Jeanne Moreau

French actress Jeanne Moreau (1928-2017) was one of the biggest stars of European cinema and the personification of French womanhood and sensuality. Moreau had a diverse career: she was a magnificent stage and film actress, a producer, screenwriter and film director, a successful singer with a substantial recording career, and a theatre and opera director. She combined off-kilter beauty with strong character in Nouvelle Vague classics as Ascenseur pour l'échafaud (1958) and Les amants (1959). Her role as the flamboyant, free-spirited Catherine with her devil-may-care sensuality in Jules et Jim (1962) is one of the greatest performances in the history of the cinema. Throughout her long career with more than 130 films, Jeanne Moreau worked with some of the most notable film directors ever.


French postcard in the Collection Cinéma by Editions Art & Scene, Paris, no. CF 88. Photo: R. Cauchetier. Jeanne Moreau, Henri Serre and Oskar Werner in Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).

French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 81. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 987. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 275. Offered by Corvisart, Epinal. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 809. Photo: Sam Lévin, Paris.


French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 1017. Photo: Sam Lévin.

Alien enemies

Jeanne Moreau was born in 1928, Paris, France. Her father, Anatole-Désiré Moreau, owned a restaurant in Montmartre, Paris. Her mother, Katherine Buckley, was an English dancer who had come to the Folies Bergère with the Tiller Girls.

Jeanne grew up living part of the time in Paris and part of the time in Mazirat, her father's native village. During the Second World War, Katherine and Jeanne were forced to stay in Paris, classified as alien enemies. She attended the Lycée Edgar Quinet in Paris and began to discover her love of literature and the theatre.

When her parents divorced in the late 1940s and her mother returned to England, Jeanne remained with her father in Montmartre. Opposing her father's wishes, she decided to become an actress. She trained for the stage at the Paris Conservatoire and made her theatrical debut in 1947 at the Avignon Festival.

In 1948, when she was only 20 years old, she became the youngest full-time member in the history of the Comédie-Française, France's most prestigious theatrical company. Her first play was Ivan Turgenev's 'A Month in the Country', directed by Jean Meyer. She soon was one of the leading actresses of the troupe and was recognised as the prime stage actress of her generation.

She left in 1951, finding the Comédie-Française too restrictive and authoritarian, and joined the more experimental Théâtre Nationale Populaire. Moreau also began playing small roles in films like Dernier amour / Last Love (Jean Stelli, 1949). During the 1950s, she appeared in several mainstream films like the superb thriller Touchez pas au grisbi / Grisbi (Jacques Becker, 1953) with Jean Gabin and the colourful historical drama La reine Margot / Queen Margot (Jean Dréville, 1954).


French postcard by Editions La Malibran, Paris, no. T4. Jeanne Moreau and Gérard Philipe in 'Le Prince de Hombourg' (1952), based on the play by Henrich von Kleist and Jean Vilar.


German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 1015. Photo: Sam Lévin, Paris.


East German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, 514, 1957. Photo: Unifrance. Publicity still for Les hommes en blanc / Men in White (Ralph Habib, 1955).


French postcard by Editions du Globe (E.D.U.G.), no. 328. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by Editions du Globe (E.D.U.G.), no. 620. Photo: Lucienne Chevert.

Scandal

Jeanne Moreau was almost 30 before her film career really took off, thanks to her work with first-time director Louis Malle. His murder mystery Ascenseur pour l'échafaud seemed to be in the same thriller genre as her earlier films, but after seeing the first week of dailies for Ascenseur, the technicians at the film lab went to the producer and said: “You must not let Malle destroy Jeanne Moreau”.

Louis Malle later explained: “She was lit only by the windows of the Champs Elysées. That had never been done. Cameramen would have forced her to wear a lot of make-up and they would put a lot of light on her, because, supposedly, her face was not photogenic”.

This lack of artifice revealed Moreau's ‘essential qualities’: "she could be almost ugly and then, ten seconds later, she would turn her face and would be incredibly attractive. But she would be herself.”

