THE SINGLE STANDARD

For the first time since she hit these shores, grim Greta Garbo has done a good piece of work. In The Single Standard she actually walks, smiles, and acts. I have never been able to understand the universal palpitation that has followed her slow but stupid appearance on the great American screen–sex appeal, unfortunately, is a matter of opinion. Nice legs and much hair might be “it,” but it doesn't make an actress. Nevertheless the lady can, and does, act in her latest movie, and the fact that she is homely and awkward while so engaged only make me like her more. However, I'm funny. that way–unless a person has a broken nose, a cauliflower ear, or folding ankles, I can never really get interested. There is not much of a story to The Single Standard, although it starts out with a great big bold statement to the effect that if men can, so can women, and the action boils down to the situation wherein a woman is given the choice of leaving her husband and child for an erstwhile free-lance lover or staying with her husband and letting the little one have a respectable woman for a mother. The situation is neatly turned, Miss Garbo works hard and effectively, and on the whole it all furnishes good summer entertainment. The best thing about The Single Standard is its muteness.

THE SINGLE STANDARD
(USA 1929)
ALTERNATE TITLE
Le droit d'aimer (FRANCE) Unsichtbare Fesseln (GERMANY) Gleiche Moral (AUSTRIA) En kvinnas moral (SWEDEN) La donna che ama (ITALY) Mulher Singular (BRAZIL) Pokusa (POLAND)
FILM SCENES

COMPANY
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM MGM Production 430
CREDITS
Directed by John S. Robertson. Produced by Hunt Stromberg (uncredited). Adaptation and scenario by Josephine Lovett, from the novel by Adela Rogers St. John. Titles by Marion Ainslee. Photographed by Oliver Marsh. Edited by Blanche Sewell. Musical Score by Dr. William Axt. Art Direction by Cedric Gibbons. Gowns by Adrian.
TECHNICAL SPECS
73 minutes Silent film
CAST
Greta Garbo, Nils Asther, John Mack Brown, Dorothy Sebastian, Lane Chandler, Mahlon Hamilton, Kathlyn Williams, Zeffie Tilbury, Robert Castle, Joel McCrea...
GARBO'S CHARACTER
Arden Stuart Hewlett
FILM POSTER
More HERE!
SYNOPSIS
Arden Stuart (Greta Garbo), a San Francisco debutante, meets Packy Cannon (Nils Asther), a sailor-fighter turned artist, in an art gallery. She falls in love with him and goes off with him on a yacht for a prolonged affair. When he leaves her to go to Paris on business, she returns to San Francisco and finds herself an outcast. However, Tommy Hewlett (John Mack Brown) . who has always loved her, marries her, and they have a child. Packy returns. and Arden is again attracted to him, causing her husband to contemplate suicide. Arden realizes that her husband and child are more important to her than a romantic escapade, and Packy goes out of her life forever.
MOVIE PROGRAM
More HERE!
PREMIERED/RELEASED
Release date: July 27, 1929 (New York), July 29, 1929 (USA) Premiere date: July 27, 1929 (Capitol Theatre in New York) Release Date in Germany: 13.01.1931.
LOBBYCARDS
See HERE!
PRODUCTION
Production Dates: April–May 1929 Production Location: Hollywood/Los Angeles/USA
MOVIE STILLS
The Stills were made during the production by James Manatt. 145 Movie Stills were shot. More HERE!
TRIVIA
This was Garbo's last with Nils Asther and John Mack Brown. MGM also considered Joan Crawford for Arden Stuart. The first role in which Garbo plays a real american woman. Filmed in 45 days.
BACKGROUND STORY
(in Treatment)
BUSINESS DATA
Budget :336.000 Dollar. Gross: USA: 659.000 Dollar, Non-USA: 389.000 Dollar; World: 1.048.000 Dollar Profit: 333.000 Dollar.
PORTRAITS
Ruth Harriet Louise made the portraits for the film on May 1929. Following the production of The Single Standard, Garbo was photographed by Nickolas Muray for Vanity Fair. More HERE!
REVIEWS
Pare Lorentz for Judge:
For the first time since she hit these shores, grim Greta Garbo has done a good piece of work. In The Single Standard she actually walks, smiles, and acts. I have never been able to understand the universal palpitation that has followed her slow but stupid appearance on the great American screen–sex appeal, unfortunately, is a matter of opinion. Nice legs and much hair might be “it,” but it doesn't make an actress. Nevertheless the lady can, and does, act in her latest movie, and the fact that she is homely and awkward while so engaged only make me like her more. However, I'm funny. that way–unless a person has a broken nose, a cauliflower ear, or folding ankles, I can never really get interested. There is not much of a story to The Single Standard, although it starts out with a great big bold statement to the effect that if men can, so can women, and the action boils down to the situation wherein a woman is given the choice of leaving her husband and child for an erstwhile free-lance lover or staying with her husband and letting the little one have a respectable woman for a mother. The situation is neatly turned, Miss Garbo works hard and effectively, and on the whole it all furnishes good summer entertainment. The best thing about The Single Standard is its muteness.
Variety:
What some girls do today, and a lot more would like to, Greta Garbo does in The Single Standard.... This, with all of the quickie material and rough story edges, as well as much too blase Miss Garbo, the thinking buyers will discover shortly after the production gets under way. But the thousands of typing girlies and purple-suited office boys will find this made to their order. Although the lettering in the film would set forth Miss Garbo, as Arden Stuart, throwing off the cloak of conventionalism for free plunges claimed so common in spots here and on the Continent, the actress is most unfeeling in her brazen directness. While censors probably expect to leap on this point, when the picture gets to them, they will find no show, except a veiled peep at Arden's garters. The star keeps well wrapped throughout, and her intimate postures are so frequent and so matter of fact after the first dozen times that only once, when expectation is aroused with the initial fall, do they come anywhere near getting an actual kick.
PICTURE FROM THE FILM-SET
More HERE!
STORY FROM THE FILM-SET
(in Treatment)
THE ORIGINAL NOVEL
Based on the novel The Single Standard by Adela Rogers St. John.
DVD/VHS
Available on VHS. See HERE!
VIDEO-FILE
See More HERE!
	SOURCE
	Greta Garbo: A Cinematic Legacy – by Mark A. Vieira (Harry N. Abrams, Incorporated, New York 2005). This is the best and most accurate book about Garbo's-Films.
	OTHER SOURCES
	Karen Swenson – A life Apart Barry Paris – Garbo IMDB – International Movie Database plus many other books, magazines and internet sites.


	Film - Introduction