Gossip Friday: Carole vs. Marlene

From July 1937:

Marlene [Dietrich] and Carole [Lombard] haven’t got to the hair pulling stage–yet–but it is stated that there is no love lost between the rival queens of the Paramount lot.

The Dietrich was not too pleased when Lombard got that new two million dollar contract last year, but the fight was really on when it was reported that Carole was to have the lead in “French Without Tears.”

That role was the apple of Marlene’s eye. She “discovered” the play while she was in London and had persuaded her studio to buy the screen rights. She had come to regard the part as her personal property. She promptly stormed the front office and now that the smoke and dust of battle have cleared she stands victorious.

The picture, incidentally, will mark the German star’s return to a comedy part. It is well known that she is personally tired of those devastating but humorless and rather impossible glamour ladies Hollywood has almost always given her.