What can you say about a thirty-one year-old woman who died? That she was carefree, gay, romantique? That she danced divinely? And why not -- she was played by the divine Greta Garbo? That she was invented (or refashioned) by the son of the guy who wrote "The Three Musketeers"?
That she captured the attention of the meta-handsome Robert Taylor? That Robert Taylor's real name was Spangler Arlington Brugh? That she suffered from one of those diseases that are periodically romanticized? That in the 1960s it might have been schizophrenia but in 1847 Europe it was tuberculosis? That tuberculosis, like pregnancy, was supposed to transfigure a woman's beauty? That it was believed to make her thin, pale, waif-like, alluringly enervated?
That Dumas fils book was so successful he dramatized it and Verdi turned it into an opera? That in Charles Jackson's 1944 novel "The Lost Weekend," the protagonist watches this movie and is moved to tears by it? That the author of that novel was bisexual? That the director of this movie was gay? That Truman Capote sneaked into Garbo's New York apartment and reported to The New Yorker that one of her abstract paintings was hanging upside down in the vestibule? That Truman Capote was gay? That Garbo's most devoted fans probably contain a disproportionate number of gay guys? That that last generalization strikes even me, its own author, as a little Olympian?
That Greta Garbo always struck me as a little beefy? That here she does a good job of acting casually reckless? That these tragic love stories in which someone -- usually the woman -- dies a death that we don't see as disfiguring are getting a little tiresome? That I'm still struggling to recover from Erich Segal's "Love Story" of 1970? That the first sentence of "Love Story" is, "What can you say about a 25-year-old girl who died?"
That Robert Taylor had about ten years during which he tried to act from a position other than "default," which was snarling, masculine, a little coarse? That in "Westward the Women" he even gets to use a bull whip on a dozen ladies who are pulling his Conestoga for him?
The answer to these questions is obvious and clear. I don't know.
That she captured the attention of the meta-handsome Robert Taylor? That Robert Taylor's real name was Spangler Arlington Brugh? That she suffered from one of those diseases that are periodically romanticized? That in the 1960s it might have been schizophrenia but in 1847 Europe it was tuberculosis? That tuberculosis, like pregnancy, was supposed to transfigure a woman's beauty? That it was believed to make her thin, pale, waif-like, alluringly enervated?
That Dumas fils book was so successful he dramatized it and Verdi turned it into an opera? That in Charles Jackson's 1944 novel "The Lost Weekend," the protagonist watches this movie and is moved to tears by it? That the author of that novel was bisexual? That the director of this movie was gay? That Truman Capote sneaked into Garbo's New York apartment and reported to The New Yorker that one of her abstract paintings was hanging upside down in the vestibule? That Truman Capote was gay? That Garbo's most devoted fans probably contain a disproportionate number of gay guys? That that last generalization strikes even me, its own author, as a little Olympian?
That Greta Garbo always struck me as a little beefy? That here she does a good job of acting casually reckless? That these tragic love stories in which someone -- usually the woman -- dies a death that we don't see as disfiguring are getting a little tiresome? That I'm still struggling to recover from Erich Segal's "Love Story" of 1970? That the first sentence of "Love Story" is, "What can you say about a 25-year-old girl who died?"
That Robert Taylor had about ten years during which he tried to act from a position other than "default," which was snarling, masculine, a little coarse? That in "Westward the Women" he even gets to use a bull whip on a dozen ladies who are pulling his Conestoga for him?
The answer to these questions is obvious and clear. I don't know.