Signe Hasso

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

Biography
Hasso was born in the Kungsholmen parish of Stockholm, Sweden in 1915. Her father and grandfather died when she was four, and her mother, grandmother, two siblings, and she shared a single room. Her mother, a former aspiring actress herself, worked as a waffle cook.

Hasso attended Matteusskolan, Kungsholms elementarskola för flickor (elementary school for girls) and Norrmalms enskilda läroverk.

Her acting career began by accident. When a young actress fell ill, her mother was asked if she knew of any little girl who could act. Signe Hasso later recalled, "I was 12 then and didn't want to go and neither did my sister, so my mother flipped a coin. I lost." Her audition for a Molière play was successful, and she started earning money as an actress. She performed in Royal Dramatic Theatre productions, beginning in 1927 at the age of 12, and enrolled as the youngest acting student in its history at the age of 16.

She performed on stage and in film in Sweden. In 1933, Signe Larsson made her first film, Tystnadens hus, with German film director/cameraman Harry Hasso, whom she married the same year. They had a son by the time she was 19. They divorced in 1942.

In Sweden, Signe was approached by Hollywood's Howard Hughes to move to the United States, where she signed a contract with RKO Pictures (which he would later control). With only a few RKO roles forthcoming, she turned to the stage to make a living. According to the Internet Broadway Database, she appeared in five Broadway productions, beginning with Golden Wings (1941). In the mid-1940s, she signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. 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). Her favorite role was as the ex-wife of an actor driven mad, played by Ronald Colman, in A Double Life.

In 1957, her son was killed in a motorcycle accident on Santa Monica Boulevard.

Signe was a frequent television guest on Bob Hope's NBC TV (Burbank) prime-time series. In the seventies Signe relocated to Park La Brea where she remained until her death.

From then on, she divided her time between making films in Sweden and acting on stage in New York City until she returned to Hollywood in the 1960s. She also acted on television, making guest appearances in several popular TV series, including Route 66, Bonanza, The Outer Limits, The Green Hornet, Cannon, Starsky and Hutch, The Streets of San Francisco, Ellery Queen, Quincy, M.E., Magnum, P.I., Trapper John, M.D., and Hart to Hart.

Hasso composed music, as a lyricist, songwriter and author. She also translated Swedish folk songs into English. Her debut novel, Momo (1977), depicts her childhood in interwar Stockholm. Hasso's second album, Where the Sun Meets the Moon (1979), consists of her own versions of Swedish folk tunes. In a 1995 interview, she stated she wanted to be remembered for her writing, not her acting. She continued to act until late in her life, her last film being One Hell of a Guy (1998).

Death
She died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California in 2002, aged 86, of pneumonia and cancer. Hasso adhered to Lutheranism.

Awards
In 1935, she received the Theatre League's De Wahl-stipendium and in 1939 the first Nordic nordiska Gösta Ekmanpriset. In 1972, King Gustaf VI Adolf of Sweden named her Member 1st Class of the Royal Order of Vasa. In 1989, the Vasa Order of America named her Swedish-American of the Year. 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)

Complete filmography

 * Tystnadens hus (House of Silence, 1933) - Susanna Braun
 * Witches' Night (1937) - Majken Celsing
 * Career (1938) - Monika Hall
 * Geld fällt vom Himmel (1938) - Hannelore
 * Pengar från skyn (1938) - Hanne
 * The Two of Us (1939) - Kristina - hans hustru
 * Emilie Högquist (1939) - Emelie Högqvist
 * Bastard (1940) - Aitanga, nomadepike
 * Stål (1940) - Margit
 * Än en gång Gösta Ekman (1940 short) - Birgit Steen
 * With Open Arms (1940) - Eva Richert
 * The Three of Us (1940) - Kristina, hans hustru
 * Den ljusnande framtid (Bright Prospects, 1941) - Birgit Norén
 * Assignment in Brittany (1943) - Elise
 * Heaven Can Wait (1943) - Mademoiselle
 * The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944) - Bettina
 * The Seventh Cross (1944) - Toni
 * Dangerous Partners (1945) - Carola Ballister
 * The House on 92nd Street (1945) - Elsa Gebhardt
 * Johnny Angel (1945) - Paulette Girard
 * Strange Triangle (1946) - Francine Huber
 * A Scandal in Paris (1946) - Therese De Pierremont
 * Where There's Life (1947) - Gen. Katrina Grimovitch
 * A Double Life (1947) - Brita Kaurin
 * To the Ends of the Earth (1948) - Ann Grant
 * Outside the Wall (1950) - Celia Bentner
 * Crisis (1950) - Senora Isabel Farrago
 * This Can't Happen Here (1950) - Vera Irmelin
 * Hans Christian Andersen Fairy Tales (1952 short)
 * The Sun of St. Moritz (1954) - Gerti Selle
 * Taxi 13 (1954) - Agneta
 * The Magnificent Lie (1955) - Joséphine de Merret
 * Picture Mommy Dead (1966) - Sister René
 * Code Name: Heraclitus (1967 TV movie) - Lydia Constantine
 * A Reflection of Fear (1972) - Julia
 * Shell Game (1975 TV movie) - Countess
 * The Black Bird (1975) - Dr. Crippen
 * Sherlock Holmes in New York (1976 TV movie) - Fraulein Reichenbach
 * I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (1977) - Helene
 * Winner Take All (1977 TV movie)
 * Evita Peron (1981 TV movie) - Fedora
 * Pappa är död (1982 TV movie) - Sonja Bengtsson
 * Mirrors (1985 TV movie) - Madame Eugenia
 * One Hell of a Guy (1998) - Aunt Vivian