I spent the next morning on the telephone trying to locate people who knew Marie Curie in her student days, but all in vain.
Metro provided me with a photographer and I began to look up the places where she had lived, studied, taught and experimented. We went through the empty lecture halls, laboratories and corridors of the deserted Sorbonne, and inspected from the outside the Institute of Radium, a modest building which I knew would never satisfy Franklin. The evenings I usually spent with Alfred and Lisl Polgar at the Deux Magots, or another café. Sitting around the tables were other refugees, immediately recognizable by their strained expressions. I remembered many from Berlin, from the Romanisches Café—all in a panic because of Hitler’s threats against Poland.
The Metro office notified me that Professor Jean Perrin (Nobel Prize winner for his work on the atom) and Madame Irène Joliot were at L’Arcouëst in Brittany. A chauffeur-driven Renault was to take me there, then to Eve Curie in Dinard.
It was August 15, and all the French seemed to be on wheels. My elegant chauffeur was constantly exchanging: “merde,” “imbécile,” “patate,” “voyou,” etc. with the other motorists crowding the roads. When we arrived at L’Arcouëst it was dark and late. There was no place to spend the night and after long, slow inquiries with monosyllabic innkeepers, my driver told me that we would have to take the ferry and sleep on the island of Brèhat. The prospect of an island and the ferry appealed to me. Next day a pale, misty sunshine revealed L’Arcouëst, an enchanting fishing village with dunes, firs and sandy beaches stretching far out after the retreating tide. We passed small, well-tended plots and old, gray farmhouses surrounded by low stone walls. Then among a few scattered villas, with large glassed-in verandas, was a modern new house which belonged to Professor Perrin.
A boy in bathing trunks admitted me to the hall. There was a lot of running and whispering behind closed doors, then a woman’s voice calling: “La dame de Hollywood, Papa!” One of the doors opened and Professor Perrin, a friendly old man with a snow-white beard, invited me into a room with an enormous window through which one could see the dunes, the firs and a blue-gray strip of the sea. He was already informed about the reason of my intrusion, which made it easier for me to attack the most important issue and to ask if he could help me to meet Madame Joliot. I knew how reluctant she was to talk to strangers and said that I regretted to disturb her holiday, but the discovery of radium as presented in Eve Curie’s book did not satisfy my producer. Obviously amused, Professor Perrin said that Eve’s description was very accurate but, of course, she was not a scientist. He reiterated the details of the experiments Pierre and Marie had made, spoke of radioactivity, mentioned his own work on the atom, went to his desk and looked through mountains of papers, while I felt like an impostor. He was overestimating my understanding of science. He found what he was looking for; it was his own book with the title L’Atome, for which he got the Nobel Prize. He wrote a dedication on the flyleaf and gave it to me. The dedication was much too flattering. I thought at once of the cracks Walter Reisch, Franklin and Bernie would make when I showed it to them. My sons also would find it highly amusing. We were interrupted by a knock on the door and he went to open it. I realized that it was lunch time, and although my main errand had not been accomplished, I got up. Professor Perrin would not hear of my leaving and insisted that I stay. He led me to the dining room, where his daughter and son-in-law were already waiting at the table. As I remember there were also several grandchildren. I was introduced; then we sat down in deep silence. I felt I was not a welcome guest. After a while my hostess addressed me rather sharply: how was it conceivable that Hollywood dared to make a film about Marie Curie? Surprised, I answered that Eve Curie’s book had been bought first by Universal then, upon my suggestion, Metro Goldwyn Mayer had acquired the rights to make a film for Greta Garbo. Unbelieving, she stared at me: “Impossible! Eve could not have sold her book to the films!” and she turned to her father. But he expressed pleasure that Garbo was to play Marie.
Madame Joliot was due in L’Arcouëst the next day and Professor Perrin promised to talk to her. Then he suggested that I should get in touch with Dr. Plotz, who was teaching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or Princeton (I don’t remember which). Dr. Plotz had been very close to Marie Curie in her last years. Professor Perrin asked me to come back on the following afternoon; by then he would have spoken to Irène Joliot.
