Signe Hasso

Signe Hasso (born Signe Eleonora Cecilia Larsson, 15 August 1915 – 7 June 2002) was a Swedish actress, writer and composer.

Spouses

Harry Hasso (1933–1941; divorce); 1 child
William Langford (19??–1955; his death)

Background

Hasso was born in the Kungsholmen parish of Stockholm, Sweden in 1915. She debuted at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in 1927 at the age of 12.

Career

In 1933, she made her first film, Tystnadens hus, with German film director/cameraman Harry Hasso, whom she subsequently married. In 1940, she moved to the United States, where she was signed to a contract by RKO Studios, who promoted her as "the next Garbo". She and Hasso divorced in 1941.

Her first role of note was in Heaven Can Wait (1943). During the 1940s, she appeared in The Seventh Cross (1944), Johnny Angel (1945), The House on 92nd Street (1945), A Scandal in Paris (1946), and A Double Life (1947).

By the 1950s, her Hollywood career had stalled. In 1957, her son and only child was killed in a car accident. From then on, she divided her time between making films in Sweden and acting on stage in New York until she returned to Hollywood in the mid-1960s.

In her later years, Hasso worked as a songwriter and writer and translated Swedish folk songs into English. Her debut novel, Momo (1977), depicts her childhood in interwar Stockholm while Hasso's second album, Where the Sun Meets the Moon (1979) consists of her own versions of Swedish folk tunes.

She continued to act until late in her life, her last film being One Hell of a Guy (2000).

Hasso received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to the motion picture industry. Her star ceremony was held on February 1, 1994 with the star located at 7080 Hollywood Blvd.

Death

She died in Los Angeles at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in 2002, aged 86—or 91 depending on source—of undisclosed causes.

Cause of Death: Pneumonia brought on by lung cancer. http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/person/82659%7C140793/Signe-Hasso/

Awards

In 1935, she received the Theatre League's De Wahl-stipendium and in 1939 the first Nordic nordiska Gösta Ekmanpriset. In 1972, the King of Sweden named her Member 1st Class of the Royal Order of Vasa. Hasso has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contribution to motion pictures, at 7080 Hollywood Boulevard.

Selected bibliography

• Momo (1977)
• Kom slott (1978)
• Inte än (1988)
• Om igen (1989)
• Tidens vän (1990)

Partial filmography

• Geld fällt vom Himmel (Nazi Germany, 1938)
• Emilie Högquist (1939)
• Vi två (We Two, 1939)[5]
• Bright Prospects (1941)
• Assignment in Brittany (1943)
• Heaven Can Wait (1943)
• The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
• The Seventh Cross (1944)
• Dangerous Partners (1945)
• The House on 92nd Street (1945)
• Johnny Angel (1945)
• A Scandal in Paris (1946)
• Strange Triangle (1946)
• Where There's Life (1947)
• A Double Life (1947)
• To the Ends of the Earth (1948)
• Crisis (1950)
• Outside the Wall (1950)
• This Can't Happen Here (1950)
• Picture Mommy Dead (1966)
• Code Name: Heraclitus (1967)
• A Reflection of Fear (1972)
• QB VII (1974)
• The Black Bird (1975)
• I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (1977)