Biography

December 16, 1886 · Paris, France

May 11, 1945 · Paris, France

Renée Claire Angèle Élisabeth Napierkowski

Jacques Feyder, director of Missing Husbands (1921), wrote about her, "Miss Napierkowska was an extraordinary dancer. I had seen her at a dance festival where she, as slim as a flower stalk, had been enthusiastically applauded by a crowd of Parisian admirers. A year later, having to choose actors for "L'Atlantide", I proposed her for the leading part of Antinea and the producer agreed. So, on a cold December afternoon, she was in my office, all wrapped in a fur coat, to sign the contract. I thought I did not remember so plump a face but my doubt vanished in a moment because I was too happy for having her in my film, and she left the office without having put off her coat. The first costume rehearsal was an ugly surprise for me: during last year she had gained 30 pounds of weight at least. Of course there was nothing to do but hoping that hard work and the burning sun of [the] Sahara could get my Antinea a little less fat. It happened just the opposite: the air of the desert whetted her appetite more and more. The dresser complained [about] having to enlarge the costumes almost every day. Our headquarters were at Touggourt, in a hotel where the food was simply delicious, and because of it my most important occupations were to take away as much bread as possible from her table and tell her dreadful tales about the terrible effects of cream pastry when eaten under the tropical sun".