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The common thread between all the men I have loved? Me! — Jeanne Moreau, French actress, singer, screenwriter and director (1928-2017)

wehadfacesthen

Marlene Dietrich in her Jean Louis “illusion gown”, photographed by John Engstead for her first appearances in Las Vegas, 1953

“Nellie Manning, her hairdresser, called me and said, ‘Marlene has just opened tonight… and she wants you to come up and make some pictures. Immediately.’ So I said, ‘Sure. I will.’ So we did it right away. And we rushed them back…. There was a place in Vegas where we could develop them. We couldn’t shoot until after she got through at night, and that was at 12:30 or 1:00. At 3:00 or 3:30 we took the negatives in to Las Vegas, developed them and made proofs, and then I came back at 8:30 or 9:00 in the morning, and she was there…. They were lovely pictures.

“The sitting wasn’t hurried, because you don’t hurry Dietrich. She’s slow. She knows what she’s doing. She knows the tempo of an 8x10 camera. This is what she wanted…. She loved Marlene Dietrich’s face. She had made a great thing out of this. This was her creation. She was going to be sure I helped her as much as I could. She worked harder than anybody else I ever knew.” - John Engstead, quoted in People Will Talk by John Kobal