Book Review: Pola Negri – Memoirs of a Star
Doubleday Publishers, 1970
ASIN: B0006C0782
Pola Negri may not be a household name today, but at one time Ms. Negri was one of the darlings of the film industry coming to America in September 1922 after becoming a popular film and stage actress in Europe. She was considered a member of the foreign legion who were actors that moved abroad to be in American pictures. Her first American contract was signed to Famous Players, a Hollywood studio which later became Paramount.
Courted and solicited by directors and producers during the silent film era which emerged through the Roaring Twenties, Ms. Negri continued to be in demand through the 1930’s when film first came with voice called Talkies then. She was a part of the early stages of the film industry and her autobiography, “Memoirs of a Star” chronicles her journey from the slums of Warsaw, Poland to the palatial estates of Beverly Hills to a king-size chateau in the south of France, all abodes that were once homes to Pola Negri.
Her discussions about the inner workings of the film business are insightful. Her tales exhibit a philosophical edge in them, and her observations are sharp providing the reader with a deeper understanding of the times of her life. A life which began on December 31, 1899 in Lipno, Poland born to Eleonora de Kielczeska, a Polish Catholic, and Jerzy Chalupec, an immigrant from Slovakia. Her parents named her Apolonia which was shortened to Pola. Her mother was of noble stock, but the family lost their land and title due to the ever-changing political climate of Poland then occupied by Communist Russia.
Pola’s father worked in a factory and his mother played a large role in Pola’s upbringing. She describes their home life as peaceful though they were poor and she was their only surviving child. Life changed drastically when her father was arrested for joining a group of rebels who killed a Russian prince. Chalupec was convicted and sent to Siberia. Though he was not Polish, he fought with the Polish freedom fighters to liberate Poland from Russia’s Communist regime. Pola would learn many years later after becoming a famous screen actress that her father died while fighting a war that was not his to fight.
The details of Pola Negri’s formative years show a side of life wreath in strife and poverty. It became her motivation to perform on stage and be a part of a dream-like existence. She tells that the world of performers is a fantasy while the real world is all about poverty, jealousy, spite, struggle, oppression, and abuse. She has a rags to riches story that rings true for its day being discovered on the street where she played with other school children by two performers from the Academy of Dramatic Arts.
At the age of nine, she auditioned for the Imperial Ballet and was accepted. Ballet was a tool then used by the Russian Empire which established the Bolshoi Ballet and the Kirov Ballet to wield their superiority in the arts over other countries. The Imperial Ballet was under the patronage of the Tsar and anyone accepted to the school received free tuition. The head of the Imperial Academy was Casimir de Hulewicz, a friend of Pola’s mother before her family lost their land and holdings.
Pola’s experience at the Imperial Ballet broadened her scope of literature, dance, and the arts in general. She developed skills in pantomime which proved useful when she transitioned into silent films. Her break from ballet came in her early teens when she was diagnosed with tuberculosis. Under Hulewicz’s patronage, he paid for her treatments at Zakopane’s sanatorium. It was during this period when she took an interest in Ada Negri’s poetry, identifying with the human plight which was a recurring theme in the verses. Later, Pola would be attracted to movie roles that dealt with human tragedies and the dilemmas faced by un-affluent people.
When she recovered and returned to Warsaw, she decided to try out for the Imperial Academy of the Dramatic Arts. As Apolonia Chalupec, she was known as a ballerina, so she chose to audition under the name Pola Negri taking Ada Negri’s surname, which stayed with her until her death. Her first performance was playing “Hedwig” in Henrik Ibsen’s play “The Wild Duck” at the Academy. Her delivery moved Polish audiences and put her on the path to an acting career that spanned from 1914 to 1943, encompassing two world wars, four revolutions, two husbands, and a string of lovers that she could count with ten fingers.
Her story is laden with amazing highs and debilitating travesties. The twists that fate had in store for her were impossible to predict like her love affairs with Charlie Chaplin and the Prince of Romance, Rudolph Valentino, or the German papers touting her as the Konigin (Queen) of the Screen. She played a variety of dramatic and comedic roles but was best known for playing vamps and femme fatale figures. She tells she treated the roles as though she was the person she was playing, bringing out the truth of the character in her interpretations. She thought of her roles as being real people who were trying to make their way through life just as she was and everyone else in the world was doing.
At a certain point, wherever she went in Europe and America, a fanfare ensued as people showered her with a barrage of gifts and flowers and all the regalia bestowed on a Hollywood starlet. Her narrations are poignant, particularly her experiences in making German films during Hitler’s reign and the domination of the Third Reich in Europe. She also provides insight into a lifestyle that few people are given the opportunity to lead.
She retired from films tentatively in 1943 after making the comedy, “Hi Diddle Diddle.” Twenty years later, Walt Disney charmed her into playing “the richest woman in the world” in the film “The Moon Spinners” released by Disney in 1964. It was officially her last role on screen and allowed her to go out on a grand scale.
She concludes her memoirs by revealing that her past was wonderful and the present, slated as 1969 in her entry, is tranquil. She expresses gratefulness that she survived through so much turmoil, though it is the public who can be grateful that she documented her travails in “Memoirs of a Star.”
Pola Negri passed away in 1987 and though most of her movies are forgotten except by the movie buffs who have a fetish for films from the Roaring Twenties and 1930’s, she remains an integral part of the world that turned Hollywood into a dream factory. She was one of the innovators, a pioneer in films who influenced others of her kind, and her story is one that shocks and stimulates readers to see the world from another point of view.
The history and credibility in her words enables readers to learn from her experiences and relate to her intimately. Pola Negri shares that the Talkies relied on conversational skills over pantomime. It is a skill that she transferred into her writing to make for an exciting read.