Ascenseur pour l'échafaud / Elevator to the Gallows (Louis Malle, 1958) was immediately followed by the controversial Les amants / The Lovers (Louis Malle, 1958). Moreau starred as a provincial wife who abandons her family for a man she has just met. Her earthy, intelligent and subtle portrayal of the adulteress caused a scandal in France.

The erotic scenes caused censorship problems all over the world. The American gossip columnists tagged her as 'The New Bardot', and Moreau instantly became an international sex symbol. Malle and his star separated privately, but professionally they would make several more films together, including the excellent Le feu follet / The Fire Within (1963).


French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 931. Offered by Les Carbones Korès 'Carboplane'. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by St. Anne, Marseille. Photo: Sam Lévin.


French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 734. Photo: Sam Lévin, Paris.


Italian postcard by Rotalcolor, Milano, no. 258.


Chinese postcard. Marcello Mastroianni and Jeanne Moreau in La Notte (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1961).


Chinese postcard. Jeanne Moreau in Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).

Marguerite Duras

Jeanne Moreau went on to work with many of the best-known Nouvelle Vague (New Wave) and avant-garde directors. Her most enduring role is the flamboyant and magnetic Catherine in François Truffaut's explosive Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962). She co-produced Jules et Jim herself and also co-produced La baie des anges / Bay of Angels (Jacques Demy, 1963) and Peau de banane / Banana Peel (Marcel Ophüls, 1963).

She teamed with Brigitte Bardot in Viva Maria! (Louis Malle, 1965). It was one of the major media events of 1965. Thanks to the on-screen chemistry between the two top French female stars of the period, the film became an international hit. Five years after Jules et Jim, she worked again with François Truffaut, starring as an icy murderess in the popular Alfred Hitchcock homage La mariée était en noir / The Bride Wore Black (François Truffaut, 1967).

She also worked with such notable directors as Michelangelo Antonioni at La notte / The Night (1961), and Beyond the Clouds (1995), Orson Welles at Le procès / The Trial (1962), Campanadas a medianoche / Chimes at Midnight (1965), L’histoire immortelle / The Immortal Story (1968), and the unfinished The Deep (1970), Joseph Losey at Eva (1962) and Mr. Klein (1976), Luis Buñuel at Le journal d'une femme de chambre / Diary of a Chambermaid (1964). Later, she acted for Elia Kazan in The Last Tycoon (1976), for Rainer Werner Fassbinder in Querelle (1982), and Wim Wenders in Bis ans Ende der Welt / Until the End of the World (1991).

Her stage hits included Anna Bonacci's 'L'heure éblouissante' (The Dazzling Hour, 1953), Jean Cocteau's La machine infernale' (1954, as the Sphinx), George Bernard Shaw's 'Pygmalion' (1955, as Eliza Doolittle), Tennessee Williams' 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof' (1956, as Maggie), Frank Wedekind's 'Lulu' (Loulou, 1976, title role), and Tennessee Williams' 'The Night of the Iguana' (1985, as Hannah Jelkes). She won the Best Actress Molière Award (the French equivalent of the Tony) in 1988 for her acclaimed performance in Hermann Broch's 'Le récit de la servante Zerline', a huge theatrical success which toured 11 countries. Moreau also enjoyed success as a vocalist. She released several albums and once performed with Frank Sinatra at Carnegie Hall.

Her name has often been associated, both socially and professionally, with that of writer-director Marguerite Duras. Apart from their close friendship, Moreau starred in two films based on Duras' novels, Moderato cantabile / Seven Days ... Seven Nights (Peter Brook, 1960) and The Sailor from Gibraltar (Tony Richardson, 1970). Duras herself directed Moreau in Nathalie Granger (1972), and she was the narrator in another Duras screen adaptation, L'amant / The Lover (Jean-Jacques Annaud, 1992). She even went on to portray Duras in the biopic Cet amour-là / This Love (Josée Dayan, 2001). Other major literary figures among her close friends were Jean Cocteau, Jean Genet, Henry Miller, and Anaïs Nin. Jeanne Moreau was the president of Equinoxe, an organisation which supports new European scriptwriters.


