Dietrich icon
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Bibliographic Information
Dietrich icon
Duke University Press, 2007
- : cloth
- : pbk
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Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. [385]-400) and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
Few movie stars have meant as many things to as many different audiences as the iconic Marlene Dietrich. The actress-chanteuse had a career of some seventy years: one that included not only classical Hollywood cinema and the concert hall but also silent film in Weimar Germany, theater, musical comedy, vaudeville, army camp shows, radio, recordings, television, and even the circus. Having renounced and left Nazi Germany, assumed American citizenship, and entertained American troops, Dietrich has long been a flashpoint in Germany's struggles over its cultural heritage. She has also figured prominently in European and American film scholarship, in studies ranging from analyses of the directors with whom she worked to theories about the ideological and psychic functions of film. Dietrich Icon, which includes essays by established and emerging film scholars, is a unique examination of the many meanings of Dietrich.Some of the essays in this collection revisit such familiar topics as Germany's complex relationship with Dietrich, her ambiguous sexuality, her place in the lesbian archive, her star status, and her legendary legs, but with fresh critical perspective and an emphasis on historical background. Other essays establish new avenues for understanding Dietrich's persona. Among these are a reading of Marlene Dietrich's ABC-an eclectic autobiographical compendium containing Dietrich's thoughts on such diverse subjects as "steak," "Sternberg (Joseph von)," "Stravinsky," and "stupidity"-and an argument that Dietrich manipulated her voice-through her accent, sexual innuendo, and singing-as much as her visual image in order to convey a cosmopolitan world-weariness. Still other essays consider the specter of aging that loomed over Dietrich's career, as well as the many imitations of the Dietrich persona that have emerged since the star's death in 1992.
Contributors. Nora M. Alter, Steven Bach, Elisabeth Bronfen, Erica Carter, Mary R. Desjardins, Joseph Garncarz, Gerd Gemunden, Mary Beth Haralovich, Amelie Hastie, Lutz Koepnick, Alice A. Kuzniar, Amy Lawrence, Judith Mayne, Patrice Petro, Eric Rentschler, Gaylyn Studlar, Werner Sudendorf, Mark Williams
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Prelude
Introduction: Marlene Dietrich's Appropriations / Mary R. Desjardins and Gerd Gemunden 3
Falling in Love Again / Steven Bach 25
I. The Icon
Dietrich's Face / Lutz Koepnick 43
The Legs of Marlene Dietrich / Nora M. Alter 60
Marlene Dietrich: The Voice as Mask / Amy Lawrence 79
II. Establishing the Star Persona
Playing Garbo: How Marlene Dietrich Conquered Hollywood / Joseph Garncarz 103
Seductive Departures of Marlene Dietrich: Exile and Stardom in The Blue Angel / Elisabeth Bronfen 119
The Blue Angel in Multiple-Language Versions: The Inner Thighs of Miss Dietrich / Patrice Petro 141
Marlene Dietrich in Blonde Venus: Advertising Dietrich in Seven Markets / Mary Beth Haralovich 162
Marlene Dietrich: The Prodigal Daughter / Erica Carter 186
III. "Marlene Has Sex But No Gender"
Marlene Dietrich and the Erotics of Code-Bound Hollywood / Gaylyn Studlar 211
"It's Not Often That I Want a Man": Reading for a Queer Marlene / Alice A. Kuzniar 239
Get/Away: Structure and Desire in Rancho Notorious / Mark Williams 259
IV. (Auto-) Biography and the Archive
The Order of Knowledge and Experience: Marlene Dietrich's ABC / Amelie Hastie 289
Dietrich Dearest: Family Memoir and the Fantasy of Origins / Mary R. Desjardins 310
An Icon between the Fronts: Vilsmaier's Recast Marlene / Eric Rentschler 328
"Life Goes On without Me": Marlene Dietrich, Old Age, and the Archive / Judith Mayne 347
"Is That Me?": The Marlene Dietrich Collection Berlin / Werner Sudendorf 376
Bibliography 385
Contributors 401
Index 405
by "Nielsen BookData"