Berlin, 1928. Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong and Leni Riefenstahl.
Marlene Dietrich is of course Marlene Dietrich. Wong, though little remembered today, was the first Chinese American actress to gain major international acclaim and was a major force in American cinema from the silent movie era until her death in 1961. Riefenstahl, unquestionably one of the pioneering film makers of the 20th century as well as an actress, was the visionary behind Adolf Hitler’s most powerful propaganda films celebrating the rise of the Third Reich. She died in 2003 at age 101.
The photographs were taken by a young Alfred Eisenstaedt, then 30 years old.
