Greta Garbo than $1 million at the box office, becoming one of the studio's biggest failures of the decade. Garbo's popularity had considerably dropped, and when her contract expired soon thereafter, she returned briefly to Sweden. On 3 May 1938, Garbo was among the many stars—including Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, Luise Rainer, Katharine Hepburn, Mae West, Marlene Dietrich, Fred Astaire, Dolores del Río and others—dubbed to be "Box Office Poison" in an article published by Harry Brandt on behalf of the Independent Theatre Owners of America. After the box office failure of "Conquest", MGM decided a change of pace was needed to
Greta Garbo side, she's afraid of it." Garbo also worried about her age. "Time leaves traces on our small faces and bodies. It's not the same anymore, being able to pull it off." George Cukor, director of "Two-Faced Woman", and often blamed for its failure, said "People often glibly say that the failure of "Two-Faced Woman" finished Garbo's career. That's a grotesque oversimplification. It certainly threw her, but I think that what really happened was that she just gave up. She didn’t want to go on." Still, Garbo signed a contract in 1948 with producer Walter Wanger, who had produced "Queen Christina",