The next day I went back to the Perrin villa, and the boy in swimming trunks ushered me into the room with the wide, open window. After a while I saw Professor Perrin among the firs, coming toward the house with a slender woman with short, gray hair. She wore a light cotton frock; her long, slim legs were bare and brown from the sun. Professor Perrin turned toward the dunes, but she walked straight to the open window and like a youngster, nimbly jumped into the room. She resembled her mother.
I rose to greet her. She said that she had received a letter from Professor Albert Einstein announcing my visit and I recognized Berthold’s thoughtful concern. However, I felt greatly embarrassed by the convocation of world-famous scientists to assist Metro Goldwyn Mayer in “reducing to most simple terms something which could be understood by an audience of primary school intelligence,” especially when Madame Joliot stated that the mere idea of a film about her parents was repulsive to her. I answered that I respected her feelings, but that films about great discoverers, scientists and artists could contribute a great deal to an interest in enlightenment and education. Madame Joliot did not relent; she had seen the Dr. Ehrlich film and found it awful. She did not protest, however, when I said that although Dr. Ehrlich’s “magic bullet” may have been oversimplified and in many things incorrect, it still had some merit, as it dealt with a taboo subject and showed dedication to the alleviation of suffering. The people who were producing the film about Marie Curie wished it to be dignified and truthful. She excitedly replied that her father, Pierre Curie, had an equal share in the discovery of radium and that her mother had always emphasized their unity. I assured her that the film would fully express this.
“Nevertheless, I cannot advise nor help you,” Irène Joliot went on. “If I cooperate I forfeit the right to protest.” Not in a position to take full responsibility, I remained silent. I was not even sure whether my own contribution to the screenplay would remain unchanged. Still following my instructions, I asked permission to photograph the Institute of Radium and the instruments Pierre and Marie Curie had used in their shack. She refused. The Institute of Radium was closed for the summer, besides it would again mean her tacit acquiescence. “The instruments are in the French Pavilion at the World Fair in New York. You can see them there.”
Discouraged I left Madame Joliot. I did not agree with her, but I was on her side and lacked arguments to prove where she was wrong. She also recommended Dr. Plotz, adding that he was a kind, charming man, who liked to help. Smiling, she added: “He is an American, and fond of motion pictures.” I resisted the temptation to mention that millions of Europeans and Asians went to see Garbo films.
The sun was gone when I arrived in Dinard at an old-fashioned but comfortable hotel, where I met Eve Curie for lunch. She was young, beautiful and very chic. The only resemblance to her sister was the high forehead and slim figure. She greeted me with warm friendliness, astonished when I told her that I had just come from L’Arcouëst, had seen Madame Joliot and that two Nobel Prize winners had pleaded that she receive me. Eve laughed. She was glad that I had talked to her sister before I met her. She knew the theater and film world and admired Garbo. She asked me about the screenplay. I answered that when I left America we were still “constructing the story line.” In Bernie’s name I invited her to come to Hollywood and work with us, but she refused for the same reason as Madame Joliot: she did not want to impair her right to protest. But she offered me an introduction to a Polish friend of her mother and with great warmth referred me to Dr. Plotz. Everyone seemed to love Dr. Plotz. We talked about Poland, where she had
been while doing research for the biography. She regretted that I was not working with Sam Behrman for whom she had a high regard, and praised the Garbo films we had done together. On the hotel terrace we ran into Henri Bernstein, the popular French dramatist—tall, quite old, interestingly ugly and childishly conceited. He told me that he had doubts whether Garbo should play Madame Curie. In his opinion she was too glamorous and would be better suited for the heroine of his own last play, which he wanted me to read and recommend to MGM. So much for business, which he conducted almost automatically but with charm; after that he talked compulsively, gloomily and masochistically about Hitler’s horrifying power and the huge success of Nazism and fascism.
I had asked Eve Curie about her childhood memories, but she said nothing I did not know. I gained great prestige with my driver when he saw me in the company of Henri Bernstein. “Un millionaire!” he respectfully informed me. In spite of his communist leanings he had a weakness for rich, self-made men, as long as they were not Americans.