Small Romanian collector card. Photo: publicity still for La Notte (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1961) with Jeanne Moreau and Marcello Mastroianni.


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 471. Photo: Jeanne Moreau and Anthony Perkins in Le procès / The Trial (Orson Welles, 1962).


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 491. Photo: Jeanne Moreau and Anthony Perkins in Le procès / The Trial (Orson Welles, 1962).


Czech collector card by Pressfoto, Prague, no. S 144/5 669. Jeanne Moreau and Jean-Louis Trintignant in Mata Hari, agent H21/Secret Agent FX18 (Jean-Louis Richard, 1964).


Romanian postcard by Casa Filmului Acin, no. 445. Photo: Daniel Ivernel and Jeanne Moreau in Le journal d'une femme de chambre / The Diary of a Chambermaid (Luis Buñuel, 1964).


Italian postcard. Photo: Dear Film. Jeanne Moreau and George Hamilton in Via Maria! (Louis Malle, 1965).

Honours

As her leading-lady days began to wane, Jeanne Moreau made a graceful transition to character parts. She used her standing in the French industry to foster the careers of young directors such as Bertrand Blier, in whose 1974 feature Les valseuses / Going Places, she gave a cryptic but memorable performance, and Andre Techiné.

In 1975, she made her debut as a director with Lumière / Light (1975), the story of several generations of actresses. She also wrote the script and played Sarah, an actress the same age as Moreau. She also helmed L'Adolescente / The Adolescent (1978), a semi-autobiographical tale of a girl sent to live with her grandmother in 1939, and Lillian Gish (1984), an homage to the silent screen heroine.

She was the only actress who had presided twice over the jury of the Cannes Film Festival (in 1975 and 1995), and she was president of the jury at the Berlin Film Festival in 1983. She has won a number of honours, including two BAFTA Awards, three Césars (the French Oscar), a Golden Lion for career achievement at the 1991 Venice Film Festival and a 1997 European Film Academy Lifetime Achievement Award.

In 1998, the American Academy of Motion Pictures presented her with a lifetime tribute. She was also made a Fellow of the British Film Institute in recognition of her outstanding contribution to film culture. And she was chosen by Empire magazine as one of the 100 Sexiest Stars in film history (#76) in 1995. In 2000, she made her debut as a stage director with a Geneva and Paris production of Margaret Edson's 'Wit'. The following year, she was the first woman to enter the Académie des Beaux-Arts of Paris. In 2001, she also made her debut as an opera director with an Opera National de Paris production of Giuseppe Verdi's 'Attila'. Among her last films were Le temps qui reste / Time to Leave (François Ozon, 2005), Disengagement (Amos Gitai, 2007) and Visage / Face (Ming-liang Tsai, 2009).

Jeanne Moreau was romantically involved with Louis Malle, François Truffaut, Lee Marvin, and fashion designer Pierre Cardin. Vanessa Redgrave named Moreau as co-respondent in her 1967 divorce from director Tony Richardson on grounds of adultery. Richardson and Moreau would never marry. Jeanne Moreau married - and divorced - three times: to actor-director Jean-Louis Richard (1949-1951), to Greek actor Teodoro Rubanis (1966-1967), and to Exorcist director William Friedkin (1977-1980). She had a son with Richard, Jérôme Richard (1950), who is a successful painter.


French poster postcard by Encyclopédie du Cinéma, no.EDC 284, VIS 1. Belgian poster for Ascenseur pour l'échafaud / Elevator to the Gallows (Louis Malle, 1957).


Trailer for Ascenseur pour l'échafaud / Elevator to the Scaffold (1958). Music: Miles Davis. Source: BFI Trailers (YouTube).


Trailer for Les amants (1958). Source: Corey Mike (YouTube).


Trailer La notte (1961). Source: Rialto Films (YouTube).

Sources: Rebecca Flint Marx (AllMovie - Page now defunct), Dale O'Connor (IMDb), Filmreference.com, Wikipedia, and IMDb.

This post was last updated on 29 October 2025.

