Salka Viertel and Greta Garbo: A Love Story

165 Mabery Road in Santa Monica is a modest, unassuming bungalow with a view of the Pacific Ocean, far from the mansions of Beverly Hills and the glamour of Hollywood.  But in the 1930s this house became a sanctuary for artists, writers, composers, film makers - the cultural elite of Europe who managed to escape the horrors of Hitler's Germany. The house was owned by Salka Viertel, a Polish-born Jewish actress and screenwriter who with little fanfare managed to create a European-style salon on the California coast.  The Catalan writer Núra Añó was kind enough to send me her book El Salon de los artistas exiliados en California (also in English: The Salon of Exiled Artists in California), based on years of research on Salka Viertel, her family and friends, and the emigré community in Pacific Palisades.  This community has always fascinated me ever since I discovered a copy of Salka Viertel's memoir The Kindness of Strangers (1969) in a Maine library.  I also discovered Salka Viertel again in Christopher Isherwood's Diaries: he was a close friend of Salka and her husband, the Austrian writer and director Bertold Viertel.  Even though Salka Viertel was such a pivotal figure in the exile community very little has been written about her, so Núra Añó's book is a corrective, and she fills in many of the gaps of The Kindness of Strangers. 

The names of Weimar luminaries who frequented Salka Viertel's salon are far too many to list here.  She had a talent for making visitors feel at ease, they could speak German and enjoy German meals and Apfelstrudel, all prepared by Salka herself.  Writers who couldn't stand one another back in Berlin - such as Bertolt Brecht and Thomas Mann - would often encounter each other at 165 Mabery Road.  And it wasn't only German speakers who would meet there:  Hollywood royalty - both actors and directors  - were frequent guests.  Charlie Chaplin could often be found there and became a close friend with the hostess.  It is amazing that Salka was able to put on these lavish parties while earning very little as a screenwriter and all the while raising three sons on her own - her husband was rarely around. 

The heart of Núra Añó's book her research into the relationship between Salka Viertel and Greta Garbo.  By the time the two of them met at one of Salka's parties in 1930 Greta Garbo was already an international film sensation - adored by millions of fans for her great beauty and acting talent.  Something immediately clicked between the two of them.  Garbo was an intensely private - even introverted  - woman, but she could let her guard down with Salka.  During Hollywood's glory years in the 1930s and 40s sexuality was quite fluid - even though this was kept from the tabloids and gossip columns.  Many of the great stars were lesbian or bi-sexual: besides Garbo there was her erstwhile rival Marlene Dietrich as well as Tallulah Bankhead, Louise Brooks and many others.  Salka Viertel herself had affairs with both men and women.  But her relationship with "G.G." was more than just a fling - they remained close and, to a large extent, dependent on each other for the rest of their lives.  For Salka Viertel's career as a screenwriter her devotion to Garbo was both a blessing and a curse. Núra Añó lists the numerous treatments and screenplays she wrote for Garbo, but most of them were rejected or never made it into production.  Garbo herself was quite fickle when it came to screen roles, and her studio and agents were very protective of her persona as a sex goddess.

As an American, it is infuriating to read how Salka Viertel's story ends.  After the war, Salka was accused of having communist sympathies since she had helped so many European exiles, regardless of their political views. But inevitably there were some people deemed "undesirable"  - such as Hanns Eisler - by the House of Un-American Activities.  Salka was blacklisted and unable to get screenwriting work in Hollywood.  Of course, she was not alone:  America had provided sanctuary to so many Europeans of great talent, and now was turning against them.  Thomas Mann, Bertolt Brecht, Charlie Chaplin and many, many others realized that America had changed and it was time to return to Europe.  Salka was extremely proud that she had become an American citizen, but now she was nearly destitute - unable to earn a living.  She left 165 Mabery Road behind and fled to Switzerland, where she could be closer to her sons and grandchildren.  In Kloster she was able to find a measure of peace and could write her memoir.  And occasionally her great love - G.G. - would come to visit. 

See also some related posts:

Review: Salka Viertel's "Kindness of Strangers"

Christopher Isherwood on Thomas Mann

Review: Pazifik Exil by Michael Lentz

Review: Christa Wolf's Stadt der Engel oder The Overcoat of Dr. Freud

 

Comments

[Donna Rifkind]

That is not Salka Viertel in the photograph with Greta Garbo.

There is no evidence that Salka Viertel and Greta Garbo ever had a "fling." They first met at Ernst Lubitsch's house, not at one of Salka's parties.

Salka Viertel lived in Klosters, Switzerland, not Kloster.

Much more information is available in my book The Sun and Her Stars: Salka Viertel and Hitler's Exiles in the Golden Age of Hollywood (New York: Other Press, Jan. 2020).

[David]

Lawrence Wechsler in the Paris Review identified the photo as that of SV and GG.

https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2019/01/11/salka-viertels-forgotten-account-of-old-hollywood/

I've added your book to my reading list.

[Donna Rifkind]

Thank you. This photo has been floating around the internet for a long time, and many scholars have made the same error. I believe the woman in the photo is the actress Francoise Rosay, a good friend of Viertel's.

[Núria Añó]

Hi, David Vickrey, your review about my book "The Salon of Exiled Artists in California" is much appreciated. Yes, it was a long work on research and I am glad if this biography of Jewish scriptwriter and salonnière Salka Viertel shows how fascinating this woman was for its time. All the best!

[Ruth viertel]

That is not a picture of my mother-in-law, Salka Viertel.She was not blond,had very curly hair, was not that tall and had a more open smile and face.