Nov 07, 2017 - Sale 2461

Sale 2461 - Lot 232

Price Realized: $ 1,300
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 700 - $ 1,000
"I THINK OF YOU SITTING NEAR ME FOR BEAUTY AND THE BEAST" COCTEAU, JEAN. Autograph Letter Signed, "Jean / [asterisk]," to Marlene Dietrich ("Marlene dear"), in French, grumbling about the exhausting work his film demands [Testament of Orpheus, 1960], giving travel plans, and recalling the time he and Dietrich viewed his Beauty and the Beast together. 2 pages, 8vo, written on the recto and verso of a single sheet; horizontal folds. [Paris], 9 December 1959
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"Sad being far from you, locked up in this exhausting work on the film for which I perform, edit, and mix. I'm back from the coast where I had to do a retake . . . (the dock at Villefranche disappeared like a domino falling from the table). Tomorrow I return . . . to Saint Maurice and every time I enter the projection room I think of you, sitting near me for Beauty and the Beast. . . ."
On May 31, 1946, Cocteau arranged a private showing of Beauty and the Beast for himself, friends, and studio technicians. Writing in his diary the following day, Cocteau recalled that screening: "Marlene Dietrich was seated beside me . . . . I sat watching the film, holding Marlene's hand, crushing it without noticing what I was doing. . . ."
Property of the family of Marlene Dietrich.