Frequently asked questions
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Where and when was Greta Garbo born?
She was born September 18, 1905 in Stockholm, Sweden.
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Where and when did Greta Garbo die?
Garbo passed away April 15, 1990 at New York Presbyterian Hospital in New York, NY (USA).
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How old was Garbo when she died?
She was 84 years old.
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What was Greta Garbo's real name?
She was born Greta Lovisa Gustafson.
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What was Greta Garbo's nationality?
Garbo was Swedish-American. She was born in Sweden, and became an American citizen in 1951.
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Does Garbo have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame?
Yes, it can be found at 6901 Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles, CA.
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How many movies did Garbo act in?
She starred in 28 films before retiring at 36 years old.
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How tall was Greta Garbo?
She was 5’ 7” or 170.2 cm.
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Did Greta Garbo ever win any awards, like an Oscar?
Garbo was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Actress in a Leading Role category three times - Anna Christie in 1930, Camille in 1938, and Ninotchka in 1940. She was given an Honorary Academy Award in 1955. Learn more about all of the awards she was nominated for or won.
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What is Greta Garbo in the Guinness Book of World Records for?
At the 1929/30 Academy Awards, of the five actresses nominated for the Best Actress in a Leading Role category, two were nominated twice: Greta Garbo for Anna Christie (USA 1930) and Romance (USA 1930) and Norma Shearer for Their Own Desire (USA 1929) and The Divorcee (USA 1930). Shearer took the award. See the record here.
Additionally - in 1950, Garbo was voted “the most beautiful woman in the world” by The Guinness Book of Records.
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What are some of Garbo's accomplishments?
Where to start?
- Garbo was the first Swedish actress to be nominated for an Academy Award.
- The Swedish Sphinx was able to transition from silent films to talkies.
- She picked ‘scandalous’ roles for the time period and brought compelling portrayals to the screen.
She captured Hollywood and the world’s attention, but her impact went beyond acting. She was a modern woman.
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Was it Gustafson or Gustafsson?
People have written Garbo’s birth name as either ‘Gustafson’ or ‘Gustafsson.’ The answer is revealed in her legal name change petition.
Swedish last names for the working-class were created at the turn of the century. Before that, you were just named after your father. Greta would have been Greta Karlsdotter. If she was a boy, it would have been Greta Karlsson, with the double letter ‘s.’ More modern thinking Swedes dropped one letter ‘s.’ That wasn’t recognized by the bureaucracy of that time. Today both versions of Swedish last names co-exist.
On Garbo’s petition for her name change the bureaucrat writes her name as Greta Gustafsson. Below that, she confidently signs her old name with a single ‘s,’ Greta Gustafson. Her mother Anna also signs her name with a single ‘s.’