We drove back to Paris via St. Malo, Mont-Saint-Michel and Caën, where he showed me medieval streets in which poor people still lived. They were so narrow that we had to leave the car and walk. The centuries-old, dilapidated, rotting houses exuded a hideous smell of excrement, poverty and dirt. Gray-faced women and ragged, emaciated children sat on their doorsteps like figures in Käthe Kollwitz drawings. Later, when I read about the bombings of Caën I had horrible visions of these houses and those people.
•
The difficulties of getting a French visa for my mother and Dusko were insurmountable. For hours I waited in line at the Mairie but could not overcome the red tape and, as Dusko insisted that I come to Poland and I had not seen him since the summer of 1927, we agreed that it would be easier if the three of us met in Warsaw. Before going to L’Arcouëst I had instructed the concièrge of the Plaza Athénée to reserve a seat for me on the plane to Warsaw via Copenhagen, intending to leave on August 23. When I returned on the afternoon of the 21st the newspapers were announcing the Soviet German Non-Aggression Pact. I was told at the desk that I could fly only to Copenhagen and then see how to proceed to Warsaw by other means. And there was hardly a chance of getting a return booking before November. While we were talking, a telegram from Gottfried Reinhardt was handed to me. He implored me not to go to Poland; everyone was convinced that war was inevitable.
I phoned the MGM office and the chief, Mr. Lawrence, told me that Bernie Hyman also had cabled, worried about my trip to Poland, but that he had assured him that there was no chance of my getting there. I sent a long telegram to my mother. She answered that she and Dusko were dismayed, but she believed the political tension would subside. She would visit me in the States when her visa arrived. (I had applied for it as soon as I became an American citizen.) She added that so far Dusko, who was in the Reserves, had not been called.
My telephone kept ringing; people had heard that I was in Paris and desperate voices besieged me for help. I had heartbreaking visits from total strangers and I promised everyone to do whatever I could to get them affidavits.
At the MGM office the Hitler-Stalin Pact had changed everything. No one was interested in the film any longer; no one cared which scientists I should contact. Cables from Berthold and telephone calls from Bernie urged me to return at once. That was easier said than done, as all ships to the States were packed with Americans cutting short their European vacations.
The blackouts made Paris fantastically beautiful. With Alfred and Lisl Polgar I walked through the Palais Royal flooded with moonlight. We were overcome by a great nostalgia for the “good old days” when Paris was a cité lumière and when no Messerschmidts could drop bombs on her. Alfred and Lisl were certain that Hitler would attack Poland. I refused to believe it.
My American passport made me feel guilty, because my heartless adopted country refused entrance to the “oppressed, persecuted and poor.” It was difficult to part with Europe at that moment but MGM had great influence and got me a cabin on the Ile De France, sailing from Le Havre on September 1.
I went to say good-bye to the Achards at their country place. The news on the radio was getting worse. Marcel drove me back to Blois, where I had to take the train to Paris. We arrived too early and had a drink in a little sidewalk café. On the other side of the street was a bakery. A lorry had driven up and soldiers were loading it with loaves of freshly baked bread. They were young recruits, morose, silent and subdued. Marcel and I looked at their boyish faces and had the same horrible thoughts.
The Plaza Athénée was deserted. The maids gathered in my room to discuss the worsening situation. They knew that I had intended to go to Poland to see my mother, and now, leaning on brooms or vacuum cleaners or sitting on the floor, they showed their sympathy. Our talks ended in tears and embraces.
On my last evening I had dinner with the Polgars; then we went to the Deux Magots. There were the usual intertwined couples on the boulevard, and the refugees, who now spoke in whispers. Those I knew approached our table and again I wrote down addresses and promised help.
The train to Le Havre left early. I was so exhausted that I slept until we arrived. Crowds were pressing toward the towering Ile De France. With the help of a kindly old porter I fought my way through to my cabin, which was a far cry from the one I had had on the Normandie. I wanted to send a telegram to my mother and went to the Radio Room on the upper deck. The operator stood outside and said that as long as we were in port he could not send any messages, but I had plenty of time to do it from the pier. I ran down the gangplank, found the telegraph office, but as I was writing the address the clerk stopped me: “Pologne? Les Allemands sont en Pologne, Madame. C’est la guerre.”
