Greta Garbo of 1931 and 1932, respectively, and Garbo was dubbed "the greatest money-making machine ever put on screen." Garbo's close friend Mercedes de Acosta then penned a screenplay for her to portray Joan of Arc but producers rebuffed the idea and the film was shelved. After appearing in "As You Desire Me" (1932), the first of three Garbo films which co-starred Melvyn Douglas, Garbo's MGM contract expired and she returned to Sweden. After nearly a year of negotiations, Garbo agreed to renew her contract with MGM on the condition she would star in "Queen Christina" and her salary would be increased
Greta Garbo Wagner at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, quoted in a 2000 press release: "[Garbo] always spoke of it as a magical evening." Italian motion picture director Luchino Visconti allegedly attempted to bring Garbo back to the screen in 1969 with a small part, Maria Sophia, Queen of Naples, in his adaptation of Proust's "Remembrance of Things Past". He exclaimed: "I am very pleased at the idea that this woman, with her severe and authoritarian presence, should figure in the decadent and rarefied climate of the world described by Proust." Claims that Garbo was interested in the part