Jules et Jim (1961)

Jules et Jim (François Truffaut, 1962) is a classic of the Nouvelle Vague, the New Wave of the French cinema. Based on a novel by Henri-Pierre Roché, it describes a 30-year relationship between 2 friends, Jules and Jim, and their shared love Catherine. In 1962, it was a bold film which challenged the norms about relationships and gave an alternative view of love and friendship. Jeanne Moreau starred as the flamboyant, free-spirited Catherine with her devil-may-care sensuality.


Chinese postcard. Jeanne Moreau in Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).


French postcard in the Collection Cinéma by Editions Art & Scene, Paris, no. CF 88. Photo: R. Cauchetier. Jeanne Moreau, Henri Serre and Oskar Werner in Jules et Jim/Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).

A famous love triangle

Jules et Jim/Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962) starts with a quote: "Tu m’as dit: 'Je t’aime'. Je t’ai dit: 'Attends'. J’ allais dire: 'Prends-moi'. Tu m’ as dit: 'Va-t-en'. (You said, 'I love you', I said, 'Wait'. I was going to say, 'Take me', you said, 'Go away'.) We are in Paris, 1912. Two writers, the shy, German Jules (Oskar Werner) and the Bohemian Frenchman Jim (Henri Serre) develop a close friendship. They share an interest in literature, art and women. At a slide show, the two become entranced with a bust of a goddess with a serene smile and travel to an island in the Adriatic Sea to see it. Back from Greece, they meet Catherine (Jeanne Moreau), who has a similar smile on her face. Both men fall in love with her and the three become inseparable. When they go on holiday with Catherine, the two friends become distant. Jules senses everything has changed and warns Jim that Catherine will be his wife. The friends always traded and shared their girlfriends, “but not this one, Jim. OK?” Jim agrees and continues to be involved with his girlfriend Gilberte (Vanna Urbino), usually seeing her apart from Jules and Catherine. Catherine asks to speak with Jim at a cafe, but she does not show up on time and he leaves. Catherine chooses Jules and marries him. But the friendship between the two men endures.

When World War I breaks out, the three lose track of each other. The two friends are haunted by the fear of killing each other in battle. After the war, Jules and Catherine live together with their daughter Sabine (Sabine Haudepin) in a chalet in the Black Forest. They invite Jim to stay for a while. He sees that Jules and Catherine are growing apart and that their marriage is unhappy. His old love for Catherine blossoms again. They all live together and Jim and Catherine become increasingly close, eventually wanting to have a child. Jules doesn't mind and promises to love Catherine no matter what. But Catherine is eternally dissatisfied and keeps changing her mind about her choice of lover. The ardour and passion binding Catherine and Jim fade, giving way to a tense, stormy atmosphere in which Catherine threatens to kill Jim. Finally, Catherine kills herself and Jim by driving over a destroyed bridge in her new car and failing to brake at the end of the carriageway. Jules watches helplessly.

Henri-Pierre Roché wrote his novel 'Jules et Jim' in 1953 when he was 73. His novel is largely autobiographical: Jim is based on himself, and Jules and Catherine are directly inspired by the German writer Franz Hessel and his wife Helen Grund. They were the parents of Stéphane Hessel, a Resistance fighter and diplomat born in Berlin in 1917. After the death of Helen Hessel (née Grund) in 1982 at the age of 96, the identity of the people who inspired this famous trio was publicly revealed. Henri-Pierre Roché's notebooks entitled 'Carnets, Les années Jules et Jim, Première partie, 1920-1921' were published in 1990 with a preface by François Truffaut. The German author Manfred Flügge wrote a factual novel about Roché and the Hessel couple entitled 'Gesprungene Liebe. The true story of ‘Jules and Jim’', which was published in 1993. In 1996, the publication of some of Helen Hessel's letters to Henri-Pierre Roché followed in 'Lettres d'Helen, lettres à Henri-Pierre Roché, 1920-1921'.

