Marlene Dietrich was a film actress whose aura of sophistication and sensuality made her one of the most glamorous of all film stars. Her father was a German police officer, and she first studied the violin, then acting under Max Reinhardt, the innovative theatrical director. She eventually joined Reinhardt's theatre company. Seven years after her first appearance in German films as an extra, her stardom was established by her role as Lola-Lola, a sultry and world-weary nightclub performer in Josef von Sternberg's Der blaue Engel (1930; The Blue Angel). Adapted from Heinrich Mann's novel Professor Unrat, the film was an international success. After its premiere, von Sternberg brought her to the United States, where they collaborated on such pictures as Morocco (1930), Dishonored (1931), Blonde Venus (1932), Shanghai Express (1932), The Scarlet Empress (1934), and The Devil Is a Woman (1935). Desire (1936) and Destry Rides Again (1939) revealed her talent as a comedienne. From 1943 to 1946 Marlene Dietrich made more than 500 personal appearances before Allied troops. After World War II she continued to make successful films, such as A Foreign Affair (1948), The Monte Carlo Story (1956), Witness for the Prosecution (1957), Touch of Evil (1958), and Judgment at Nuremberg (1961). She was also a popular nightclub performer. In 1978, after a period of retirement from the screen, she appeared in the film Just a Gigolo. In 1986 there appeared the documentary film Marlene, a review of her life and career, with a voice-over interview of the star by Maximilian Schell. Her autobiography, Ich bin, Gott sei dank, Berlinerin (I am, thank God, a Berliner) appeared in 1987.

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