Dave Hughes gave me a day and evening to explore his nomination of Hedy for an Electronic Frontier Foundation award and his own electronic pioneering. Susi Maurer not only guided me around Vienna but also located and drove me to one of Fritz Mandl’s hunting lodges, where we peered in windows and interviewed locals who remembered stories their parents told them of Hedy’s isolation and loneliness there. Stanford University librarian Mike Keller and his staff at the university libraries were unfailingly helpful. Tara C. Craig of Columbia University’s Rare Book & Manuscript Library located an important letter for me. My daughter, Katherine, drove me to Los Angeles to interview Anthony Loder.
At the Naval Undersea Museum in Keyport, Washington, curator Ron W. Roehmholdt briefed me and my grandson Isaac on torpedoes. Director Bill Galvani not only drove us to the ferry slip after our visit but also arranged to provide me with a copy of the Mark 14 torpedo manual. Meredith Peterson of the Congressional Research Service located a Washington-based researcher for me, Andrew Marchesseault, who skillfully assembled a large file of George and Boski Antheil writings and correspondence at the Library of Congress. John Adams was kind enough to answer several musical questions. Gerd Zillner at the Frederick and Lillian Kiesler Private Foundation in Vienna confirmed Frederick Kiesler’s distant relationship to Hedy. Claudette Allison organized permissions with her usual skill.
Gerry Howard has been my supportive and collegial editor at Doubleday, his assistant, Hannah Wood, a patient, thorough hunter of photographs, rights, and permissions.
Ginger Rhodes read every word, more than once.
Notes
ONE: A CHARMING AUSTRIAN GIRL
1 spring of 1931: The Weaker Sex opened under Reinhardt’s direction on 8 May 1931 at the Theater in der Josefstadt, Vienna.
2 “Are you here too”… “I took this as a mandate”: Weller (1939), 69.
3 “Hedy had only the vaguest”… “Watch me look”: Ibid.
4 “I had a little stage”… “from printing presses”: Quoted in Shearer (2010), 12.
5 “She has always had”: Quoted in ibid., 10.
6 “I underemphasized”: Quoted in Barton (2010), 13.
7 son and daughter only learned: Anthony Loder and Denise Loder-Deluca, personal communications.
8 Freud’s daughters: Barton (2010), 12.
9 twenty-one districts: As of 1910. The number today is twenty-three.
10 “a city of a thousand”: Zweig (1943), 39.
11 “Precisely because the monarchy”: Ibid., 21.
12 “The whole city”: Ibid., 25.
13 “It was not the military”: Ibid., 22–23.
14 “I acted all the time”: Hall (1938), 24.
15 “in keeping with the Viennese”… “audience”: Zweig (1943), 51.
16 “He made me”… “He had encouraged”: Hall (1938), 21, 72.
17 “I knew that the studio”: Ibid., 72.
18 Geld auf der Strasse: Lamarr misremembered which film in several later interviews, but Geld was released in November 1930 and is the only film that fits the chronology. I’ve corrected related facts such as her role and the director’s name. For a complete filmography, see Shearer (2010), 360–90.
19 “Well, it was not too bad”: Hall (1938), 72.
20 “were much more difficult”: Lamarr (1966), 17. 14 “Reinhardt made me read”: Ibid., 18.
21 “When you dance with her”: Weller (1939), 69.
22 “It was at the rehearsal”: Ibid.
23 “Almost before we knew it”: Ibid., 70.
24 “who simply recoiled”: Ibid.
25 “I’ve never been satisfied”: Hall (1938), 72.
26 “decided for herself”: Weller (1939), 70.
27 Alexis Granowsky: Barton (2010), 22.
28 “Excellent work”: Quoted in Shearer (2010), 26.
29 “When I had this opportunity”: Hall (1938), 73.
30 “I could not go”: Ibid.
31 “I went to Prague”: Quoted in Shearer (2010), 27.
32 “The world began”: Zweig (1943), 152–53.
33 “This health and self-confidence”: Ibid., 153.
34 “I don’t want to become”: Quoted in Horak (2001), 34. The source of this statement as Horak lists it is contemporary: the journal Mein Film 356 (1932), 10.
35 Vienna premiere: Barton (2010), 35.
36 “artistic”… “I wanted to run”: Lamarr (1966), 30, 31.
37 “My mother and father suffered”: Hall (1938), 73.
38 “the courtship of the young”: “Sissy in Vienna,” Time, 2 Jan. 1933.
39 “At first I felt”: Hall (1938), 73.
40 “She looks wonderful”: Quoted in Barton (2010), 46.
41 “From the first night”: Hall (1938), 73.
42 ammunition factory in Hirtenberg: See Mötz (2010).
43 “he had negotiated”: Newton (1986), 545.
44 “He introduced himself”: Hall (1938), 73.
45 “a young viveur”: “Latin America: Double Cross?” Time, 16 April 1945.
46 “He was so powerful”: Hall (1938), 73–74.
47 “He asked me to go”: Ibid., 74.
48 “I began to feel attracted”: Ibid.
49 “small and quiet”: Ibid.
50 “Almost at once”: Ibid.
51 “Democracy is a luxury”: “Latin America: Double Cross?”
52 “try to track down”: Hall (1938), 74.
53 “nearly $300,000”: “Cinema: The New Pictures,” Time, 25 July 1938.
54 “it became one of the”: Hall (1938), 74.
55 “I knew very soon”: Ibid.
56 “prison of gold”: Ibid.
TWO: BAD BOY OF MUSIC
1 to Europe in 1922: “In early 1922 I became a concert pianist, and traveled with my impresario, M. H. Hanson, to Europe where I was an immediate success.” “Autobiographical Notes,” box 14, folder 5, Antheil Collection, Library of Congress.
2 “a cello-sized man”: “Music: Antheil’s Fourth,” Time, 28 Feb. 1944.
3 “He did nothing but write”: Hecht (1964), 158.
4 “When I first went”: Quoted in Antheil (1945), 2.
5 “Curiously enough”: “The American Composer’s Heritage,” 1–2, box 14, folder 1, Antheil Collection.
6 “I myself was present”: Ibid.
7 “When I was 17”: “Why ‘Bad Boy of Music’?” box 14, folder 7, Antheil Collection.
8 “I told him I was broke”: Antheil (1945), 19.
9 “one of the richest”: Quoted in Ford (1987), 8–9.
10 “on the basis”: Bok to Antheil, 28 Sept. 1934, George Antheil Correspondence files, Library of Congress.
11 “In this way”: Antheil (1945), 10.
12 “the exact duplicate”: Antheil to Van H. Cartmell, 30 Sept. 1944, Correspondence files, Antheil Collection.
13 two tours: Ford (1987), 12.
14 “to either Italy”: Antheil (1945), 9.
15 “the day she had disappeared”: Ibid., 11.
16 “first, I wanted to learn”: Untitled essay beginning “In 1922, as a young American composer,” box 14, folder 14, Antheil Collection.
17 “the girls and wives”: Antheil (1945), 26–27.
18 “There were just too many”: Ibid., 27.
19 “George was a tremendously”: Boski Antheil memoir, 10–11, box 17, folders 1–3, Antheil Collection.
20 “Thereafter, for two straight months”: Antheil (1945), 33.
21 “about mechanistic”: George Antheil, “MAMA!” datelined Paris, April 1, 1925, box 14, folder 8, Antheil Collection.