When Hedwig Kiesler was a child, she took a music box apart and then put it back together. This sparked an interest in mechanical things and how they worked.
In 1933, when she was 18, Hedwig was cast in a Czech film called Extase (Ecstasy). In one scene, showing only her face, she had to fake an orgasm. Her acting was aided by someone poking her with a pin.
In another part of the movie, the director wanted her to get undressed and do a bit of nude swimming. Then her horse, upon which she had set her clothes, would wander off, and she, au naturel, would chase after it.
Hedwig refused and threatened to quit. The director compromised and said they would set the camera up some distance away so that audiences would only see long shots of her body. Hedwig agreed and filmed the sequences.
When the film was shown in theaters, there were closeups of Hedwig’s nude scenes. The camera had used a telephoto lens.
She was dismayed at having been duped into doing the nude scenes and felt like her film career was over. In 1933, still just 18, Hedwig married a rich, charming 33-year old Austrian named Friedrich Mandl.
After they were married, Mandl turned out to be not so charming.
Hedwig was not allowed to act and was kept on a very short leash. She was given a small, tightly controlled allowance. She couldn’t go out unless a servant went with her. She had expensive jewelry, but could only wear it at dinner parties at Mandl’s castle. The rest of the time it was locked up.
She later wrote, “I was like a thing, some object of art which had to be guarded – and imprisoned – having no mind, no life of its own.”
Mandl was an arms dealer, selling munitions to Italy, and later, to Nazi Germany. Hedwig would accompany him to meetings and conferences. On occasions, she would hear discussions involving military technology, and this re-awakened her early interest in science and invention.
There are two versions of how Hedwig managed to escape from Mandl. In one, she convinced him to let her wear all her best jewelry to a dinner party at the castle, during which she excused herself to go to the bathroom, hopped on a bicycle, and disappeared into the night.
The other says she disguised herself as her maid and escaped.
Either way, Hedwig made it to Paris, then to the United States. Mandl, rather than chase her around the world, divorced her.
In the States, Hedwig Kiesler changed her name to Hedy Lamarr and became one of Hollywood’s greatest stars.
My favorite quote of hers is: “Any girl can be glamorous. All you have to do is stand still and look stupid.”
Though glamorous, Hedy was not stupid. Among other things, she invented a type of frequency-hopping signal that can’t be tracked or jammed.
Today, her invention, which she patented back in 1942, is a vital part of modern communication technology, including WIFI and Bluetooth.
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