Helmut Dantine "Mrs. Miniver" (1942), playing a downed German pilot captured by the title character (played by Greer Garson). This film was a huge hit and Dantine received much positive attention. In August 1942 Warners signed him to a new contract. The studio kept him busy in war films: "The Pied Piper" (1942); "Desperate Journey" (1942), fighting Errol Flynn; and "The Navy Comes Through" (1942). He had a sympathetic role in "Casablanca" (1942), as the young refugee trying to earn money for a visa via gambling who is helped by Humphrey Bogart. Warners begin to give Dantine more sizeable roles in "A"
Norma Shearer free his mother from a concentration camp. With increasing interest in the war in Europe, the film performed well at the box office, but Shearer made errors in judgement, passing up roles in the highly successful films "Now, Voyager" and "Mrs. Miniver", to star in "We Were Dancing" and "Her Cardboard Lover" (1942), which both failed at the box office. In 1942, Shearer unofficially retired from acting. After Thalberg's unexpected death on September 14, 1936, Shearer retained a lawyer to ensure that Thalberg's percentages of films on which he had worked were still paid to his estate, which was contested