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Of the many talented and charismatic 1920s female stars, there were perhaps few who inspired such rapturous fan magazine articles as Greta Garbo. Motion Picture Magazine once declared: “Everyone feels, without being able to explain the fact, that this slim girl is one of the children of Destiny–as definitely precious as a piece of pale green jade.” Picture-Play Magazine likewise gushed: “Her first appearance on the screen struck lightning into the public’s heart.” And one particularly insightful Screenland essay said: “Her appeal is not direct, like that of an Anita Page or a Mary Pickford; it is subtle, evasive, often unexpected…Most actresses have what we might call one face. Greta Garbo is a woman of a thousand faces.”
And there were perhaps even fewer actresses who became full-fledged icons as quickly and as decisively as Garbo. Even today it’s not hard to see why: amid all the flappers, ingenues, and motherly types filling the screens, suddenly here was this sleek woman of mystery with almost ridiculously perfect Nordic features. And if that weren’t enough for the public, talkies soon revealed a husky voice with a thrillingly heavy accent.
Garbo was born Greta Gustafsson (a very common Swedish surname) in Stockholm, Sweden in 1905. Her family lived in a dreary working-class neighborhood and her father worked various low-paying jobs until passing away from the Spanish flu in 1920. Young Greta disliked school and decided not to attend highschool, working jobs at a barber shop and a department store instead…
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