrich as the ninth greatest female star of all time.

Filmography

Silent feature films

Sound feature films

Short films

Television

Complete list of television appearances (excluding news footage):

• Unicef Gala (Düsseldorf, 1962): Guest Appearance
• Cirque d'hiver (Paris, 9 March 1963): Cameo as "Garcon de Piste"
• Deutsche-Schlager-Festspiele (Baden-Baden, 1963): Guest Appearance
• Grand Gala du Disque (Edison Awards) (The Hague, 1963): Guest Appearance
• Galakväll pa Berns (Stockholm, 1963): Concert, with introduction by Karl Gerhardt and orchestra conducted by Burt Bacharach
• Royal Variety Performance (London, 4 November 1963): Guest Appearance
• The Stars Shine for Jack Hylton (London, 1965): Guest Appearance
• The Magic of Marlene (Melbourne, October 1965): Concert, with orchestra conducted by William Blezard.
• The 22nd Annual Tony Awards (New York, 21 April 1968): Acceptance Speech
• Guest Star Marlene Dietrich (Copenhagen – for Swedish Television, 1970): Interview
• I Wish You Love (An Evening with Marlene Dietrich) (London, 23 & 24 November 1972): Concert TV Special, with orchestra conducted by Stan Freeman.

References

1. ↑ Homer Dickens (1968). The films of Marlene Dietrich. Citadel Press. pp. 7, 13, 49. 

• Marlene Dietrich at the Internet Movie Database
• Marlene Dietrich filmography at the TCM Movie Database
• Official website