It took me quite a while to pull myself together; then I went back to my cabin. It was a blessing that we had not gone to Warsaw. I reread Mama’s last letter: “Even if the war breaks out it will by-pass Sambor. It’s too unimportant.” The steward came and found me in tears. It was better to go on deck.
Hours went by; we were still moored at the pier. The air was hot and oppressive. I caught sight of Gina Kaus, the novelist, whom I had known in Berlin and seen recently in Paris. She, her two sons and her husband, Dr. Frischauer, were emigrating to America. “What are we waiting for?” her boys kept asking anxiously. Rumors were spreading that if France declared war the ship would not sail. Night came, tiny blue lamps, indicating stairs and companionways, were the only lights on. Two American ladies were loudly discussing the Salzburg festival. I went back to my cabin and waited in vain for the sound of the anchor being weighed.
Early in the morning we were called for life-boat drill. I put on my life jacket and went to my assigned place, where a large group had gathered. I was welcomed by Gregor Piatigorsky, the cello virtuoso, who with his wife and small child was returning to California. In the same lifeboat would be Nathan Milstein, the famous violinist, and his American wife. The conversation around us varied on the theme: would France and England go to war? or would the appeasers prevail?
The drill was over but the Ile De France remained motionless, her decks crowded with restless human beings, tortured by fear and uncertainty.
At last, at ten at night, the siren was blown hoarsely, the anchor weighed and the ship began to pull out. A bulletin was issued saying only that Poland was defending herself heroically; nothing about her allies. Everyone remained on deck to wait for the English newspapers, which would be brought aboard in Southampton. The crew began converting the library and the main drawing room into sleeping quarters for the additional passengers we were to pick up. Four hundred were expected; American students leaving Europe in a hurry.
At three in the morning the Ile De France anchored offshore and we could see faint lights. Wasn’t Southampton blacked out? We waited another hour until we heard the motors of approaching tenders. The first to come aboard were Western Union messengers with telegram blanks and the English newspapers. The passengers pounced on them. I succeeded in getting hold of The T
imes and overwhelmed with emotion, I read the headline: ENGLAND AND FRANCE DECLARE WAR ON GERMANY. “At last!” exclaimed an American near me.
I cabled to my family in Santa Monica that I was sailing. I was not permitted to name the ship. Meanwhile the other tender unloaded a horde of Americans, young men and girls. They climbed aboard with rucksacks and suitcases, laughing and pushing, rough, handsome and healthy, joking about the U-boats. Had the Ile De France enough lifeboats? Where would they sleep? How about the bar? The whole thing was tremendous fun.
Next morning we were sailing full blast. My steward told me in great secrecy that the British ship Athenia had been sunk, close to the English coast. Later, back home, I heard how terribly worried they all had been, because they thought I was on her. (Ernst Lubitsch’s ten-month-old daughter Nicola was aboard but was saved by her nurse.) At night on the dark ship people remained in their deck chairs, afraid to sleep in their cabins. The crew was grim and unfriendly: why should France fight because of Poland? We zigzagged for eight days on the north Atlantic, until one evening the lights on the Ile De France lit up brightly—we were in American waters.
As soon as I entered my hotel room in New York, Bernie’s voice from the West Coast welcomed me back to America. He was overjoyed that I had returned safely, that I had not gone to Poland, and was most sympathetic about my mother and brother. Then he announced that the studio had decided to shelve Marie Curie; I should be thinking about a comedy for Garbo. He agreed that I stay a few days in the East to take action on behalf of my mother’s visa. I called a friend in Washington who was close to the White House, and implored him to help cut the red tape. He said that in face of the rapid advance of the Germans, there was nothing to do but wait. I went home. Three weeks after she had been invaded, Poland surrendered. The State Department notified me that my mother’s visa had been forwarded to the American Consulate in Bucharest. Then the Germans retreated behind the so-called Curzon Line, the Russians occupied the West Ukraine, and Wychylowka came under Soviet rule.
The Kindness of Strangers Page 32