Director, producer and co-scriptwriter François Truffaut altered several elements of the novel in his adaptation. He changed the character of German Kathe in the novel into French Catherine in the film. In the novel, Kathe has two children, whereas in the film she has only one daughter. Rather than replace scenes from the novel that were difficult to adapt with equivalent scenes, Truffaut had Michel Subor read passages from Roché's novel in voice-over. Earlier, Truffaut had denounced the practice of using 'equivalent scenes' in his famous article ‘Une certaine tendance du cinéma Française' (A Certain Trend in French cinema), which he published in 1954 in Les Cahiers du Cinema. The scenes with Subor worked well and brought the literary flavour of the novel to the screen.

The period of the film is 20 years without the characters showing any signs of ageing. Instead, Truffaut placed thirteen reproductions of paintings by Pablo Picasso in the film which are temporal markers but also clues reflecting the state of mind or transformations of the characters in the foreground. At the start of the film, Truffaut placed 'L'Étreinte dans la mansarde' in Jules's flat, reflecting his desire to find the company of a woman, and 'Famille d'acrobates avec singe' in Jim's flat, reflecting his more flighty, acrobat-like character. Similarly, in the scene where Jim is waiting for Catherine in a café, Picasso's painting 'Au Lapin Agile: Arlequin au verre Au Lapin Agile' can be seen in the background, depicting a relationship similar to Pablo Picasso and Germaine Pichot, who had the reputation of being a femme fatale with whom Carles Casagemas was madly in love.


French postcard in the Collection Cinéma by Editions Art & Scene, Paris, no. CF 891996. Photo: R. Cauchetier. Jeanne Moreau, Oskar Werner and Henri Serre (left) in Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).


Dutch collectors card in the series 'Filmsterren: een portret' by Edito Service, 1995. Photo: Sunset / KIPA-Interpress. Jeanne Moreau and Henri Serre in Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).

Charges of immorality

François Truffaut came across the novel 'Jules et Jim' in 1956 in a second-hand bookshop in Paris. He later befriended the old author, Henri-Pierre Roché, who approved of Truffaut's interest in adapting his semi-autobiographical novel. Truffaut was also a big fan of Ernst Lubitsch's comedy Design for Living (1933). The basic plot of this film classic is the same as that of 'Jules and Jim': two friends fall in love with the same woman. But where Lubitsch made a comedy, Truffaut made a drama. Lubitsch's film also ends in a car, but with a happy ending: the three lovers are reunited and continue to live together. ‘Jules et Jim is a hymn to life and death, a demonstration through joy and sadness of the impossibility of any amorous combination outside the couple’, wrote Truffaut a year before filming.

For the two friends, Truffaut chose Austrian stage actor Oskar Werner, and French actor Henri Serre, who were both relatively unknown at the time. Truffaut was impressed by Werner's role in Max Ophüls's film Lola Montès (1955). Years later, Truffaut would give him another leading role in his film Fahrenheit 45 (1966) about a world where books are banned. He chose Henri Serre because of his stunning resemblance to Henri-Pierre Roché. Like Roché, Serre is tall, slim and has a sonorous voice. For Catherine, he chose Jeanne Moreau. Film historian Peter Bosma: 'Jeanne Moreau is the perfect choice for the portrayal of Catherine. She has the strong charisma of a headstrong, non-conformist woman, capable of anything: crime, but also melancholic endless walks.'

Jules et Jim was released in 1962, at the time of the creative explosion of the Nouvelle Vague. It was François Truffaut’s third feature film after Les 400 Coups / The 400 Blows (1959) and the crime drama Tirez sur le pianiste / Shoot the Piano Player (1960). After the latter flopped, Truffaut was forced to make his next film on a low budget and he shot some indoor scenes for his next film at friends' homes. He was determined that Jules et Jim became a success, otherwise filming in the future would become very difficult. He adapted his film to the taste of the general public, in which he amazed his contemporaries. But his tactic paid off. Jules et Jim's success exceeded even Truffaut's own expectations. Film critic Roger Ebert: 'Although a case can be made for Godard’s A Bout de Souffle / Breathless (1960) (based on a story by Truffaut), Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim was perhaps the most influential and arguably the best of those first astonishing films that broke with the past. There is joy in the filmmaking that feels fresh today and felt audacious at the time. In the energy pulsing from the screen, you can see the style and sensibility that inspired Bonnie and Clyde (1967), a film Truffaut was once going to direct, and which jolted American films out of their torpor."

