By Rondald Constantino
LAWLESS – Among Hollywood stars of yore, whose face is flawless?
The book “Star Style” by Patty Fox points at Greta Garbo. Let’s listen to what Miss Fox had to say.
“Critics may have denigrated her body, but Garbo’s face was flawless. Modern-day plastic surgeons have cited it as the benchmark of perfection, noting that its dimensions are in consummate balance, the lower lip only slightly fuller than her shape upper lip, eyes well spaced with one eye’s width between them and at each temple, the nose length exactly one-third the distance from hairline to chin.
“Less analytical types simply would say that her long, thick lashes, her finely chiseled features and her pearlescent skin, she was a looker. Offscreen she needed only a modicum of makeup, just a touch of eyebrow pencil, a light lipstick, a dusting of powder, and a lavish coat of mascara on her long, naturally pale lashes.
“That face helped to convince (Louis B.) Mayer that she was worth the $ 18,200 contract he had waiting for her when she arrived from Stockholm (Sweden). At a time when Joan Crawford was lucky to be making $ 75 a week, a five figure salary meant that Greta Garbo came to the American cinema already a star, however unproven.”
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WARDROBE – Miss Fox, writing in “Star Style,” continues:
“As extraordinary as her face was, Garbo’s personal wardrobe was common. ‘I care nothing about clothes…when I am off the set, I don’t want to think of clothes at all…I like to live simply, dress simply.’ Comfort was her priority. At the times her need to be comfortable interferred with her image, as Joe Ruttenberg, a Hollywood photographer of her day, commented. “Unfotunately, she had a taste for bulky, ugly clothes that made her look much older than she was.”
Well, no matter Miss Fox says: “Garbo became the world’s most enigmatic screen star. Like no other actress, she used her clothes to hide from her public. Yet the more she covered up, the more her understated quiet style entranced her audience, enhanced her mysterious image, and turned her into a perennial symbol of chic.”