Initially, the film was boycotted in Italy and received an ‘over 18’ status in France. American critic Pauline Kael defended the film against the charges of immorality: "Jules and Jim is not only one of the most beautiful films ever made and the greatest motion picture of recent years, it is also, viewed as a work of art, exquisitely and impeccably moral. Truffaut does not use the screen for messages or special pleading or to sell sex for money; he uses the film medium to express his love and knowledge of life as completely as he can." Her colleague Roger Ebert added: "Truffaut’s camera is nimble, its movement so fluid that we sense a challenge to the traditional Hollywood grammar of establishing shot, closeup, reaction shot and so on; “Jules and Jim” impatiently strains toward the hand-held style. The narrator also hurries things along, telling us that there is no time to show us. The use of a narrator became one of Truffaut’s favorite techniques; it’s a way of signaling us that the story is over and its ending known before it even begins. His use of brief, almost unnoticeable freeze-frames treats some of the moments as snapshots, which also belong to the past."

Jules et Jim won the 1962 Étoile de Cristal, with Jeanne Moreau winning that year's prize for best actress, and became a huge success in Europe and the United States. The film unleashed a veritable craze in ‘Jules et Jim’ merchandise, such as caps, T-shirts, etc. It gave Truffaut a high profile in the film world, but he also became an international star. Years later, François Truffaut also adapted Roché's second novel 'Les deux anglaises et le continent' (1956) into a film, the romantic drama Les Deux Anglaises et le Continent / Two English Girls (François Truffaut, 1971) starring Jean-Pierre Léaud as Claude, Kika Markham as Anne, and Stacey Tendeter as Muriel. The film also tells about a passionate triangle in which three people are trapped, all in love with all, all reluctant to hurt the others.


French postcard in the Collection Cinéma by Editions Art & Scene, Paris, no. CF 81, 1995. Photo: Raymond Cauchetier. Jeanne Moreau in Jules et Jim / Jules and Jim (François Truffaut, 1962).


French postcard in the Collection Noire by Editions Hazan, Paris, no. 6109, 1989. Photo: Les films du Carosse, Paris. François Truffaut at the set of Jules et Jim (François Truffaut, 1961).

Sources: Roger Ebert (Roger Ebert.com), Peter Bosma (Dutch), Marc Pieters (Dutch), Wikipedia (Dutch, French and English) and IMDb.

The Choice of Meiter

Our guest today is my colleague-collector Meiter from the city of Groningen in the north of the The Netherlands. Regularly I buy film star postcards from her e-shop at the Dutch site Marktplaats. We started to correspond about the beauty of postcards, about our passion for collecting, film, our children and what they like to eat, about life. Thus I invited her to write at EFSP about her favorite European film star postcards, and she accepted. Meiter: "I like postcards so much, because they resemble (and when old, often are) real photos. They tell a story and represent a certain era. Because they are cards of filmstars, you can read a lot about them in books, magazines and on the internet. You can also make up your own story."
So, here's the Choice of.... Meiter.


Lilli Palmer. German postcard by UFA, Berlin. Collection: Meiter.
Meiter: "This is one of my favourite cards of Lilli Palmer. She seems relaxed and even laughs. On most of her photos she comes across as an elegant and beautiful woman, but remote. On this one she wears her Sunday dress with, what looks like, an apron. Her husband is out hunting and she just finished cleaning the house and enjoys a well deserved rest in the garden. I like the kitschiness and colours."


Sophia Loren. French postcard by Éditions Hazan, Paris. Collection: Meiter.
"Oh, oh, how beautiful. It is not a very old card (I am sure there must be an original somewhere), but it was one of the first cards of which I thought ‘I must have it’. What first struck me was the thing on which she is sitting: is it a chair? It looks like a retro 1960’s design chair, but you only see a curved leg. Sophia manages to sit quite elegantly on it and has a stylish, yet coquettish air. And still, she has this rather innocent look. (And why is she pointing at her knee?) I love it."


Marilyn Monroe. Vintage postcard, no. PU 13. Collection: Meiter.
"I know Marilyn is a Hollywood Filmstar, not a European Star. But this card is My Pride. It is a card I have not seen before. (Now some people will say, of course, it is quite common). On the back it only says “Nr. PU 13”. I assume PU stands for Pin Up and perhaps it is part of a series pin-up cards, Marilyn being number 13 (the unlucky number..). She represents the optimistic 1950’s and 60’s and plays those funny roles in her movies. Yet, she herself led this tragic life and had to play a role both in her movies and her own life. Nevertheless, I am just very proud of this card and like to boast about it."


O.W. Fischer. German postcard by IRMA-Verlag, Stuttgart. Collection: Meiter.
"O.W. Fischer loved cats and, as we can see on this card, cats loved him. I never understood this man. That makes him interesting. He seemed to lead a life of opposites. This photo represents an example: although at he end of his life he lived for and with his cats, he left half of his money to a dogs’ home. This cat is ignorant of the fact that she will not inherit any money. She just adores him."


Caterina Valente. German postcard by UFA, Berlin. Collection: Meiter.
"I don’t have anything with Caterine Valente and her music, but I love her cards. A very photogenic lady, and the more kitsch the better."


Jester Naefe. German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag. Collection: Meiter.
"Jester Naefe was also called the German Marilyn Monroe. She had a promising future as an actress. Unfortunately she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and died, after an agressive progression of this disease, 8 years later, only 37 years old."


Jeanne Moreau. East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb. Collection: Meiter.
"BEAUTIFUL. This card reminds me of a picture of Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn never had her prom photo taken. In 1956, when she was 30 (!) years old, she asked Milton Greene if he could photograph her as a ‘prom-girl’. The picture Greene made, looks just like this photo of Jeanne Monroe..uh..Moreau."


Gina Lollobrigida. French postcard by E.D.U.G., no. 55. Collection: Meiter.
"This card is not a cliché picture of La Lollobrigida. I like the colours in it. It is not kitschy, yet colourful. It is as if Gina happens to pass by and accidentally had her picture taken. She seems rather young, but frankly I have no idea. Rather mysterious. But then again I do not know much about her, and it might be a scene in one of her most famous films."


Claudia Cardinale. German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag. Collection: Meiter.
"Claudia once signed a contract which forbade her to marry, gain weight and cut her hair. She already had given birth to a son when she was 17 years old. The family pretended that Claudia was a (much older) sister. When he was 19, he was told his older sister was his mother. How much are you willing to give up to be a filmstar? Claudia Cardinale apparently quite a lot. Originally she did not want to be a moviestar at all. She wanted to be a teacher in her home country Tunisia. Which would have made her happier..."


And last but not least: Anny Ondra. German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6847/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Lothar Stark-Film. Collection: Meiter.
"I hesitated between Sybille Schmitz and Anny Ondra. But I saw that an extensive article already had been written about the androgyne, alcoholic, drug-addicted, bisexual Sybille Schmitz (I just wanted to use all these descriptions in connection with Sybille Schmitz), so the last card is of pretty, pretty Anny Ondra. When I read about pretty Anny Ondra, I have to think of ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ where a silent movie is transformed into a musical with real sound. Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen) appears to have a rather shriekish and screaming voice and it is decided that her voice will be dubbed over. Something similar happened to Anny Ondra, not because she was loud-voiced, but because her thick accent was considered unacceptable. I think she sounded lovely, but it is true that she did not sound like a London born girl.. She looks lovely and was married to the same man, a German boxer, for 54 years. Quite romantically. Yet, I am sure there must be more to this story."

Thanks Meiter, bedankt Carla!

The Choice of... is an irregularly appearing series. Earlier guests were Egbert Barten, Véronique3, Didier Hanson, Asa, Bunched Undies, Miss Mertens, and Manuel Palomino Arjona.